Valley fever is a fungal respiratory infection that’s stealthily spreading through the soil and dust throughout the American West. An interdisciplinary research team is trying to map where the disease-causing fungus can survive and where it’ll spread as the climate changes.
A conveyer belt of ice jostles the entire Ross Ice Shelf out of place at least once daily, according to new research from Washington University in St. Louis.
The lipids in some herbal teas have been identified in detail for the first time, preparing the ground for investigating their contribution to the health benefits of the teas.
While pacemakers have been instrumental in treating many patients with heart rhythm disorders, their bulky design and dependence on wires can limit their usefulness and poses a risk of heart damage or infection. Researchers have cut the cords, shrunk the size, and expanded the capabilities of current designs.
PPPL researchers have determined the maximum density of uncharged particles at the edge of a plasma before certain instabilities become unpredictable. This is the first time such a level has been established for Lithium Tokamak Experiment-Beta. Knowing this level is a big step in their mission to prove lithium is the ideal choice for an inner-wall coating in a tokamak because it guides them toward the best practices for fueling their plasmas.
A case study on the effects of open waste burning on air quality in Northwestern Greenland calls attention to the importance of no-one-left-behind sustainable air quality monitoring in the Arctic region.
Findings from a National Eye Institute-supported study show for the first time that when babies look at photos of unfamiliar everyday scenes, such as an office or a lab, they tend to fixate on the same regions where adults find meaning. This inclination to home in on what’s interesting or meaningful grows more pronounced as babies age. The findings, published in Infancy, provide a more nuanced understanding of visual development, which may lead to earlier detection of brain-based causes of vision problems, such as cerebral/cortical visual impairment.
National Eye Institute researchers studying human retinas discovered 87 target genes where a mix of environmental factors likely influence one’s risk of developing age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a leading cause of vision loss in people ages 65 and older.
Researchers at the Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, have discovered that a protein called Piezo1 prevents a type of immune cell in the lung from becoming hyperactivated by allergens.
More than half of all new doctors face some form of sexual harassment in their first year on the job, including nearly three-quarters of all new female doctors and a third of males, a new study finds.
Human artificial chromosomes (HACs) capable of working within human cells could power advanced gene therapies, including those addressing some cancers, along with many laboratory applications, though serious technical obstacles have hindered their development.
Using novel genetic and genomic tools, researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai have shed light on the role of immune cells called macrophages in lipid-rich tissues like the brain, advancing our understanding of Alzheimer’s and other diseases.
Finding viable alternatives to traditional petroleum-based plastics and microplastics has never been more important. New research from scientists at UC San Diego and Algenesis shows that their plant-based polymers biodegrade — even at the microplastic level — in under seven months.
Prostate cancer patients receiving care at hospitals that are part of a special drug-pricing program were more likely to stick to their prescription drug therapy than patients at other hospitals, according to a study from researchers at the University of Michigan’s Rogel Cancer Center and Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation.
A multidisciplinary group of NIH-funded scientists have successfully captured real-time, high-resolution images of the developing mouse placenta during the course of pregnancy.
Infectious diseases specialists call the medical field to be ready to deal with the impact of climate change on spreading diseases, such as malaria, Valley fever, E-coli and Lyme disease.
Older Americans who enroll in Medicare, or change their coverage, do so as individuals, even if they’re married or live with a partner. But a new study suggests the need for more efforts to help both members of a couple weigh and choose their options together.
Scientists at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital showed that the MYCN protein promotes a switch in the cellular state within the tumor microenvironment, with slow-growing mesenchymal cells swapping to the more dangerous and faster-growing adrenergic state.
Researchers from St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and The University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center discovered two T-cell receptors in a single patient that recognizes the fusion and can guide T cells to kill all tumor cells carrying the hybrid protein in a mouse model.
Monitoring levels of DNA shed by tumors and circulating in the bloodstream could help doctors accurately assess how gastroesophageal cancers are responding to treatment, and potentially predict future prognosis, suggests a new study led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center and its Bloomberg~Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy.
PPPL’s important work seeding the field of plasma physics was evident from the list of first authors in Physics of Plasmas 2023 Early Career Collection, which included four people from the Lab: Ben Isreali, Stephen Majeski, Ian Ochs and Willca Villafana.
Researchers — including the University of Wisconsin–Madison’s Min Chen and Fa Li — have developed a new model that combines several data sources and uses physics-guided machine learning to more accurately understand methane emissions in the boreal arctic region.
New research has shown that not only are middle-aged Americans lonelier than their same-age peers in Europe, but levels of loneliness are also increasing across generations in the U.S. and Europe.
Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel have identified a yeast that could be used to prevent invasive candidiasis, a major cause of death in hospitalized and immunocompromised patients. The study, to be published March 18 in the Journal of Experimental Medicine (JEM), shows that the novel yeast lives harmlessly in the intestines of mice and humans and can displace the yeast responsible for candidiasis, Candida albicans.
The team taught a group of high schoolers to code by combining cultural research into various embroidery traditions with “computational embroidery.” The method teaches kids to encode embroidery patterns on a computer through a coding language called Turtlestitch.
A recent study observing wild chimpanzees over a period of more than 10 years revealed that when food gets scarcer, the adults put play aside and focus on survival, while mother chimps continue to be their children’s primary playmate – suggesting their indispensable role to foster their young’s physical and social development
The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded SMU engineering professor Digvijay Boob a five-year CAREER grant to pioneer quicker, streamlined solutions that could speed up how AI learns from data to make predictions and decisions.
Targeting a non-encoding stretch of RNA may help shrink tumors caused by an aggressive type of brain cancer in children, according to new research in mice reported March 8 in Cell Reports by Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center investigators.
Soil stores 80 percent of carbon on earth, yet with increasing cycles of drought, that crucial reservoir is cracking and breaking down, releasing even more greenhouse gases creating an amplified feedback loop that could accelerate climate change.
To advance neuromorphic computing, some researchers are looking at analog improvements--advancing not just software, but hardware too. Research from the UC San Diego and UC Riverside shows a promising new way to store and transmit information using disordered superconducting loops.
If left to their own devices, bacteria on our teeth or wounded skin can encase themselves in a slimy scaffolding, turning into what is called biofilm. These bacteria wreak havoc on our tissue and, being shielded from antibiotic medication by the slime, are difficult to dislodge.
Researchers at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities may have discovered a mechanical explanation for instability observed in the lungs in cases of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), particularly in the aftermath of respiratory illnesses such as COVID-19 or pneumonia.
Age-related changes that cause the skin to stiffen and become less elastic may also contribute to higher rates of metastatic skin cancer in older people, according to research by investigators from the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center.
It has been well established that people who live in rural areas in the U.S. are more likely to have diabetes and experience barriers to managing their condition compared to those who live in the suburbs and cities.
Researchers seeks to devise a way to detect lung cancers earlier and more accurately, increasing the likelihood that treatments can slow and cure the disease.
UC San Diego engineers developed a cathode material for lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries that is healable and highly conductive, overcoming longstanding challenges of traditional sulfur cathodes. The advance holds promise for bringing more energy dense and low-cost Li-S batteries closer to market.
Scientists are using the imperfections in magnetic fields that confine a fusion reaction to improve and enhance the plasma in an approach outlined in a new paper in the journal Nature Communications. PPPL Physicist Seong-Moo Yang led the research team, which spans various institutions in the U.S. and South Korea. Yang says this is the first time any research team has validated a systematic approach to tailoring magnetic field imperfections to make the plasma suitable for use as a power source. These magnetic field imperfections are known as error fields.
What if bacteria—which love to grow deep inside tumors—could guide cancer therapies directly to their target? A team of NIH-funded researchers has engineered a bacterial strain to “light up” tumors so that reprogrammed T cells, drawn like a moth to a flame, can find and destroy them. Their preclinical treatment could potentially be effective against any solid tumor type.
Those who report having poor oral health are as likely to have negative long-term systemic health outcomes as those previously diagnosed with periodontal disease, or gum disease, according to a new Tufts University School of Dental Medicine.
Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis trained a machine-learning algorithm to predict accurately brain metastasis using biopsy samples from early-stage non-small cell lung cancer patients. It was also highly accurate in predicting those patients who do not develop metastatic brain tumors.
In a new study, published online today in Scientific Reports, researchers found differences in how people with ICD process the consequences of their actions compared to those without ICD, both on and off medication.
Johns Hopkins Medicine neuroscientists say they have found a new function for the SYNGAP1 gene, a DNA sequence that controls memory and learning in mammals, including mice and humans.
Researchers at the University of Michigan Health Rogel Cancer Center are exploiting a unique biological feature of glioblastoma to gain a better understanding of how this puzzling brain cancer develops and how to target new treatments against it. The team developed human and mouse models of glioblastoma oncostreams and examined multiple factors in the tumor microenvironment that could impact how oncostreams develop and how to reverse them.
Supported by a $2 million R01 grant from the National Institutes of Health, the Auerbach Lab at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology will examine how different genes associated with autism spectrum disorders may similarly impact our brain’s neurons, resulting in heightened sensitivity to sounds.
New research from Steven Goodreau, University of Washington professor of anthropology, shows that condom use has been trending downward among younger gay and bisexual men over the last decade, even when they aren’t taking pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP.