TUCSON, Arizona — A new study led by University of Arizona Mel and Enid Zuckerman College of Public Health researchers in collaboration with fire service partners and other researchers around the country through the Fire Fighter Cancer Cohort Study showed that post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety are associated with lower levels of anti-Müllerian hormone, a marker of ovarian reserve, among women firefighters. The ovarian reserve is the number of healthy eggs in a woman’s ovaries that ...

MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL (1/22/2025) — A research team from the University of Minnesota Medical School recently received a three-year, $1.2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to study the use of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) as a treatment for youth with Tourette syndrome and other tic disorders.  These conditions affect one in every 50 children and are characterized by involuntary movements or sounds called “tics.” Tics are often painful, distressing and interfere with daily life activities. In some cases, tics can be quite disabling. The research team recently completed the first phase of this clinical trial ...

Enzymes are crucial to life. They are nature’s little catalysts. In the gut, they help us digest food. They can enhance perfumes or get laundry cleaner with less energy. Enzymes also make potent drugs to treat disease. Scientists naturally are eager to create new enzymes. They imagine them doing everything from drawing greenhouse gases out of the skies to degrading harmful toxins in the environment.  That age-old quest for new enzymes just got a whole lot easier. A team of bioengineers and synthetic biologists has developed a computational workflow that can design thousands of new enzymes, predict how they will behave in the real world, and test their performance ...

SAN ANTONIO, Jan. 22, 2025 – Females have a 31% higher associated risk of developing long COVID, with women aged 40 to 55 years having the highest propensity, according to a study led by The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (UT Health San Antonio) funded by the National Institutes of Health. The findings are part of a nationwide initiative launched by NIH, called Researching COVID to Enhance Recovery, or RECOVER, to understand the long-term health effects of COVID-19. The latest ...

Macquarie University researchers have worked with an international team of scientists to achieve a major milestone in synthetic biology by completing the creation of the final chromosome in the world's first synthetic yeast genome. This achievement represents the completion of the global Sc2.0 project to create the world's first synthetic eukaryotic genome from Saccharomyces cerevisiae (baker's yeast) and a new-to-nature tRNA neochromosome. Using cutting-edge genome-editing techniques, including the CRISPR D-BUGS protocol, the team identified and corrected genetic errors that impacted yeast growth. These changes restored the strain’s ability to grow on glycerol, ...

Researchers at Emory University have developed a groundbreaking artificial intelligence (AI) model capable of accurately predicting the likelihood of blood transfusion in non-traumatic intensive care unit (ICU) patients. Published in Health Data Science, the study addresses longstanding challenges in predicting transfusion needs across diverse patient groups with varying medical conditions​.   Blood transfusions are critical in managing anemia and coagulopathy in ICU settings, yet current clinical decision support systems often ...

HOUSTON ― The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center’s Research Highlights showcases the latest breakthroughs in cancer care, research and prevention. These advances are made possible through seamless collaboration between MD Anderson’s world-leading clinicians and scientists, bringing discoveries from the lab to the clinic and back. Novel allogeneic NK cell therapy from induced pluripotent stem cells shows encouraging efficacy in relapsed or refractory B-cell lymphoma patients Patients ...

CHICAGO, IL (January 22, 2025) — Scholastica, a leading software solutions provider for academic journals, has released a new integration with Crossmark by Crossref, the industry standard mechanism for reporting updates to published research. The Crossmark integration is now available to journals subscribed to the Scholastica Open Access Publishing Platform that are published by a Crossref member organization participating in the Crossmark service. “Clearly communicating article updates and retractions is critical to maintaining the integrity of the scholarly record, and with this ...

Women are born with two X chromosomes and inherit one from each parent. But in every cell of their body, just one X chromosome is needed – so the other is randomly inactivated. Some cells use only a maternal X chromosome; others rely only on the paternal X.   Now, UC San Francisco researchers have found that when the brain cells of female mice express only a maternal X chromosome, their memory and cognitive skills deteriorate faster than female mice that express both maternal and paternal X chromosomes.   The discovery, which appears Jan. 22 in Nature, could explain the variation in brain aging between the sexes, since males inherit only a maternal X, as ...

Deeply hidden in Earth’s mantle there are two huge ‘islands’ with the size of a continent. New research from Utrecht University shows that these regions are not only hotter than the surrounding graveyard of cold sunken tectonic plates, but also that they must be ancient: at least half a billion years old, perhaps even older. These observations contradict the idea of a well-mixed and fast flowing Earth’s mantle, a theory that is becoming more and more questioned. “There is less flow in Earth’s ...

Complete recombination map of the human genome,  a major step in genetics Scientists at deCODE genetics/Amgen have constructed a complete map of how human DNA is mixed as it is passed down during reproduction. The map marks a major step in the understanding of genetic diversity and its impact on health and fertility. It continues 25 years of research at deCODE genetics into how new diversity is generated in the human genome, and its relationship to health and disease. The new map, appearing today in the online edition of Nature, is the first to incorporate shorter-scale shuffling, ...

Like humans, mice will compete over territory and mates, and show increased confidence in their fighting skills the more they win. At first, a brain chemical called dopamine is essential for young males to master this behavior. But as they gain experience, the chemical grows less important in promoting aggression, a new study shows. Dopamine has been linked to male aggression for decades. How past experiences might influence this relationship, however, had until now been unclear. In experiments in rodents, a team led by researchers at NYU Langone Health boosted activity in dopamine-releasing cells in a part of the brain called the ventral tegmental area. The findings revealed that in ...

About The Study: Following landmark clinical trials and changes in guideline recommendations, self-reported primary prevention aspirin use decreased among older adults and adults with low atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) risk for whom aspirin was not recommended, but also decreased among adults with higher ASCVD risk for whom aspirin may still be recommended. Despite these reductions, many patients with limited likelihood to benefit reported continuing to take aspirin.  Corresponding Author: To contact the ...

About The Study: This study found that female sex was associated with an increased risk of long COVID compared with male sex, and this association was age, pregnancy, and menopausal status dependent. These findings highlight the need to identify biological mechanisms contributing to sex specificity to facilitate risk stratification, targeted drug development, and improved management of long COVID. Corresponding author: To contact the corresponding author, Dimpy P. Shah, M.D., Ph.D., email ShahDP@uthscsa.edu. To ...

About The Study: The results of this study showed that adults ages 18 to 49 reporting medical-only or medical-nonmedical cannabis use vs nonmedical-only use had higher prevalence of cannabis use disorder at all severity levels and reported more frequent cannabis use. These findings suggest that medically recommended cannabis is not associated with reduced addiction risk compared with nonmedical use. Corresponding author: To contact the corresponding author, Nora D. Volkow, M.D., email nvolkow@nida.nih.gov. To access the embargoed study: ...

A study led by David Sancho at the Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares (CNIC) in Madrid reveals how an increase in intestinal permeability allows the natural gut bacteria to cross the intestinal barrier and reach the bone marrow, where they induce epigenetic changes—modifications that alter gene activity without affecting DNA sequence—in the stem cells that give rise to immune cells. The epigenetic changes induced by the translocated gut bacteria generate “trained” immune cells primed to respond more efficiently to future infections. However, this same ability to amplify the immune response can also aggravate the inflammatory conditions such as ...

In the world of modern optics, frequency combs are invaluable tools. These devices act as rulers for measuring light, enabling breakthroughs in telecommunications, environmental monitoring, and even astrophysics. But building compact and efficient frequency combs has been a challenge—until now. Electro-optic frequency combs, introduced in 1993, showed promise in generating optical combs through cascaded phase modulation but progress slowed down because of their high power demands and limited bandwidth. This led to the field being dominated by femtosecond lasers and Kerr soliton microcombs, which, while effective, require complex tuning and ...

Seattle, WASH.—January 22, 2025—The human immune system is like an army of specialized soldiers (immune cells) each with a unique role to play in fighting disease. In a new study published in Nature, led by scientists at the Allen Institute, La Jolla Institute for Immunology, and UC San Diego, researchers reveal how cells known as tissue-resident memory CD8 T cells, play unique and specialized roles based on where they are located within the small intestine. Tissue-resident memory cells provide a local first ...

Thanks to a new technology called Moscot (“Multi-Omics Single-Cell Optimal Transport”), researchers can now observe millions of cells simultaneously as they develop into a new organ—for example, a pancreas. This groundbreaking method was developed by an international research team led by Helmholtz Munich and has been published in the renowned journal Nature. Until now, biologists had only a limited understanding of how cells develop in their natural environment—for instance, when they form an organ in the ...

January 22, 2025    New Study Finds Social Programs Could Reduce the Spread of HIV by 29%    Although HIV was used as a case study, the UMass Amherst researchers say their assessment tool has applications for other diseases    AMHERST, Mass. — Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have quantified the impacts of a constellation of social factors on the spread of HIV. Their study, published in Health Care Management Science, found that a hypothetical 100% effective intervention addressing barriers to HIV treatment and care from depression, homelessness, ...

New University of Virginia School of Medicine research revealing the fingerprints of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome within blood samples could open the door to simple tests to identify babies at risk. The findings also represent an important step forward in unraveling the causes of SIDS, an unexplained condition that is the No. 1 killer of babies between amonth and a year old.  The UVA researchers analyzed blood serum samples collected from infants who died ...

Ozone (O3) exposure may reduce the availability of oxygen in the body, resulting in arterial stiffening due to the body’s natural response to create more red blood cells and hemoglobin, according to a study published today in JACC, the flagship journal of the American College of Cardiology. “Researchers found that even brief exposure to elevated ozone levels reduced blood oxygen saturation, triggered hypoxia-related biomarkers, and increased arterial stiffness, highlighting the novel connection between ozone exposure and arterial stiffness, demonstrated through comprehensive biomarker analysis in a high-altitude ...

The Chang Lab at Princeton Chemistry continues in its mission to elucidate the role of metal nutrients in human biology: last year, iron; this year, copper. The lab’s first paper of 2025 showcases its development of a revelatory sensing probe for the detection of copper in human cells and then wields it to uncover how copper may be regulating cell growth in lung cancer. Researchers also offer a possible treatment modality in which copper chelation shows promising results in certain lung cancers where cells have two related phenomena: a heightened transcription factor responding to oxidative stress and a diminished level of bioavailable copper. Their collaborative paper, A histochemical ...

Despite significant therapeutic advances, breast cancer remains a leading cause of cancer-related death in women. Treatment typically involves surgery and follow-up hormone therapy, but late effects of these treatments include osteoporosis, sexual dysfunction and blood clots. Now, researchers reporting in ACS Central Science have created a novel treatment that eliminated small breast tumors and significantly shrank large tumors in mice in a single dose, without problematic side effects. Most breast cancers are ...

PULLMAN, Wash. – When it comes to getting people to want to go places, the future is ever more lovely than the past, according to a new Washington State University-led study in the Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research. Led by Ruiying Cai, an assistant professor in the Carson College of Business, the study found that forestalgia-focused destination ads—those that emphasize an idealized future—are more effective at enticing travelers to click the purchase button for a vacation than ads based on fond recollections. The research also revealed that forestalgia advertising is particularly effective for getting people to book near-term trips, as imagining ...