The Aligning Science Across Parkinson’s (ASAP) initiative opened applications for members of the research community to apply to join the Collaborative Research Network (CRN) 2025 Scientific Track. The new Scientific Track grants will support collaborative research teams focused on dissecting the mechanisms that contribute to Parkinson’s disease (PD) heterogeneity across one of six focus areas listed below, offering funding of up to $3 million per year over three years.  Examining PD in the context of aging Understanding how co-pathologies can influence PD pathogenesis and progression Dissecting ...

Three scientists were awarded the 2024 Kaul Foundation Prize for Excellence in Plasma Physics Research and Technology Development based on their decades of groundbreaking research about how plasma behaves in fusion reactors.  Choongseok (CS) Chang, Seung-Hoe Ku and Robert Hager of the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) were recognized “for experimentally validated simulations of turbulence-broadened divertor heat flux widths using the X-Point Included Gyrokinetic Code (XGC),” following decades of research developing comprehensive simulations to model the fusion plasma edge.  Recently, ...

The Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative (DAC), a pioneering worldwide initiative seeking to cure Alzheimer’s disease and improve brain health, today announced the launch of its Brain Health Navigator program. The initiative led by the DAC Healthcare System Preparedness (DAC-SP) team will provide resources for patients and providers at six sites across the U.S.  Despite Alzheimer’s status as a growing worldwide epidemic, pathways for accurate diagnosis and evidence based interventions including new therapies are either underdeveloped or non-existent. ...

New York, NY  – Jan. 15, 2025 –We are excited to welcome you to San Francisco for the ATS 2025 International Conference! Journalists will have access to leaders, as well as emerging scientists and clinicians, who are at the forefront of medical breakthroughs and clinical innovation in pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine. Join us beginning Sunday, May 18* through Wednesday, May 21. Register now and check out our Program at a Glance.   As always, you are welcome to contact the ATS communications and marketing director about scientific sessions and expert interviews whether you are joining us in person or from your (home) office. Registered ...

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (01/15/2024) — A study by researchers at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities offers new insights into how alternating corn and soybean crops can help increase crop yield in a changing climate. The research is published in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Global Change Biology. Rising temperatures and weather extremes are threatening global food security, making it crucial to understand how sustainable practices like crop rotation can help improve agricultural yields and resilience. The study found that the benefits to corn-soybean rotation, compared to continuous corn year after year, are extremely sensitive to ...

With the increase in climate change, global precipitation estimates have become a necessity for predicting water-related disasters like floods and droughts, as well as for managing water resources. The most accurate data that can be used for these predictions are ground rain gauge observations, but it is often challenging due to limited locations and sparse rain gauge data. To solve this problem, Assistant Professor Yuka Muto from the Center for Environmental Remote Sensing, Japan, and Professor Shunji Kotsuki of the Institute for Advanced Academic Research, Center for Environmental Remote Sensing, ...

The term “omics” refers to the study of entirety of molecular mechanisms that happen inside an organism. With the advent of omics technologies like transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics, and lipidomics, our understanding of molecular pathways of toxic environmental pollutants has deepened. But most environmental toxicology studies are still dependent on a single-omics analyses, leading to gaps in our understanding of integrated toxicity pathways of pollutants. Researchers from all over the world have ...

The Tomosynthesis Mammographic Imaging Screening Trial (TMIST) has reached its enrollment goal of 108,508 women, as announced today by the ECOG-ACRIN Cancer Research Group (ECOG-ACRIN). The study, funded by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), one of the National Institutes of Health, will now proceed with the completion of regularly scheduled mammograms and follow-up on all participants through 2027. Key in this follow-up is the collection of biospecimens and data that will help researchers learn how to personalize breast cancer screening for women. Participants in TMIST were randomly ...

WASHINGTON - Women who were cared for by the MedStar Health D.C. Safe Babies Safe Moms program (SBSM) have better outcomes in pregnancy, delivery, and postpartum, according to a study published today in NEJM Catalyst Innovations in Care Delivery. Additionally, the study showed that Black patients cared for by SBSM were also less likely to have low or very low birthweight babies or preterm birth than Black or White patients who received prenatal care elsewhere. Compared to patients who received prenatal care elsewhere, patients cared for under Safe ...

Octopus arms move with incredible dexterity, bending, twisting, and curling with nearly infinite degrees of freedom. New research from the University of Chicago revealed that the nervous system circuitry that controls arm movement in octopuses is segmented, giving these extraordinary creatures precise control across all eight arms and hundreds of suckers to explore their environment, grasp objects, and capture prey. “If you're going to have a nervous system that's controlling such dynamic movement, that's a good way to set it up,” said Clifton Ragsdale, PhD, Professor of Neurobiology at UChicago and senior author ...

The three-dimensional shape of a protein can be used to resolve deep, ancient evolutionary relationships in the tree of life, according to a study in Nature Communications.   It is the first time researchers use data from protein shapes and combine it with data from genomic sequences to improve the reliability of evolutionary trees, a critical resource used by the scientific community for understanding the history of life, monitor the spread of pathogens or create new treatments for disease.  Crucially, the approach works even with the ...

PHILADELPHIA, PA (January 15, 2025) - Can memory influence what and how much we eat? A groundbreaking Monell Chemical Senses Center study, which links food memory to overeating, answered that question with a resounding “Yes.” Led by Monell Associate Member Guillaume de Lartigue, PhD, the research team identified, for the first time, the brain’s food-specific memory system and its direct role in overeating and diet-induced obesity.  Published in Nature Metabolism, they describe a specific population of neurons in the mouse brain that encode memories for sugar and fat, profoundly impacting food intake and body ...

Indigenous students identified inadequate funding as a major barrier to completing post-secondary education according to a new study published in AlterNative: An International Journal of Indigenous Peoples. The study surveyed Indigenous university students at Algoma University. The students, who identified as either First Nations or Métis, reported that they required multiple sources of funding, including government student loans and personal savings, to afford their post-secondary education. About two-thirds (69%) of students received funding for their education from First Nations sources, including funding from federal programs for Indigenous students.   “This ...

Hot Jupiters are giant planets initially known to orbit alone close to their star. During their migration towards their star, these planets were thought to accrete or eject any other planets present. However, this paradigm has been overturned by recent observations, and the final blow could come from a new study led by the University of Geneva (UNIGE). A team including the National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS, the Universities of Bern (UNIBE) and Zurich (UZH) and several foreign universities has just announced the existence of a planetary system, WASP-132, ...

University of Birmingham venture Dexter has demonstrated the power of its Dexter software platform in a study showing that people whose childhoods featured abuse, neglect or domestic abuse carry a significantly increased risk of developing rheumatoid arthritis or psoriasis in later life.     The starting point for the recently published study was a database of over 16 million Electronic Health Records, from which the Dexter software defined a cohort, one arm that was exposed to childhood maltreatment, and one arm that was not.   The software then checked the records over a 26-year period ...

The discovery of two new planets beyond our solar system by a team of astronomers from The University of Warwick and the University of Geneva (UNIGE), is challenging scientific understanding of how planetary systems form. The existence of these two exoplanets - an inner super-Earth and an outer icy giant planet - within the WASP-132 system is overturning accepted paradigms of how ‘hot Jupiter’ planetary systems form and evolve. Hot Jupiters are planets with masses similar to those of Jupiter, but which orbit closer to their star than Mercury orbits the Sun. There is not enough gas and dust for these giant planets to form ...

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Weddnesday, Jan. 15, 2025 — Nearly half of Americans (46%) think the country is headed in the wrong direction when it comes to the incoming president’s policies to lower healthcare costs, while 31% say it’s on the right track, according to the latest West Health-Gallup survey released today. When viewed through a political lens, only Republicans are more positive than negative about the future of healthcare costs under the Trump administration; nearly three-quarters (73%) think the incoming administration’s healthcare policies are headed in the right direction. In contrast, 24% of independents and 3% of Democrats say the same. Democrats ...

Sign languages have been developed by nations around the world to fit the local communication style, and each language consists of thousands of signs. This has made sign languages difficult to learn and understand. Using artificial intelligence to automatically translate the signs into words, known as word-level sign language recognition, has now gained a boost in accuracy through the work of an Osaka Metropolitan University-led research group. Previous research methods have been focused on capturing information about the signer’s ...

Nearly a third of people in the U.S. have been exposed to unregulated contaminants in their drinking water that could impact their health, according to a new analysis by scientists at Silent Spring Institute. What’s more, Hispanic and Black residents are more likely than other groups to have unsafe levels of contaminants in their drinking water and are more likely to live near pollution sources. The findings, published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, add to growing concern about the quality of drinking water in the United States and the disproportionate impact of contamination ...

CLEVELAND, Ohio (Jan 15, 2025)–It’s not easy being a woman. Just look at the statistics. Women are more likely to have such debilitating conditions as osteoporosis, migraines, Alzheimer disease, depression, multiple sclerosis, and brain tumors. Sex hormones are often blamed. However, a new study suggests no link between hormone therapy (HT) and common brain tumors known as gliomas. Results of the study are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The Menopause Society. The debate over the risks and benefits ...

CLEVELAND, Ohio (Jan 15, 2025)—Artificial intelligence (AI) is positioned to make a major impact on almost every industry, including healthcare. A new study suggests that machine learning models can more quickly and affordably identify women with severe subjective cognitive decline during the menopause transition, effectively opening the door to better management of cognitive health. Results of the study are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The Menopause Society. Subjective cognitive decline refers to a person’s ...

Light absorption is a cornerstone for several applications such as solar cells, photodetectors, and optical sensors, to name a few. Yet, the trade-off between the thickness of the absorber and its efficiency has long limited the performance of such devices. The goal in this investigation is to get the best of both worlds—ultra-thin materials with maximized absorption.   In a recent paper published in Light: Science & Applications, a group of researchers from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), led by Prof. Ying Wu and Prof. Xiangliang Zhang (now at University of Notre Dame), successfully put forward an efficient broadband light absorber ...

Low back pain is a leading cause of disability worldwide with many treatments, such as medication, often failing to provide lasting relief. Researchers from the University of Sydney’s Centre for Rural Health have uncovered a possible solution. Their study, published in JAMA Network Open, found integrating lifestyle support into back pain care could reduce disability and enhance quality of life. The randomised controlled trial included 346 participants from across Australia, all of whom had chronic low back pain and at least one lifestyle risk factor, such as obesity, poor diet, sedentary habits, or smoking. Participants were randomly assigned ...

Waking up does not activate an increase in the release of the stress hormone cortisol. Cortisol does, however, increase in the hours prior to wakening as part of the body’s preparation for the next day, new research led by the University of Bristol has found.  The study is published today [15 January] in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B. For many years it has been generally accepted that waking up results in a stimulus to release hormone cortisol  - a phenomenon called the “cortisol awakening response” (CAR). This response has been used to investigate many clinical conditions including PTSD, depression, obesity, and chronic ...

      MEDIA INQUIRES   WRITTEN BY Laura Muntean   Olga ...