Growth hormone (GH) acts on many tissues throughout the body, helping build bones and muscles, among other functions. It is also a powerful anxiolytic. A study conducted by researchers at the University of São Paulo (USP) in Brazil has produced a deeper understanding of the role of GH in mitigating anxiety and, for the first time, identified the population of neurons responsible for modulating the influence of GH on the development of neuropsychiatric disorders involving anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress. An article on the study is published in the Journal of Neuroscience. In ...

ITHACA, N.Y. – New Cornell University-led research finds that social media platforms and the metrics that reward content creators for revealing their innermost selves to fans open creators up to identity-based harassment. “Creators share deeply personal – often vulnerable – elements of their lives with followers and the wider public,” said Brooke Erin Duffy, associate professor of communication. “Such disclosures are a key way that influencers build intimacy with audiences and form communities. There’s a pervasive sense that internet users clamor for less polished, less idealized, ...

Imagine blasting off on a multiyear voyage to Mars, fueled by a diet of bland, prepackaged meals. As space agencies plan for longer missions, they’re grappling with the challenge of how to best feed people. Now, researchers reporting in ACS Food Science & Technology have designed the optimal “space meal”: a tasty vegetarian salad. They chose fresh ingredients that meet male astronauts’ specialized nutritional needs and can be grown in space. Astronauts in space burn ...

Perceived time has a significant impact on the actual time it takes to heal physical wounds, according to new research by Harvard psychologists Peter Aungle and Ellen Langer. Their study, published late last month in Nature Scientific Reports, challenges conventional beliefs about psychological influences on physical health. The findings suggest a broader range of psychological influences than is currently appreciated. To complete their study, the authors used a standardized procedure to mildly wound volunteer subjects. Perceived time was then manipulated in the lab, with each study participant completing three ...

About The Study: This study of 67,000 freezing cycles among 47,000 patients reveals a distinct pattern in the utilization of cryopreserved oocytes among patients undergoing planned oocyte cryopreservation in the U.S. Despite the increase in number of patients pursuing oocyte cryopreservation, there is a notably low rate of return to utilize previously vitrified oocytes; notably, patients with poor ovarian response are more likely to return, although the time to return is similar to those with normal ovarian response.  Authors: Yuval Fouks, M.D., M.P.H., of Boston IVF-The Eugin Group in Waltham, Massachusetts, is the corresponding ...

About The Study: The findings of this systematic review and meta-analysis of 23 randomized clinical trials including 3,100 parents suggest that problem-solving skills training for parents of children with chronic health conditions may improve the psychosocial well-being of the parents, their children, and their families. Further high-quality randomized clinical trials with longer follow-up times and that explore physical and clinical outcomes are encouraged to generate adequate evidence.  Authors: Yuanhui Luo, Ph.D., of Central South University in Changsha, Hunan, China, is the corresponding ...

In a report just published in the journal Nature Climate Change, researchers argue that tackling inequality is vital in moving the world towards Net-Zero – because inequality constrains who can feasibly adopt low-carbon behaviours. They say that changes are needed across society if we are to mitigate climate change effectively. Although wealthy people have very large carbon footprints, they often have the means to reduce their carbon footprint more easily than those on lower incomes. The researchers say there is ...

Synthetic biology offers the opportunity to build biochemical pathways for the capture and conversion of carbon dioxide (CO2). Researchers at the Max-Planck-Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology have developed a synthetic biochemical cycle that directly converts CO2 into the central building block Acetyl-CoA. The researchers were able to implement each of the three cycle modules in the bacterium E.coli, which represents a major step towards realizing synthetic CO2 fixing pathways within the context of living cells. Developing new ways for the capture and conversion of CO2 is key to tackle ...

Monitoring glucose levels is one of the key elements in health monitoring. A research team has now developed a battery-independent fluorescent nanosensor based on single-wall carbon nanotubes and an inactive form of the enzyme glucose oxidase (GOx). Because the enzyme is not in its active form, the analyte is not consumed during the measurement, and continuous, reversible, and non-invasive bioimaging of glucose levels in body fluids and tissues is possible, the team reports in the journal Angewandte Chemie. Blood glucose levels are typically measured using GOx-based electrochemical sensors. However, these sensors ...

After a long day, there’s the age-old question of do we eat out or stay in? Over the last decade, that answer has increasingly shifted to eating out. In that timeframe, households have increasingly spent more money on food outside of the home than what's spent on eating at home. In that same time, the farmer’s share of the food dollar eaten outside of the home has declined while the share of food eaten at home has increased. With a more than $550,000 grant from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, researchers George Davis and Anubhab Gupta, in the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics in Virginia Tech's College ...

New study finds that adolescent obesity significantly heightens the risk of developing early chronic kidney disease in young adulthood. Even those with high-normal BMI are at risk. Severe obesity poses the highest risk, but even mild obesity and being overweight contribute significantly to this increased risk for both males and females. Lowering obesity rates in adolescents is crucial to better managing the risk of kidney disease and subsequent cardiovascular issues. This study emphasizes the need for preventive measures and management of risk factors associated with chronic kidney disease ...

Could healthy fats found in nuts and fish slow the progression of potentially deadly lung scarring known as pulmonary fibrosis and delay the need for lung transplants?  UVA pulmonary researchers looked at the association between blood-plasma levels of omega-3 fatty acids – the heart-healthy fats found in foods such as salmon and flaxseeds – and the progression of pulmonary fibrosis, as well as how long patients could go without needing a transplant. The researchers found that higher levels of omega-3 were associated with better lung function and longer transplant-free survival. While more research ...

An AI model can predict which SARS-CoV-2 variants are likely to cause new waves of infection. Current models used to predict the dynamics of viral transmission do not predict variant-specific spread. Retsef Levi and colleagues studied what factors could shape the viral spread based on analysis of 9 million SARS-CoV-2 genetic sequences collected by the Global Initiative on Sharing Avian Influenza Data (GISAID) from 30 countries, along with data on vaccination rates, infection rates, and other factors. The patterns that emerged from this analysis ...

Norway’s exports products derived from from tangle kelp (Laminoria hyperborea) and knotted kelp (Ascophyllum nodosu) to the tune of more than NOK 1 billion a year. The industry mainly extracts alginate from kelp, which is used in over 600 different products as diverse as paint, soft serve ice cream, sauces, bandages, nappies, acid reflux medicine and material for encapsulating cells and medicine. However, the market is far from saturated. “Alginate is becoming a scarce commodity on the global market. There are great opportunities here if we could cultivate more kelp that yielded alginate of good enough quality,” says Finn Aachmann, a professor at the Norwegian ...

Our memories are rich in detail: we can vividly recall the color of our home, the layout of our kitchen, or the front of our favorite café. How the brain encodes this information has long puzzled neuroscientists. In a new Dartmouth-led study, researchers identified a neural coding mechanism that allows the transfer of information back and forth between perceptual regions to memory areas of the brain. The results are published in Nature Neuroscience. Prior to this work, the classic understanding of brain organization was that perceptual regions of the brain represent the world "as it is," with the ...

Just like a doctor adjusts the dose of a medication to the patient’s needs, the expression of therapeutic genes, those modified in a person to treat or cure a disease via gene therapy, also needs to be maintained within a therapeutic window. Staying within the therapeutic window is important as too much of the protein could be toxic, and too little could result in a small or no therapeutic effect. Although the principle of therapeutic window has been known for a long time, there has been no strategy to implement it safely, limiting the potential applications of gene therapy in the clinic. ...

Embargoed for release until 5:00 p.m. ET on Monday 1 January 2024  Annals of Internal Medicine Tip Sheet    @Annalsofim   Below please find summaries of new articles that will be published in the next issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. The summaries are not intended to substitute for the full articles as a source of information. This information is under strict embargo and by taking it into possession, media representatives are committing to the terms of the embargo not only ...

Osaka, Japan – Just as healthy organs are vital to our well-being, healthy organelles are vital to the proper functioning of the cell. These subcellular structures carry out specific jobs within the cell, for example, mitochondria power the cell and lysosomes keep the cell tidy. Although damage to these two organelles has been linked to aging, cellular senescence, and many diseases, the regulation and maintenance of these organelles has remained poorly understood. Now, researchers at Osaka University have identified a protein, HKDC1, that plays a key role in maintaining these two organelles, thereby acting to prevent ...

Heterocyclic compounds are organic molecules with a ring structure comprising at least two or more elements. In most cases, these rings are composed of carbon atoms along with one or more other elements such as nitrogen, oxygen, or sulfur. They are highly sought-after as raw materials in the chemical and pharmaceutical industry, owing to their versatility and excellent physiological activities. While several methods are available for synthesizing these compounds, most of them involve high temperature and pressure conditions, or the use of precious ...

A new study published in Addiction has found that cytisine, a low-cost, generic stop-smoking aid that has been used in eastern Europe since the 1960s, increases the chances of successful smoking cessation by more than two-fold compared with placebo and may be more effective than nicotine replacement therapy. It has a benign safety profile, with no evidence of serious safety concerns.  Sounds perfect for your New Year resolution, doesn’t it? But there’s a catch: Cytisine is not licensed or marketed in most countries outside of central and eastern Europe, ...

Travel deep enough below Earth’s surface or inside the center of the Sun, and matter changes on an atomic level.  The mounting pressure within stars and planets can cause metals to become nonconducting insulators. Sodium has been shown to transform from a shiny, gray-colored metal into a transparent, glass-like insulator when squeezed hard enough.  Now, a University at Buffalo-led study has revealed the chemical bonding behind this particular high-pressure phenomenon. While it’s been theorized that high pressure essentially squeezes sodium’s electrons out into the spaces between atoms, researchers’ quantum chemical ...

WASHINGTON—The Endocrine Society, the world’s oldest and largest professional medical society devoted to the study and treatment of hormone-related conditions, applauds Governor Mike Dewine’s veto of a proposed Ohio law that would have banned gender-affirming care for minors. The bill he vetoed contradicts mainstream medical practice and scientific evidence and would have taken medical decision-making out of the hands of families and their physicians and instead relied upon government officials.  More ...

Researchers from the University of Maine and Penn State discovered that molecules experience non-reciprocal interactions without external forces.  Fundamental forces such as gravity and electromagnetism are reciprocal, where two objects are attracted to each other or are repelled by each other. In our everyday experience, however, interactions don’t seem to follow this reciprocal law. For example, a predator is attracted to prey, but the prey tends to flee from the predator. Such non-reciprocal interactions are essential for complex behavior associated with living organisms. ...

New research from Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) developed CAR T cells that target two acute myeloid leukemia-specific antigens; shed new light on a genetic element called LINE-1, opening the door to new treatments; identified a key regulator of blood stem cell fate; and found an immunotherapy technique using antibodies that target CD47 shows promise in mice. CAR T Cells that target two antigens treat AML with minimal toxicity Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) has so far resisted treatment with chimeric ...

The demand for industrial enzymes is continually rising, driven by the growing need to shift towards more sustainable industrial processes. Our research outlines a novel approach in enzyme production, harnessing the untapped potential of cyanobacterial biomass within the P. pastoris platform. Group Leader, Dr. Schieder, highlights the nature of the study, stating, "Our work reveals the potential of cyanobacterial biorefineries to support enzyme production." This achievement stems from an extensive multi-field approach. We characterized and expanded a combinatorial library, streamlining P. pastoris engineering for enhanced efficiency. ...