Light activity every day keeps disability at bay

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Pushing a shopping cart or a vacuum doesn’t take a lot of effort, but enough of this sort of light physical activity every day can help people with or at risk of knee arthritis avoid developing disabilities as they age, according to a new Northwestern Medicine study.It is known that the more time people spend in moderate or vigorous activities, the less likely they are to develop disability, but this is the first study to show that spending more time in light activities can help prevent disability, too.”Our findings provide encouragement for adults who may not be candidates to increase physical activity intensity due to health limitations,” said Dorothy Dunlop, professor of medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and lead author of the study. “Even among those who did almost no moderate activity, the more light activity they did, the less likely they were to develop disability.”Results of the study were published April 29 in the British Medical Journal.The scientists identified a group of almost 1,700 adults, ages 45 to 79, from the Osteoarthritis Initiative study who were free of disability but were at elevated risk for developing it because they had knee osteoarthritis or other risk factors for knee osteoarthritis, such as obesity.Knee osteoarthritis commonly leads to disability, preventing people from engaging in activities essential to independent living and quality of life, such as dressing, bathing, walking across a room or making telephone calls, managing money and grocery shopping. Two-thirds of obese adults are expected to develop knee osteoarthritis during their lifetime.To track the amount and intensity of physical activity these at-risk people engaged in every day, scientists had them wear an accelerometer during waking hours for about a week. The device is worn around the hip and measures the intensity of movement. The data collected reveals how much time is spent in vigorous, moderate or light activities.Two years after collecting the results from the accelerometer, participants were surveyed and asked about the development of disabilities. As expected, more time spent in moderate or vigorous activity was associated with lower reports of disabilities, but researchers were pleased to find that greater time spent in light intensity activities also was related to fewer disabilities, even after accounting for time spent in moderate activities.Those who spent more than four hours per day doing light physical activity had more than a 30 percent reduction in the risk for developing disability compared to those spending only three hours a day in light activity (the least average number of hours collected in the study).The findings controlled for time spent in moderate or vigorous physical activity and other predictors of disability, both demographic and health factors.”We were delighted to see that more time spent during the day, simply moving your body, even at a light intensity, may reduce disability,” Dunlop said. “Now people with health problems or physical limitations, who cannot increase the intensity of their activity, have a starting place in the effort to stay independent.”Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by Northwestern University. The original article was written by Erin White. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


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Brain, cognitive reserve protect long-term against cognitive decline, MS researchers find

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Multiple sclerosis researchers have found that brain reserve and cognitive reserve confer a long-term protective effect against cognitive decline.James Sumowski, PhD, lead author of the article, and John DeLuca, PhD, are at Kessler Foundation. Co-authors are from the Manhattan Memory Center, New York, NY, the San Raffaele Scientific Institute, Milan, Italy, and the University of Belgrade, Serbia. Neurology is the official journal of the American Academy of Neurology. Dr. Sumowski presented these findings at the AAN 2014 conference in Philadelphia.”Our research aims to answer these questions,” explained Dr. DeLuca. “Why do some people with MS experience disabling symptoms of cognitive decline, while others maintain their cognitive abilities despite neuroimaging evidence of significant disease progression? Can the theories of brain reserve and cognitive reserve explain this dichotomy? Can we identify predictors of cognitive decline?”In this study, memory, cognitive efficiency, vocabulary (a measure of intellectual enrichment/cognitive reserve), brain volume (a measure of brain reserve), and disease progression on MRI, were evaluated in 40 patients with MS at baseline and at 4.5-year followup. After controlling for disease progression, scientists looked at the impact of brain volume and intellectual enrichment on cognitive decline.Results supported the protective effects of brain reserve and cognitive reserve,” noted Dr. …


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Engineers grow functional human cartilage in lab

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Researchers at Columbia Engineering announced today that they have successfully grown fully functional human cartilage in vitro from human stem cells derived from bone marrow tissue. Their study, which demonstrates new ways to better mimic the enormous complexity of tissue development, regeneration, and disease, is published in the April 28 Early Online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).”We’ve been able — for the first time — to generate fully functional human cartilage from mesenchymal stem cells by mimicking in vitro the developmental process of mesenchymal condensation,” says Gordana Vunjak-Novakovic, who led the study and is the Mikati Foundation Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Columbia Engineering and professor of medical sciences. “This could have clinical impact, as this cartilage can be used to repair a cartilage defect, or in combination with bone in a composite graft grown in lab for more complex tissue reconstruction.”For more than 20 years, researchers have unofficially called cartilage the “official tissue of tissue engineering,” Vunjak-Novakovic observes. Many groups studied cartilage as an apparently simple tissue: one single cell type, no blood vessels or nerves, a tissue built for bearing loads while protecting bone ends in the joints. While there has been great success in engineering pieces of cartilage using young animal cells, no one has, until now, been able to reproduce these results using adult human stem cells from bone marrow or fat, the most practical stem cell source. Vunjak-Novakovic’s team succeeded in growing cartilage with physiologic architecture and strength by radically changing the tissue-engineering approach.The general approach to cartilage tissue engineering has been to place cells into a hydrogel and culture them in the presence of nutrients and growth factors and sometimes also mechanical loading. But using this technique with adult human stem cells has invariably produced mechanically weak cartilage. So Vunjak-Novakovic and her team, who have had a longstanding interest in skeletal tissue engineering, wondered if a method resembling the normal development of the skeleton could lead to a higher quality of cartilage.Sarindr Bhumiratana, postdoctoral fellow in Vunjak-Novakovic’s Laboratory for Stem Cells and Tissue Engineering, came up with a new approach: inducing the mesenchymal stem cells to undergo a condensation stage as they do in the body before starting to make cartilage. He discovered that this simple but major departure from how things were usually? being done resulted in a quality of human cartilage not seen before.Gerard Ateshian, Andrew Walz Professor of Mechanical Engineering, professor of biomedical engineering, and chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, and his PhD student, Sevan Oungoulian, helped perform measurements showing that the lubricative property and compressive strength — the two important functional properties — of the tissue-engineered cartilage approached those of native cartilage. …


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MRI-guided biopsy for brain cancer improves diagnosis

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Neurosurgeons at UC San Diego Heath System have, for the first time, combined real-time magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technology with novel non-invasive cellular mapping techniques to develop a new biopsy approach that increases the accuracy of diagnosis for patients with brain cancer.”There are many different types of brain cancer. Making an accurate diagnosis is paramount because the diagnosis dictates the subsequent course of treatment,” said Clark C. Chen, MD, PhD, vice-chairman of research, division of neurosurgery, UC San Diego School of Medicine. “For instance, the treatment of glioblastoma is fundamentally different than the treatment for oligodendroglioma, another type of brain tumor.”Chen said that as many as one third of brain tumor biopsies performed in the traditional manner can result in misdiagnosis. He cited two challenges with conventional biopsy.”First, because distinct areas of brain tumors exhibit different cell densities and higher cell densities are generally associated with higher tumor grade, biopsies taken from one region may yield a different diagnosis than if another area is biopsied,” said Chen. “Second, because tumors are hidden within the brain, surgeons must use mathematical algorithms to target where the biopsy should occur. As with all calculations, the process is subject to errors that the surgeon cannot easily correct in real time once the biopsy has begun.”Chen’s team applied an MRI technique called Restriction Spectrum Imaging (RSI) to visualize the parts of the brain tumor that contain different cell densities.”RSI allows us to identify the regions of the cell that are most representative of the entire tumor,” said Chen. “By targeting biopsies to these areas, we minimize the number of biopsies needed but still achieve a sampling that best characterizes the entire tumor.”To ensure a targeted biopsy, Chen performs the procedure in the MRI suite while the patient is under general anesthesia. Because conventional biopsy equipment cannot be used in the MRI, Chen uses a special MRI-compatible system called ClearPoint. This system utilizes an integrated set of hardware, software, and surgical equipment to allow the surgeon to target and visualize the path of the biopsy as well as the actual biopsy site, intraoperatively.”Surgeons have been performing brain biopsies in a near blind manner for the past fifty years. …


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Increased prevalence of GI symptoms among children with autism, study confirms

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A new study conducted by researchers at Marcus Autism Center, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta and Emory University School of Medicine indicates that children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are more than four times more likely to experience general gastrointestinal (GI) complaints compared with peers, are more than three times as prone to experience constipation and diarrhea than peers, and complain twice as much about abdominal pain compared to peers.The results are reported in the April 28, 2014, online early edition of the journal Pediatrics.While parents frequently express concern regarding GI symptoms among children with ASD in pediatric settings, this study is the first meta-analysis of all published, peer-reviewed research relating to this topic.”Our findings corroborate a history of anecdotal reports and case studies suggesting increased risk of GI concerns in autism,” says co-author William Sharp, PhD, director of the Pediatric Feeding Disorders Program at Marcus Autism Center and assistant professor of pediatrics at Emory University School of Medicine. “This analysis reinforces the need for greater clinical and research scrutiny in this area to guide best standards of care and to address important questions regarding the detection and treatment of GI symptoms among children with autism.”The process of detecting and studying possible GI concerns in children with ASD is complicated by the unique combination of behavioral, neurological and medical issues associated with the condition. Most notably, limitations in verbal communication in patients with ASD make it difficult for them to communicate information about GI symptoms, making it more challenging for physicians to detect possible underlying GI issues. In such cases, parents and medical professionals must rely on non-verbal signs that fall outside of the routine GI diagnostic evaluation.”In many cases, the only indication of a possible GI problem in autism may be the emergence or escalation of problem behaviors, such as self-injury, aggression, or irritability, that cannot be otherwise explained,” says co-author Barbara McElhanon, MD, pediatric gastroenterologist at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta and assistant professor of pediatrics at Emory University School of Medicine. “Relying on these atypical signs to detect possible GI concerns can be difficult for practitioners because repetitive and stereotyped patterns of behavior occur so frequently in ASD and no guidelines exist to help parents and clinicians navigate the diagnostic process.”For this reason, McElhanon and her colleagues emphasize the need to develop a standardized screening instrument as well as clinical guidelines for conducting GI examinations among children with ASD, particularly non-verbal children. More detailed, standardized screening procedures would enhance detection, while also increasing awareness in the ASD community regarding what to look for among children suspected of possible GI disorders.”The important point from this research is that children with autism — who have difficulties in communicating their symptoms — need special attention from physicians to determine whether or not a child is experiencing GI distress” says Sharp. “Unfortunately for parents, the unfounded assertion that vaccinations somehow caused an inflammatory GI disease which then caused autism has significantly hindered progress in this field for years. Many studies have now shown no evidence of an association with vaccines, and vaccines are important for child health. That controversy diverted attention from the GI needs of children with ASD, and we hope that our work helps spur renewed investment for addressing these needs.”In addition to more standardized assessment, the authors recommend studying GI symptoms in ASD with consideration to the high rates of feeding problems and related dietary issues, such as food selectivity, in this population. “If food intake becomes highly restricted, a child is likely to experience issues like GI distress and constipation or diarrhea; but for children with autism, they often can’t communicate those issues in the same way,” says McElhanon. …


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Psychologists discover babies recognize real-life objects from pictures as early as nine months

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Babies begin to learn about the connection between pictures and real objects by the time they are nine-months-old, according to a new study by scientists at Royal Holloway, University of London, and the University of South Carolina.The research, published today in Child Development, found that babies can learn about a toy from a photograph of it well before their first birthday.”The study should interest any parent or caregiver who has ever read a picture book with an infant,” said Dr Jeanne Shinskey, from the Department of Psychology at Royal Holloway. “For parents and educators, these findings suggest that, well before their first birthdays and their first words, babies are capable of learning about the real world indirectly from picture books, at least those that have very realistic images like photographs.”Researchers familiarized 30 eight and nine-month-olds with a life-sized photo of a toy for about a minute. The babies were then placed before the toy in the picture and a different toy and researchers watched to see which one the babies reached for first.In one condition, the researchers tested infants’ simple object recognition for the target toy by keeping both objects visible, drawing infants’ attention to the toys and then placing the toys inside clear containers. In another condition, they tested infants’ ability to create a continued mental idea of the target toy by hiding both toys from view, drawing infants’ attention to the toys and then placing the toys inside opaque containers.When the toys were visible in clear containers, babies reached for the one that had not been in the picture, suggesting that they recognized the pictured toy and found it less interesting than the new toy because its novelty had worn off. But when the toys were hidden in opaque containers, babies showed the opposite preference — they reached more often for the one that had been in the photo, suggesting that they had formed a continued mental idea of it.Dr Shinskey said: “These findings show that one brief exposure to a picture of a toy affects infants’ actions with the real toy by the time they reach nine-months-old. It also demonstrates that experience with a picture of something can strengthen babies’ ideas of an object so they can maintain it after the object disappears — so out of sight is not out of mind.”The study, which was carried out at the Baby Lab at Royal Holloway’s campus, in Egham, Surrey, was published online today in Child Development, the journal of the Society for Research in Child Development.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by University of Royal Holloway London. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


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Wetlands likely to blame for atmospheric methane increases: Study

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A surprising recent rise in atmospheric methane likely stems from wetland emissions, suggesting that much more of the potent greenhouse gas will be pumped into the atmosphere as northern wetlands continue to thaw and tropical ones to warm, according to a new international study led by a University of Guelph researcher.The study supports calls for improved monitoring of wetlands and human changes to those ecosystems — a timely topic as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change prepares to examine land use impacts on greenhouse gas emissions, says Prof. Merritt Turetsky, Department of Integrative Biology.Turetsky is the lead author of a paper published today in Global Change Biology based on one of the largest-ever analyses of global methane emissions. The team looked at almost 20,000 field data measurements collected from 70 sites across arctic, temperate and tropical regions.Agnieszka Kotowska, a former master’s student, and David Olefeldt, a post-doc at Guelph, also were among 19 study co-authors from Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Finland, Germany and Sweden.One of the strongest greenhouse gases, methane comes from agriculture and fossil fuel use, as well as natural sources such as microbes in saturated wetland soils.The amount of atmospheric methane has remained relatively stable for about a decade, but concentrations began to rise again in 2007. Scientists believe this increase stems partly from more methane being released from thawing northern wetlands.Scientists have assumed that wetland methane release is largest in the tropics, said Turetsky.”But our analyses show that northern fens, such as those created when permafrost thaws, can have emissions comparable to warm sites in the tropics, despite their cold temperatures. That’s very important when it comes to scaling methane release at a global scale.”The study calls for better methods of detecting different types of wetlands and methane release rates between flooded and drained areas.Fens are the most common type of wetland in Canada, but we lack basic scientific approaches for mapping fens using remote sensing products, she said.”Not only are fens one of the strongest sources of wetland greenhouse gases, but we also know that Canadian forests and tundra underlain by permafrost are thawing and creating these kinds of high methane-producing ecosystems.”Most methane studies focus on measurements at a single site, said co-author Narasinha Shurpali, University of Eastern Finland. “Our synthesis of data from a large number of observation points across the globe is unique and serves an important need.”The team showed that small temperature changes can release much more methane from wetland soils to the atmosphere. But whether climate change will ramp up methane emissions will depend on soil moisture, said Turetsky.Under warmer and wetter conditions, much more of the gas will be emitted. If wetland soils dry out from evaporation or human drainage, emissions will fall — but not without other problems.In earlier studies, Turetsky found drying peatlands can spark more wildfires.Another study co-author, Kim Wickland, United States Geological Survey, said, “This study provides important data for better accounting of how methane emissions change after wetland drainage and flooding.”Methane emissions vary between natural and disturbed or managed wetlands, says Wickland, who has helped the IPCC improve methods for calculating greenhouse gas emissions from managed wetlands.Turetsky holds a Canada Research Chair in Integrative Ecology. She and her students examine how ecosystems regulate climate in field sites in Canada and Alaska.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by University of Guelph. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


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Increasing diversity of marketable raspberries

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Raspberries are the third most popular berry in the United States. Their popularity is growing as a specialty crop for the wholesale industry and in smaller, local markets, and U-pick operations. As consumer interest in the health benefits of colorful foods increases, small growers are capitalizing on novelty fruit and vegetable crops such as different-colored raspberries. Authors of a newly published study say that increasing the diversity of raspberry colors in the market will benefit both consumers and producers. “Producers will need to know how fruit of the other color groups compare with red raspberries with regard to the many postharvest qualities,” noted the University of Maryland’s Julia Harshman, corresponding author of the study published in HortScience (March 2014).Raspberries have an extremely short shelf life, which can be worsened by postharvest decay. Postharvest susceptibility to gray mold (Botrytis cinerea) drastically reduces the shelf life of this delicate fruit. “The main goal of our research was to compare the postharvest quality of different-colored raspberries that were harvested from floricanes under direct-market conditions with minimal pesticide inputs,” Harshman said. The researchers said that, although there is abundant information in the literature regarding red raspberry production in regard to gray mold, very little research has been conducted on postharvest physiology of black, yellow, or purple raspberries.The researchers analyzed 17 varieties of raspberries at the USDA’s Agricultural Research Center in Beltsville, Maryland, examining each cultivar for characteristics such as anthocyanins, soluble solids, titratable acids, pH, color, firmness, decay and juice leakage rates, ethylene evolution, and respiration.”In comparing the four commonly grown colors of raspberry, we drew several important conclusions,” they said. “The mechanisms controlling decay and juice leakage are distinct and mediated by both biotic and abiotic factors. The colors that performed well for one area are opposite the ones that did well in the other.” For example, firmness was expected to track closely with either leakage or decay resistance; however, the analyses did not indicate this.Red raspberries, in comparison with the other three colors analyzed during the study, had the highest titratable acids (TA) and the lowest ratio of soluble solids to TA, which, the authors say, accounts for the tart raspberry flavor consumers expect.Yellow raspberries had the lowest levels of anthocyanins and phenolics. …


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Don"t like the food? Try paying more

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Restaurateurs take note — by cutting your prices, you may be cutting how much people will like your food.Researchers in nutrition, economics and consumer behavior often assume that taste is a given — a person naturally either likes or dislikes a food. But a new study suggests taste perception, as well as feelings of overeating and guilt, can be manipulated by price alone.”We were fascinated to find that pricing has little impact on how much one eats, but a huge impact on how you interpret the experience,” said Brian Wansink, Ph.D., a professor at the Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management at Cornell University who oversaw the research. “Simply cutting the price of food at a restaurant dramatically affects how customers evaluate and appreciate the food.”The researchers teamed up with a high-quality Italian buffet in upstate New York to study how pricing affects customers’ perceptions. They presented 139 diners with a menu that offered an all-you-can-eat buffet priced at either $4 or $8. Customers were then asked to evaluate the food and the restaurant and rate their first, middle and last taste of the food on a nine-point scale.Those who paid $8 for the buffet reported enjoying their food on average 11 percent more than those who paid $4, though the two groups ate the same amount of food overall. People who paid the lower price also more often reported feeling like they had overeaten, felt more guilt about the meal, and reported liking the food less and less throughout the course of the meal.”We were surprised by the striking pattern we saw,” said Ozge Sigirci, a researcher at Cornell University Food and Brand Lab who conducted the study. “If the food is there, you are going to eat it, but the pricing very much affects how you are going to feel about your meal and how you will evaluate the restaurant.”Public health researchers and health advocates have focused on how all-you-can-eat buffets influence people’s eating habits. On the theory that such restaurants foster overeating and contribute to obesity, some advocates have proposed imposing special taxes on buffet consumers or restaurant owners.The study did not directly address the public health implications of all-you-can-eat buffets, but the researchers said the results could offer lessons about how to optimize a restaurant experience. “If you’re a consumer and want to eat at a buffet, the best thing to do is eat at the most expensive buffet you can afford. You won’t eat more, but you’ll have a better experience overall,” said Wansink.The study fits within a constellation of other work by Wansink and others offering insights about how health behaviors can be manipulated by small changes, such as putting the most healthful foods first in a display or using a smaller dinner plate.”This is an example of how a really small change can transform how a person interacts with food in a way that doesn’t entail dieting,” said Wansink, who is author of Slim by Design: Mindless Eating Solutions for Everyday Life, an upcoming book about how design choices influence eating behavior.Ozge Sigirci presented the findings during the Experimental Biology 2014 meeting on Tuesday, April 29.


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Facial transplantation: Almost a decade out, surgeons prepare for burgeoning demand

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Plastic and reconstructive surgeons leading the first retrospective study of all known facial transplants worldwide conclude that the procedure is relatively safe, increasingly feasible, and a clear life-changer that can and should be offered to far more carefully selected patients.Reporting in The Lancet online April 27, NYU Langone plastic and reconstructive surgeon and senior author Eduardo Rodriguez, MD, DDS, says results after nearly a decade of experience with what he calls the “Mount Everest” of medical-surgical treatments are “highly encouraging.”The review team noted that the transplants still pose lifelong risks and complications from infection and sometimes toxic immunosuppressive drugs, but also are highly effective at restoring people to fully functioning lives after physically disfiguring and socially debilitating facial injuries.Surgeons base their claims on the experience of 28 people known to have had full or partial face transplants since 2005, when the first such procedure was performed on a woman in France.Of the 22 men and six women whose surgeries were reported, including seven Americans, none have chronically rejected their new organs and tissues, says Dr. Rodriguez, chair of the Department of Plastic Surgery at NYU Langone Medical Center and director of its Institute of Reconstructive Plastic Surgery. All but three recipients are still living. Four have returned to work or school.Dr. Rodriguez, the Helen L. Kimmel Professor of Reconstructive Plastic Surgery at NYU Langone, in 2012 performed what is widely considered the most extensive facial transplant (when he practiced at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore). The patient was a Virginia man who had lost the lower half of his face in a gunshot accident 10 years earlier. Dr. Rodriguez is currently readying his new team at NYU Langone to perform its first facial transplantation, expected later this year.In The Lancet article, Dr. Rodriguez and his colleagues point out that although all recipients to date have experienced some complications from infection, and mild to moderate signs of rejection, the few deaths among patients were due to infection and cancer not directly related to their transplants. …


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Prematurity linked to altered lung function during exercise, high blood pressure in adults

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Advances in medicine have greatly contributed to the survival of extremely preterm infants in the US. However, the picture of long-term health effects related to prematurity is still unclear. Researchers at the University of Oregon compared lung function among adults who were born extremely preterm (at less than 28 weeks), very preterm (at less than 32 weeks), and full term (~39-40 weeks). Steven Laurie, PhD, will present the research team’s findings in a poster session on Tuesday, April 29, at the Experimental Biology meeting.Experimental Biology is an annual meeting comprised of more than 14,000 scientists and exhibitors from six sponsoring societies and multiple guest societies. With a mission to share the newest scientific concepts and research findings shaping current and future clinical advances, the meeting offers an unparalleled opportunity for exchange among scientists from throughout across the United States and the world who represent dozens of scientific areas, from laboratory to translational to clinical research. www.experimentalbiology.orgLaurie et al. studied three groups at rest and during exercise: young adults who were born extremely to very preterm and developed a lung condition called bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD), preterm adults who didn’t develop BPD (PRE), and full-term adult control subjects (CONT). They found that the PRE subjects had a harder time handling the increased blood flow from the heart during exercise than the BPD and CONT subjects. The vascular function of the lungs during exercise suggested that the PRE adults may also be at increased risk of developing high lung blood pressure.”Healthy young humans have lungs designed to easily handle the increased blood flow from the heart during exercise. However, adults born extremely to very preterm have abnormally developed lungs, which may result in lungs that are unable to handle the demands of exercise. …


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Consuming high-protein breakfasts helps women maintain glucose control, study finds

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In healthy individuals, the amount of glucose, or sugar, in the blood increases after eating. When glucose increases, levels of insulin increase to carry the glucose to the rest of the body. Previous research has shown that extreme increases in glucose and insulin in the blood can lead to poor glucose control and increase an individual’s risk of developing diabetes over time. Now, a University of Missouri researcher has found that when women consumed high-protein breakfasts, they maintained better glucose and insulin control than they did with lower-protein or no-protein meals.”For women, eating more protein in the morning can beneficially affect their glucose and insulin levels,” said Heather Leidy, an assistant professor of nutrition and exercise physiology. “If you eat healthy now and consume foods that help you control your glucose levels, you may be protecting yourself from developing diabetes in the future.”Kevin Maki, of Biofortis Clinical Research, completed the study in collaboration with Leidy. They studied women aged 18-55 years old who consumed one of three different meals or only water on four consecutive days. The tested meals were less than 300 calories per serving and had similar fat and fiber contents. However, the meals varied in amount of protein: a pancake meal with three grams of protein; a sausage and egg breakfast skillet with 30 grams of protein; or a sausage and egg breakfast skillet with 39 grams protein. Researchers monitored the amount of glucose and insulin in the participants’ blood for four hours after they ate breakfast.”Both protein-rich breakfasts led to lower spikes in glucose and insulin after meals compared to the low-protein, high-carb breakfast,” Maki said. “Additionally, the higher-protein breakfast containing 39 grams of protein led to lower post-meal spikes compared to the high-protein breakfast with 30 grams of protein.”These findings suggest that, for healthy women, the consumption of protein-rich breakfasts leads to better glucose control throughout the morning than the consumption of low-protein options, Leidy said.”Since most American women consume only about 10-15 grams of protein during breakfast, the 30-39 grams might seem like a challenging dietary change,” Leidy said. …


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Breath Analysis Offers Non-invasive Method to Detect Early Lung Cancer

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Researchers at the University of Louisville School of Medicine are using breath analysis to detect the presence of lung cancer. Preliminary data indicate that this promising noninvasive tool offers the sensitivity of PET scanning, and has almost twice the specificity of PET for distinguishing patients with benign lung disease from those with early stage cancer. Michael Bousamra II, MD, Associate Professor, Department of Cardiovascular and Thoracic Surgery, is presenting the results of the study at the AATS 2014 Conference on April 29, 2014.A reliable, noninvasive diagnostic method imposes less physical and financial burden on patients who actually have no significant disease, while rapid and accurate diagnosis expedites treatment for patients who truly have lung cancer.The team believes that while the breath test would not replace CT as a primary screening tool, it would be particularly helpful in conjunction with a positive CT scan result. “This breath analysis method presents the potential for a cheaper and more reliable diagnostic option for patients found to have bulky disease on a CT scan. If the breath analysis is negative, the patient may, in some instances, be followed with repeated exams without necessitating a biopsy. But a positive breath analysis would indicate that the patient may proceed to definitive biopsy, thus expediting treatment,” says Dr. Bousamra.Investigators used specially coated silicon microchips to collect breath samples from 88 healthy controls, 107 patients with lung cancer, 40 individuals with benign pulmonary disease, and 7 with metastatic lung cancer.Previous work had pinpointed four specific substances, known as carbonyl compounds, in breath samples as “elevated cancer markers” (ECMs) that distinguish patients with lung cancer from those with benign disease. The carbonyl compounds found in the breath are thought to reflect chemical reactions occurring in malignant lung tumors. In this study, the authors compared the findings from the breath analyses to the results from PET scans.The investigators found that the sensitivity and specificity of breath analysis depended upon how many of the ECMs were elevated. For example, having 3 or 4 ECMs was diagnostic of lung cancer in 95% of those with this result. …


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When harm done can never be balanced: Vicarious revenge and the death of Osama bin Laden

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Friday will mark the third anniversary of Osama bin Laden’s assassination, a day when U.S. President Barack Obama famously stated “Justice has been done.” But has it? A new study from a team of social psychology researchers led by Mario Gollwitzer of Philipps University of Marburg, has questioned whether this instance of vicarious revenge led to feelings of satisfaction and reestablished justice within the American public, including whether bin Laden’s assassination ignited craving for more revenge.Justice achievedVicarious revenge, where the need for justice is felt not by the victims, but by people in the same group, has been shown to feel similar to personal revenge. Gollwitzer and his team developed two studies designed to test the notion “that Americans’ vengeful desires in the aftermath of 9/11 predicted a sense of justice achieved after bin Laden’s death…”The data suggest that those Americans who believed that bin Laden’s assassination sent a message to the perpetrators (“Don’t mess with us”) were also the ones who thought that his death balanced the scales of justice.The second important finding from the study is that bin Laden’s death did not fully quench Americans’ desire for revenge. Respondents who showed a stronger sense of “justice achieved” also showed a stronger desire to take further revenge against those who were responsible for the 9/11 terrorist attacks.Although justice might be achieved, the avengers might not feel psychological closure. Reestablishing justice, successfully asserting one’s message, does not necessarily close the chapter in the case of revenge.The “how” mattersThe third important finding presented shows that Americans were more satisfied with fact that bin Laden was killed intentionally than the possibility of bin Laden being killed accidentally (e.g., in an airplane crash). Compared to self-reported responses from Pakistanis or Germans, Americans felt much more satisfaction towards the death of bin Laden as it actually happened than towards any other circumstance of his death.Gollwitzer and his team believe that this difference in “intent” reflects the fact that Americans were the victims of 9/11, whereas Germans, for example, merely observed these events, but were not directly involved in them.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by Society for Personality and Social Psychology. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.
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When harm done can never be balanced: Vicarious revenge and the death of Osama bin Laden - 29 April 2014


Snobby staff can boost luxury retail sales - 29 April 2014


Risk-assessment approach recommended for biomarker-driven cancer clinical trials - 29 April 2014






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Snobby staff can boost luxury retail sales

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When it comes to luxury brands, the ruder the sales staff the better the sales, according to new research from the University of British Columbia’s Sauder School of Business.The forthcoming Journal of Consumer Research study reveals that consumers who get the brush-off at a high-end retailer can become more willing to purchase and wear pricey togs.”It appears that snobbiness might actually be a qualification worth considering for luxury brands like Louis Vuitton or Gucci,” says Sauder Marketing Professor Darren Dahl. “Our research indicates they can end up having a similar effect to an ‘in-group’ in high school that others aspire to join.”For the study, participants imagined or had interactions with sales representatives — rude or not. They then rated their feelings about associated brands and their desire to own them. Participants who expressed an aspiration to be associated with high-end brands also reported an increased desire to own the luxury products after being treated poorly.The effect only held true if the salesperson appeared to be an authentic representative of the brand. If they did not fit the part, the consumer was turned off. Further, researchers found that sales staff rudeness did not improve impressions of mass-market brands.”Our study shows you’ve got to be the right kind of snob in the right kind of store for the effect to work,” says Dahl.The researchers also found that improved impressions gained by rude treatment faded over time. Customers who expressed increased desire to purchase the products reported significantly diminished desire two weeks later.Based on the study’s findings, Dahl suggests that, if consumers are being treated rudely, it’s best to leave the situation and return later, or avoid the interactions altogether by shopping online.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by University of British Columbia. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


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Risk-assessment approach recommended for biomarker-driven cancer clinical trials

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In an article published in The Lancet Oncology, an NCI (US National Cancer Institute), NCRI (UK National Cancer Research Institute), and EORTC (European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer) working group outline a practical risk-management approach for effective integration of biomarkers into cancer clinical trials. Their work provides the international community with a set of common principles by which biomarkers can be integrated into clinical trials, exchange of data can be facilitated, quality promoted, and research accelerated while simultaneously respecting local approaches and legislation.Their risk-assessment approach for designing and conducting cancer clinical trials include risks to patient safety, operational risks, and biomarker development risks, and for each risk they evaluate possible consequences, provide solutions along with examples of these as well as references to helpful resources. Concerning protocol design, the working group recommends items that a protocol should include as well as items that should be assessed during protocol development. For the conduct of the trial, they make recommendations for the close monitoring of variability in test results, and they also make recommendations for particular aspects following completion of the trial.Dr. Jacqueline Hall, who coordinated this NCI, NCRI, and EORTC working group says, “We readily acknowledge that in today’s clinical trial landscape, many stakeholders play a role in clinical trials. These include regulators, public authorities, and patients, amongst others. By opening this discussion to others, we hope to find solutions to the varied challenges facing molecularly driven clinical research.”Support for this research came from the EORTC Charitable Trust and the UK Department of Health’s National Institute for Health Research Biomedical Research Centres funding scheme.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer. The original article was written by John Bean. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


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Toll of trampoline fractures on children is high

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Trampoline accidents sent an estimated 288,876 people, most of them children, to hospital emergency departments with broken bones from 2002 to 2011, at a cost of more than $400 million, according to an analysis by researchers at the Indiana University School of Medicine.Including all injuries, not just fractures, hospital emergency rooms received more than 1 million visits from people injured in trampoline accidents during those 10 years, boosting the emergency room bills to just over $1 billion, according to the study.The research, published online in the Journal of Pediatric Orthopeadics, is the first to analyze trampoline fracture patterns in a large population drawn from a national database, said the study’s lead author, Randall T. Loder, M.D., chair of the IU School of Medicine Department of Orthopaedic Surgery and a surgeon at Riley Hospital for Children at IU Health.”There have not been any large-scale studies of these injuries,” Dr. Loder said. “We wanted to document the patterns of injury. This gives us an idea of the magnitude of the problem across the country.”Dr. Loder and his colleagues retrieved data for all trampoline-related injuries for the decade beginning 2002 from the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, which collects data from a sample of 100 hospitals across the country. Using statistical techniques, they estimated there were just over 1 million emergency department visits, with 288,876 of them involving fractures.About 60 percent of the fractures were upper-extremity injuries, notably fingers, hands, forearms and elbows. Lower-extremity fractures most commonly were breaks in the lower leg — the tibia and fibula — and ankles. Just over 4 percent involved fractures to the axial skeleton, including the spine, head, and ribs and sternum. An estimated 2,807 spinal fractures were reported during the period studied.”Fortunately, there were fewer spine injuries than might have been expected, but those can be catastrophic,” said Meagan Sabatino, clinical research coordinator for pediatric orthopedic surgery and a study co-author.While the average age for most of the injuries was about 9 years old, the average age for axial skeleton injuries was substantially higher at 16.6 years old.”They’re probably jumping higher, with more force,” Dr. …


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Bacteria on the skin: Our invisible companions influence how quickly wounds heel

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A new study suggests microbes living on our skin influence how quickly wounds heal. The findings could lead to new treatments for chronic wounds, which affect 1 in 20 elderly people.We spend our lives covered head-to-toe in a thin veneer of bacteria. But despite a growing appreciation for the valuable roles our resident microbes play in the digestive tract, little is known about the bacteria that reside in and on our skin. A new study suggests the interplay between our cells and these skin-dwelling microbes could influence how wounds heal.”This study gives us a much better understanding of the types of bacterial species that are found in skin wounds, how our cells might respond to the bacteria and how that interaction can affect healing,” said Matthew Hardman, Ph.D., a senior research fellow at The University of Manchester Healing Foundation Centre who led the project. “It’s our hope that these insights could help lead to better treatments to promote wound healing that are based on sound biology.”Chronic wounds — cuts or lesions that just never seem to heal — are a significant health problem, particularly among elderly people. An estimated 1 in 20 elderly people live with a chronic wound, which often results from diabetes, poor blood circulation or being confined to bed or a wheelchair.”These wounds can literally persist for years, and we simply have no good treatments to help a chronic wound heal,” said Hardman, who added that doctors currently have no reliable way to tell whether a wound will heal or persist. “There’s a definite need for better ways to both predict how a wound is going to heal and develop new treatments to promote healing.”The trillions of bacteria that live on and in our bodies have attracted a great deal of scientific interest in recent years. Findings from studies of microbes in the gut have made it clear that although some bacteria cause disease, many other bacteria are highly beneficial for our health.In their recent study, Hardman and his colleagues compared the skin bacteria from people with chronic wounds that did or did not heal. The results showed markedly different bacterial communities, suggesting there may be a bacterial “signature” of a wound that refuses to heal.”Our data clearly support the idea that one could swab a wound, profile the bacteria that are there and then be able to tell whether the wound is likely to heal quickly or persist, which could impact treatment decisions,” said Hardman.The team also conducted a series of studies in mice to shed light on the reasons why some wounds heal while others do not. They found that mice lacking a single gene had a different array of skin microbiota — including more harmful bacteria — and healed much more slowly than mice with a normal copy of the gene.The gene, which has been linked to Chrohn’s disease, is known to help cells recognize and respond to bacteria. …


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Genetic mutations involved in human blood diseases identified

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A study published today in Nature Genetics has revealed mutations that could have a major impact on the future diagnosis and treatment of many human diseases. Through an international collaboration, researchers at the Montreal Heart Institute (MHI) were able to identify a dozen mutations in the human genome that are involved in significant changes in complete blood counts and that explain the onset of sometimes severe biological disorders.The number of red and white blood cells and platelets in the blood is an important clinical marker, as it helps doctors detect many hematological diseases and other diseases. Doctors can also monitor this marker to determine the effectiveness of therapy for certain pathologies.”Complete blood counts are a complex human trait, as the number of cells in the blood is controlled by our environment and the combined expression of many genes in our DNA,” explained Dr. Guillaume Lettre, a study co-author, an MHI researcher, and an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Medicine at Universit de Montral.In collaboration with their colleagues at the University of Washington in Seattle and the University of Greifswald in Germany, these MHI researchers analyzed the DNA of 6,796 people who donated specimens to the MHI Biobank by looking specifically at segments of DNA directly involved in protein function in the body. They specifically identified a significant mutation in the gene that encodes erythropoietin, a hormone that controls the production of red blood cells. “Subjects who carry this mutation in their DNA have reduced hemoglobin levels and a 70% greater chance of developing anemia,” explained Dr. Lettre. The scientists also identified a mutation in the JAK2 gene, which is responsible for a 50% increase in platelet counts and, in certain cases, for the onset of bone marrow diseases that can lead to leukemia. Dr. Jean-Claude Tardif, Director of the MHI Research Centre, Full Professor at the Faculty of Medicine at Universit de Montral, and a study co-author, added that “after reviewing pre-existing clinical data from the MHI Biobank, we observed that these donors also had a higher risk of having a stroke during their lifetime.”Dr. …


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"Gaydar": Are women better at spotting one of their own?

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Previous research has proven the ‘gaydar’ to be a real phenomenon. Reliable predictions of sexual orientation have been made simply by hearing a voice or seeing a face. This article in Cognition & Emotion asks who has better gaydar? Lesbian women or straight? The expectation was that lesbians due to their experience of choosing partners would be more tuned in to others orientation. The authors conducted a study which revealed some thought-provoking insights into who has greater interpersonal sensitivity.The study entailed a mixture of lesbian and straight women watching video clips of a target group of women discussing family relationships and future life. The watchers were asked to rate multiple aspects of the target group; what were they thinking? What emotions they experienced? What type of personality did they have and overall were they gay or straight on a continuous scale of homosexuality? This ground-breaking research stands out from previous studies which have primarily considered sexuality of men. …


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Scientists create circuit board modeled on the human brain

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Stanford scientists have developed faster, more energy-efficient microchips based on the human brain — 9,000 times faster and using significantly less power than a typical PC. This offers greater possibilities for advances in robotics and a new way of understanding the brain. For instance, a chip as fast and efficient as the human brain could drive prosthetic limbs with the speed and complexity of our own actions.Stanford scientists have developed a new circuit board modeled on the human brain, possibly opening up new frontiers in robotics and computing.For all their sophistication, computers pale in comparison to the brain. The modest cortex of the mouse, for instance, operates 9,000 times faster than a personal computer simulation of its functions.Not only is the PC slower, it takes 40,000 times more power to run, writes Kwabena Boahen, associate professor of bioengineering at Stanford, in an article for the Proceedings of the IEEE.”From a pure energy perspective, the brain is hard to match,” says Boahen, whose article surveys how “neuromorphic” researchers in the United States and Europe are using silicon and software to build electronic systems that mimic neurons and synapses.Boahen and his team have developed Neurogrid, a circuit board consisting of 16 custom-designed “Neurocore” chips. Together these 16 chips can simulate 1 million neurons and billions of synaptic connections. The team designed these chips with power efficiency in mind. Their strategy was to enable certain synapses to share hardware circuits. The result was Neurogrid — a device about the size of an iPad that can simulate orders of magnitude more neurons and synapses than other brain mimics on the power it takes to run a tablet computer.The National Institutes of Health funded development of this million-neuron prototype with a five-year Pioneer Award. Now Boahen stands ready for the next steps — lowering costs and creating compiler software that would enable engineers and computer scientists with no knowledge of neuroscience to solve problems — such as controlling a humanoid robot — using Neurogrid.Its speed and low power characteristics make Neurogrid ideal for more than just modeling the human brain. Boahen is working with other Stanford scientists to develop prosthetic limbs for paralyzed people that would be controlled by a Neurocore-like chip.”Right now, you have to know how the brain works to program one of these,” said Boahen, gesturing at the $40,000 prototype board on the desk of his Stanford office. …


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Novel drug cocktail may improve clinical treatment for pancreatic cancer

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Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer deaths in the U.S. and has the lowest overall survival rate of all major cancers (~6%). With current treatment options being met with limited success it is anticipated that pancreatic cancer will move up to the second leading cause of cancer deaths by as early as 2015. Surgical removal of the tumor presents the best chance of survival, however only 15% of patients are eligible due to the late stage of diagnosis common with this disease. With very limited improvements in patient outcome over the last two decades there remains an enormous need for new therapies and treatment options.David Durrant, a Ph.D. student in the laboratory of Dr. Rakesh Kukreja from the Pauley Heart Center at Virginia Commonwealth University’s School of Medicine, is studying a novel combination therapy for the treatment of pancreatic cancer. The traditional chemotherapy drug, doxorubicin (DOX), has long been used in the treatment of several cancers. However, patients commonly acquire resistance to DOX because of increased activation of specific survival proteins or through increased expression of drug transporters which reduce cellular levels of the drug. This is especially true for pancreatic cancer, which does not respond to multiple treatment strategies, including those that contain DOX. …


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School nutrition, wellness program improves eating habits, lowers BMI

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Can we fight childhood obesity by telling kids to eat more, not less? Researchers behind a new comprehensive school nutrition and wellness program say you get further by offering kids a carrot — literally, in this case — by giving them reasons to be excited about fruits and vegetables, rather than harping about what they should avoid, such as sugar-sweetened beverages.In a randomized control study, the researchers found 4th-graders who participated in the nutrition program ate substantially more fruits and vegetables and lowered their body mass index (BMI) during the school year that the program was implemented. The percentage of 4th-graders who were overweight or obese dropped from 56 percent to 38 percent over the course of the year.”We take the approach that positive messages are going to be more readily adopted by students than restrictive messages,” said Rachel Scherr, Ph.D., an assistant project scientist at the University of California at Davis and one of the study’s lead investigators. “For us, the most important thing is that the kids and their families really enjoyed the program. It was very successful, and I think it was critical that we focused on empowering kids and their families to want to make a change.”The “Shaping Healthy Choices Program” takes a holistic approach to engage students, schools, parents and community partners in building healthful habits. At its core is a curriculum that integrates classroom nutrition activities with physical activity and gardening. It also includes cooking demonstrations and recipes, health-related activities for school events, family newsletters and guidance for school lunchrooms to encourage healthy eating, for example, by creating a salad bar.Four elementary schools in two California school districts participated in the study. In each district, one school received the Shaping Healthy Choices Program over the course of the 2012-2013 school year while the other school did not. The researchers assessed several outcomes including students’ BMI, reported dietary intake and knowledge about nutrition at the start and end of the school year.Although the analyses are still underway, preliminary results from one district show participating children dropped their BMI percentile by nearly 9 points, from an average of the 77th percentile to an average of the 68th percentile. Participating 4th-grade children who reported eating one or fewer servings of vegetables per day at the start of the study increased their vegetable intake by 40 percent. …
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School nutrition, wellness program improves eating habits, lowers BMI - 28 April 2014


Can exercise help reduce methamphetamine use? - 28 April 2014


Specialized yoga program could help women with urinary incontinence - 28 April 2014






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Can exercise help reduce methamphetamine use?

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The abuse of amphetamine type psychomotor stimulants remains a critical legal and public health problem in the US. In California, 27% of substance abuse treatment admissions are for amphetamines; high treatment-admission rates for amphetamines are also reported for other Western States such as Idaho (25%), Nevada (25%), Arizona (18%), Oregon (16%) and Washington (14%). Additional data show that 36% of the people arrested in San Diego CA, and 23% of men arrested in Portland OR, had methamphetamine in their system upon arrest. A 2009 study by the RAND Corporation estimated the total US costs for methamphetamine at $23.4 billion.Researchers from The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have found that physical exercise may be a useful technique to reduce methamphetamine use. Drs. Shawn M. Aarde and Michael A. Taffe used a preclinical model in which male rats are trained to press a lever to obtain intravenous infusions of methamphetamine. Prior work had shown that an extended interval (6 weeks) of voluntary activity on a running wheel could reduce cocaine self-administration in laboratory rats. The investigators now report that running wheel access in only the 22 hours prior to the test session is sufficient to significantly reduce the amount of methamphetamine self-administered. …
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Antibiotics from mangroves? - 28 April 2014






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Antibiotics from mangroves?

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Researchers at the Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) in Malaysia have conducted a study on the mangrove ecosystem to search for actinomycetes bacteria. The mangrove ecosystem is known as a highly productive habitat for isolating actinomycetes, which has the potential of producing biologically active secondary metabolites.The UiTM study focused on eight different mangrove sites in Malaysia, which were chosen at random to isolate and screen actinomycetes from soil samples. A total of 53 possible marine actinomycetes were isolated and it was found that a three percent concentration of sodium chloride was sufficient to support the growth of marine actinomycetes.Among the isolated filamentous bacteria, five isolates showed antimicrobial activity from direct culture broth against at least one of the test organisms. Meanwhile, four extracts of ethyl acetate showed activity against Gram-positive test organisms. The results revealed that marine actinomycetes is a potential source for producing antibiotics.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM). Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


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Marketing to Internet-savy Moms

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Moms on the net should be the focus of those carrying out market research as it turns out that the old word-of-mouth benefits to sales are stronger than ever now that the school gathering places, shops and mother and child groups have been augmented by online social networks aimed at mothers. That’s the conclusion of a research paper to be published in the International Journal of Web Based Communities.Marketing expert Raechel Johns of the University of Canberra and educationalist Rebecca English of Queensland University of Technology Kelvin Grove, Australia, explain how mothers represent a large segment of marketing dollars. They point out that there is limited research so far aimed at understanding the evolution of the family, mothers’ groups and the advent of online meeting places for those with children and money to spend. Their survey of mothers and quantitative analysis of the available online data suggest that mothers discuss products a lot. Moreover, they found that, “trust between mothers is generally high and mothers tend to trust the opinions of other mothers when they recommend a product.”In some cases, the team found, mothers were passively absorbing information, but more often than not they were proactive in seeking opinions about particular products. Fundamentally, the maternal consumers were willing to buy products that offer their family a clear benefit but were dissatisfied when the purchase turned out to be useless or of low-quality, the active seeking of word-of-mouth opinions would thus point to a desire to avoid this situation. “It is not surprising that social media makes a contribution toward the buying behaviour of its users,” the team says. However, in online mothers groups and communities this is stronger than ever, the team found. Repeated interactions within the community and the accumulation of trust make the effect stronger still as the community matures. The effect is strongest among mothers with the same number of children and offspring of similar ages.In terms of the implications for advertiser and marketers hoping to increase sales of their “useful” products, fostering word of mouth is essential, the team says. …


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Cartilage, made to order: Living human cartilage grown on lab chip

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In a significant step toward reducing the heavy toll of osteoarthritis around the world, scientists have created the first example of living human cartilage grown on a laboratory chip. The researchers ultimately aim to use their innovative 3-D printing approach to create replacement cartilage for patients with osteoarthritis or soldiers with battlefield injuries.”Osteoarthritis has a severe impact on quality of life, and there is an urgent need to understand the origin of the disease and develop effective treatments” said Rocky Tuan, Ph.D., director of the Center for Cellular and Molecular Engineering at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, member of the American Association of Anatomists and the study’s senior investigator. “We hope that the methods we’re developing will really make a difference, both in the study of the disease and, ultimately, in treatments for people with cartilage degeneration or joint injuries.”Osteoarthritis is marked by a gradual disintegration of cartilage, a flexible tissue that provides padding where bones come together in a joint. Causing severe pain and loss of mobility in joints such as knees and fingers, osteoarthritis is one of the leading causes of physical disability in the United States. It is estimated that up to 1 in 2 Americans will develop some form of the disease in their lifetime.Although some treatments can help relieve arthritis symptoms, there is no cure. Many patients with severe arthritis ultimately require a joint replacement.Tuan said artificial cartilage built using a patient’s own stem cells could offer enormous therapeutic potential. “Ideally we would like to be able to regenerate this tissue so people can avoid having to get a joint replacement, which is a pretty drastic procedure and is unfortunately something that some patients have to go through multiple times,” said Tuan.In addition to offering relief for people with osteoarthritis, Tuan said replacement cartilage could also be a game-changer for people with debilitating joint injuries, such as soldiers with battlefield injuries. “We really want these technologies to help wounded warriors return to service or pursue a meaningful post-combat life,” said Tuan, who co-directs the Armed Forces Institute of Regenerative Medicine, a national consortium focused on developing regenerative therapies for injured soldiers. “We are on a mission.”Creating artificial cartilage requires three main elements: stem cells, biological factors to make the cells grow into cartilage, and a scaffold to give the tissue its shape. Tuan’s 3-D printing approach achieves all three by extruding thin layers of stem cells embedded in a solution that retains its shape and provides growth factors. …


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Zinc supplementation shows promise in reducing cell stress after blasts

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Each year, approximately 2 million traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) occur in the USA, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That number includes troops wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan, for whom TBI is considered an invisible wound of war, one that has few successful treatments. “We have nothing beyond ibuprofen for most TBIs,” said Dr. Angus Scrimgeour, who has been investigating the effects of low zinc diets on cell stress following a blast injury. “The adult brain does not self-repair from this kind of trauma.”Scrimgeour works for the US Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine and recently looked at the effects of 5-weeks of low and adequate zinc diets on a specific protein in muscle cells called MMP. The study recreated blast injuries in 32 rats similar to what soldiers experience from IEDs, including loss of consciousness. An equal number of rats served as a control group. Results suggest that zinc supplementation reduces blast-induced cell stress. He will be presenting the results of his research at the American Society for Nutrition’s Scientific Sessions & Annual Meeting at EB on Sunday, April 27.“We know that soldiers’ brain tissue cannot repair on low zinc diets,” said Scrimgeour. “And they are losing zinc through diarrhea and sweating.” The question moving forward is whether prevention through diet supplementation or post-blast treatment works best to repair behavioral deficits associated with mild TBI.Scrimgeour added that further research is planned to investigate nutrient combinations for treating mild TBI, including omega-3, vitamin D, glutamine and/or zinc. …


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Risks of testosterone treatment urgently needed, researcher suggests

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Physicians do not have sufficient information from clinical trials to understand the risks associated with the prescription of testosterone in older men, according to a Comment in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology, written by Professor Stephanie Page, of the University of Washington and Harborview Medical Center, Seattle, USA.While the benefits of testosterone therapy in younger men with a deficiency of the hormone are well established, testosterone is now widely prescribed to older men, particularly in the USA.Existing studies have produced conflicting findings over whether the prescription of testosterone is associated with increased cardiovascular risk in older men, and ongoing studies are unlikely to adequately address this question, meaning that even if an appropriately powered trial were to start today, reliable safety data are at least a decade away.According to Professor Page, “In an era when millions of men are using testosterone every day, support is urgently needed from both the public and medical communities to fund an appropriate clinical study to assess the risks and benefits of testosterone treatment in older men. There is a danger that funding and regulatory agencies will overinterpret the evidence from existing and ongoing observational studies, and conclude that larger and longer clinical trials are unnecessary and unwarranted. This conclusion would do men’s health a disservice.”*”Testosterone is a billion dollar industry, probably fuelled partly by direct to consumer advertising and some degree of overprescription,” Professor Page adds. “Physicians need to discuss with their patients that we simply do not fully understand the risks associated with testosterone use in older men, and use conservative treatment guidelines — such as those provided by the Endocrine Society — to guide therapeutic decisions.”Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by The Lancet. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.


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"Horsing around" reduces stress hormones in youth

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New research from Washington State University reveals how youth who work with horses experience a substantial reduction in stress — and the evidence lies in kids’ saliva.The results are published in the American Psychological Association’s Human-Animal Interaction Bulletin this month.”We were coming at this from a prevention perspective,” said Patricia Pendry, a developmental psychologist at WSU who studies how stress “gets under the skin” and the effects of prevention programs on human development. “We are especially interested in optimizing healthy stress hormone production in young adolescents, because we know from other research that healthy stress hormone patterns may protect against the development of physical and mental health problems.”NIH grant to apply hard scienceHer work is the first evidence-based research within the field of human-equine interaction to measure a change in participants’ levels of the stress hormone cortisol.”The beauty of studying stress hormones is that they can be sampled quite noninvasively and conveniently by sampling saliva in naturalistic settings as individuals go about their regular day,” Pendry said.While human-animal interaction programs with horses, dogs, cats and other companion animals have been credited with improving social competence, self-esteem and behavior in children, scientifically valid research to support these claims — and an understanding of the underlying mechanism for why people report a positive experience in these programs — has been limited.Three years ago, the National Institutes of Health began asking researchers to tackle big questions about the effects of human-animal interaction on child development. With the support of a $100,000 NIH grant, Pendry led a research project to engage students in grades 5-8 in a 12-week equine facilitated learning program in Pullman, Wash.She approached the coordinator of PATH (Palouse Area Therapeutic Horsemanship) at the WSU College of Veterinary Medicine, which had been offering a therapeutic riding program for over 30 years. Pendry has been riding and working with horses since she was a child and reacquainted herself with therapeutic horsemanship when she began to look for her next research project at WSU.Higher hormone levels pose potential riskShe said stress hormone functioning is a result of how we perceive stress as well as how we cope with it. Stress is not just what you experience, she said, but it’s how you interpret the size of the stressor. A child in front of a large, unfamiliar horse may experience more stress than when he or she encounters a smaller, more familiar animal.Working with PATH director Sue Jacobson and Phyllis Erdman from the WSU College of Education, Pendry designed and implemented an after-school program serving 130 typically developing children over a two-year period that bused students from school to the barn for 12 weeks.Children were randomly assigned to participate in the program or be waitlisted. Based on natural horsemanship techniques, the program provided 90 minutes weekly to learn about horse behavior, care, grooming, handling, riding and interaction.Participants provided six samples of saliva over a two-day period both before and after the 12-week program. Pendry compared the levels and patterns of stress hormone functioning by measuring cortisol. The results were exciting, she said.”We found that children who had participated in the 12-week program had significantly lower stress hormone levels throughout the day and in the afternoon, compared to children in the waitlisted group,” she said. “We get excited about that because we know that higher base levels of cortisol — particularly in the afternoon — are considered a potential risk factor for the development of psychopathology.”Evidence to support human-animal workPendry said the experimental design underlying the study gives more scientific credit to the claims of therapeutic horsemanship professionals, parents and children who have reported a positive impact from these types of programs. …


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Two breath compounds could be associated with larynx cancer

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Participants exhaled into tedlar bags after fasting for more than eight hours.Credit: SINC[Click to enlarge image]Researchers at the Rey Juan Carlos University and the Alcorcn Hospital (Madrid) have compared the volatile substances exhaled by eleven people with cancer of larynx, with those of another twenty healthy people. The results show that the concentrations of certain molecules, mainly ethanol and 2-butanone, are higher in individuals with carcinoma, therefore they act as potential markers of the disease.Human breath contains thousands of volatile organic compounds (VOC) and some of them can be used as non-invasive biomarkers for various types of head and neck cancers as well as cancer of the larynx.This was shown in the experiment carried out by scientists from the Rey Juan Carlos University (URJC) with 31 volunteers: 20 healthy subjects (half of which are smokers) and 11 with cancer of the larynx in various phases of the disease and who are being treated in the Alcorcn Hospital in Madrid.The results, published in the journal Chromatographia, reveal that the air exhaled by the more seriously ill patients – in a stage called T3 – contains different concentrations of seven compounds compared with the levels of healthy people or even those with a less developed tumour (T1).Specifically, in the graphics of individuals with advanced cancer, the peaks that represent ethanol (C2H6O) and 2-butanone (C4H8O) are particularly significant. These two compounds therefore become potential markers of laryngeal carcinoma.”At the moment it is still a preliminary study and a wider sample has to be obtained,” Rafael Garca, professor of Chemical Engineering at the URJC and co-author of the study told SINC, “but it is a step in the right direction, an alternative with regard to identifying biomarkers, not only for this type of cancer but for other more prevalent and serious ones such as lung cancer, where early detection is key”.As part of the experiment, the researchers asked the participants to breathe into tedlar bags after fasting for at least eight hours so there was no leftover food or drink on their breath.The samples were then analysed with solid phase micro-extraction, gas chromatography and mass spectrometry techniques, which enable very small amounts of a substance to be separated and identified. The concentrations are around or slightly above the equipment’s detection limits (40 nanograms/mL), which is equivalent to 40 ppb or parts per billion.The ultimate aim of the research is to “create an electronic nose that can be used in hospitals and health centres for the early detection of these types of diseases,” concluded Rafael Garca. This team, together with other Spanish and foreign research groups, is working hard to develop sensors capable of detecting diseases through breath analysis.Head and neck cancers represent between 5% and 10% of all malignant tumours currently diagnosed in Spain. Every year nearly half a million new cases are detected worldwide, mainly attributed to tobacco and alcohol use and approximately 90% are laryngeal cancer. The study also identified four markers in the exhaled breath that are typical of smokers, such as benzene and furfural.Story Source:The above story is based on materials provided by Plataforma SINC. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.Journal Reference:Rafael A. Garca, Victoria Morales, Sergio Martn, Estela Vilches, Adolfo Toledano. Volatile Organic Compounds Analysis in Breath Air in Healthy Volunteers and Patients Suffering Epidermoid Laryngeal Carcinomas. …


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Couples need just one conversation to decide not to have children

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Many couples agree not to have children after only one discussion, and sometimes none at all, the British Sociological Association’s annual conference in Leeds heard today.Edina Kurdi, of Middlesex University, said that 40% of the childless women she surveyed for a study had either not talked about having children, or had only discussed this once early in their relationship.Miss Kurdi carried out an online survey which included responses from 75 UK women aged 35 and above who were childless. She interviewed nine of them face-to-face.The survey asked about discussions the woman had had with her current partner about not having children. She found that 23 of the 63 who responded to the question had decided not to have children after one conversation. Three others mentioned they had not talked about the issue at all.One woman said: “Negotiation? It only needed one brief discussion, along the lines of ‘I don’t want kids — do you?’ ‘Nope, me neither’. Then move onto something more interesting to talk about… and neither of us reconsidered our options. There was no need to.”Another said: “it never really got said, it was just realized by our actions — we had a two-seater car!”Other quotes, all from different women:”We didn’t discuss whether or not to have children, we were both child-free when we met.” “In both relationships the issue of whether to have children or not was not a point of major discussion.” “To be honest, it was never a serious discussion. I never reached that stage when I thought I must have this conversation.” “There is no discussion, I don’t want kids and I would never bother to pursue a romantic relationship with someone who did, it would be a pointless endeavour.” “We didn’t discuss really, just mutually agreed. There was no issue to discuss.” “We were prompted to discuss based on conversation and pressure from friends and family but neither of us wanted kids.” Miss Kurdi, a Lecturer at Middlesex University, said the result was “somewhat surprising and very interesting.”She told the conference: “Not having children is obviously a very important decision, and what was interesting from the research was the negligible amount of discussion that couples engaged in — many are agreeing not to have children in one conversation, or in an unspoken way.”One possible reason that couples did not need to talk about the issue much is that they could accurately sense their partner did not want children from their beliefs and lifestyle.”Her research project also studied the reasons why couples remained childless and attitudes of others towards a childless couple. …


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Gene mutation, key symptoms of autism appear to be linked

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Scientists have known that abnormal brain growth is associated with autism spectrum disorder. However, the relationship between the two has not been well understood.Now, scientists from the Florida campus of The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) have shown that mutations in a specific gene that is disrupted in some individuals with autism results in too much growth throughout the brain, and yet surprisingly specific problems in social interactions, at least in mouse models that mimic this risk factor in humans.“What was striking is that these were basically normal animals in terms of behavior, but there were consistent deficits in tests of social interaction and recognition—which approximate a major symptom of autism,” said Damon Page, a TSRI biologist who led the study. “This suggests that when most parts of the brain are overgrown, the brain somehow adapts to it with minimal effects on behavior in general. However, brain circuits relevant to social behavior are more vulnerable or less able to tolerate this overgrowth.”The study, which focuses on the gene phosphatase and tensin homolog (PTEN), was recently published online ahead of print by the journal Human Molecular Genetics.Autism spectrum disorder is a neurodevelopmental disorder involving a range of symptoms and disabilities involving social deficits and communication difficulties, repetitive behaviors and interests, and sometimes cognitive delays. The disorder affects in approximately one percent of the population; some 80 percent of those diagnosed are male.In a previous study, Page and colleagues found that mutations in Pten causes increased brain size and social deficits, with both symptoms being exacerbated by a second “hit” to a gene that regulates levels of the neurotransmitter serotonin in the brain. In the new study, the TSRI team set out to explore whether mutations in Pten result in widespread or localized overgrowth within the brain, and whether changes in brain growth are associated with broad or selective deficits in tests of autism-relevant behaviors in genetically altered mice. The team tested mice for autism spectrum disorder-related behaviors including mood, anxiety, intellectual, and circadian rhythm and/or sleep abnormalities.The researchers found that Pten mutant mice showed altered social behavior, but few other changes—a more subtle change than would have been predicted given broad expression and critical cellular function of the gene.Intriguingly, some of the more subtle impairments were sex-specific. In addition to social impairments, males with the mutated gene showed abnormalities related to repetitive behavior and mood/anxiety, while females exhibited additional circadian activity and emotional learning problems.The results raise the question of how mutations in PTEN, a general regulator of growth, can have relatively selective effects on behavior and cognitive development. One idea is that PTEN mutations may desynchronize the normal pattern of growth in key cell types—the study points to dopamine neurons—that are relevant for social behavior.“Timing is everything,” Page said. “Connections have to form in the right place at the right time for circuits to develop normally. …


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Climate change: Don"t wait until you can feel it

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Despite overwhelming scientific evidence for the impending dangers of human-made climate change, policy decisions leading to substantial emissions reduction have been slow. New work from Carnegie’s Katharine Ricke and Ken Caldeira focuses on the intersection between personal and global impacts. They find that even as extreme weather events influence those who experience them to support policy to address climate change, waiting for the majority of people to live through such conditions firsthand could delay meaningful action by decades. Their findings are published by Nature Climate Change.Nearly every year, extreme weather events such as heat waves and hurricanes spur the discussion of climate change in the media and among politicians. This can create a window of opportunity for those seeking to enact policy aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions. But this window of opportunity could be delayed by decades due to the vagaries of weather.”When support for doing something about climate change is based on personal observations of local weather, policymaking may end up being dictated by the roulette wheel of natural climate variability,” says Ricke.Ricke and Calderia’s modeling studies show that within 50 years nearly every country in the world will experience the kind of extreme weather that can be a policy trigger. However, local natural variability in weather means that majority of people in each nation, particularly large countries like China and the United States, could personally experience these extremes for themselves either tomorrow or many years from now. If citizens do not support emissions reductions and other efforts to fight climate change until they experience extreme events firsthand, naturally-driven variations in weather could delay action by decades, Ricke and Caldeira found. They find that sound science should guide policy rather than the vagaries of weather. “Local weather is anecdotal information, but climate change is sound science,” Caldeira said. …


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Soy-dairy protein blend increases muscle mass, study shows

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A new study published online in the Journal of Applied Physiology shows additional benefits of consuming a blend of soy and dairy proteins after resistance exercise for building muscle mass. Researchers from the University of Texas Medical Branch found that using a protein blend of soy, casein and whey post-workout prolongs the delivery of select amino acids to the muscle for an hour longer than using whey alone. It also shows a prolonged increase in amino acid net balance across the leg muscle during early post-exercise recovery, suggesting prolonged muscle building.The study was conducted by researchers from UTMB in collaboration with DuPont Nutrition and Health. “This study sheds new light on how unique combinations of proteins, as opposed to single protein sources, are important for muscle recovery following exercise and help extend amino acid availability, further promoting muscle growth,” said Blake B. Rasmussen, chairman of UTMB’s Department of Nutrition and Metabolism and lead researcher of the study.This new research, using state-of-the-art methodology, builds on an earlier publication reporting that a soy-dairy blend extends muscle protein synthesis when compared to whey alone, as only the blended protein kept synthesis rates elevated three to five hours after exercise. Together, these studies indicate that the use of soy-dairy blends can be an effective strategy for active individuals seeking products to support muscle health.”Because of the increased demand for high-quality protein, this study provides critical insight for the food industry as a whole, and the sports nutrition market in particular,” said Greg Paul, global marketing director for DuPont Nutrition and Health. “With more and more consumers recognizing the importance of protein for their overall health and well-being, the results of this study have particular relevance to a large segment of the population, from the serious sports and fitness enthusiast to the mainstream consumer.”The double-blind, randomized clinical trial included 16 healthy subjects, ages 19 to 30, to assess if consumption of a blend of proteins with different digestion rates would prolong amino acid availability and lead to increases in muscle protein synthesis after exercise. The protein beverages provided to study subjects consisted of a soy-dairy blend (25 percent isolated DuPont Danisco SUPRO soy protein, 50 percent caseinate, 25 percent whey protein isolate) or a single protein source (whey protein isolate). Muscle biopsies were taken at baseline and up to five hours after resistance exercise. The protein sources were ingested one hour after exercise in both groups.The study demonstrates that consuming a soy-dairy blend leads to a steady rise in amino acids, the building blocks of muscle. …


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