Feature Channels: All Journal News

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Researchers from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center have found a startling amount of new information about molecular features of tumors as well as identified previously unknown cancer subtypes based on a comprehensive analysis of 2,579 tumors from breast and four different types of gynecologic cancers. These new findings potentially could serve as a launching pad for future therapeutic studies.

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At the heart of any cancer diagnosis or treatment are cells. If one thinks of the cell components controlling gene activation as a Russian nesting-doll of gene regulatory layers, within those increasingly smaller tiers are short pieces of non-coding DNA called enhancers. A study at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reveals enhancers as a significant area of research for diagnosing and/or treating many cancers.

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By combining data on pathology images of 13 types of cancer and correlating that with clinical and genomic data, researchers are able to identify tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TILs), called TIL maps, which will enable specialists to generate tumor-immune information from pathology slides.

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Cells acquire distinct fates and functions during development. A study from the IMBA reveals a new mechanism of cell fate specification involving the regulation of cell metabolism.

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Researchers nationwide have reached a major milestone in describing the genetic landscape of cancer. Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and other institutions have completed the genetic sequencing and analyses of more than 11,000 tumors from patients, spanning 33 types of cancer — all part of The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) project, funded by the National Cancer Institute and National Human Genome Research Institute.

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In the April 5, 2018 issue of the journal Cell, researchers push for greater emphasis on the neglected viral-surface influenza protein neuraminidase. For decades, flu vaccines have concentrated on hemagglutinin. The authors maintain that a focus on neuraminidase could lower infection rates and lessen severity.

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Conflict, a death in the family, financial hardship and serious medical crises are all associated with accelerated physical aging. In a new study, researchers at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine found that such negative fateful life events — or FLEs — appear to also specifically accelerate aging in the brain.

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For consumers looking to reduce their consumption of meat — particularly due to a greater understanding of the ethical treatment of animals — researchers have analyzed the leading cookbooks of 26 celebrity chefs to offer insight and guidance. Their findings show that not all chefs are what they appear: while some offer recipes that align with their public personas, others show great dissonance in what is said, and what is cooked.

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It’s hard enough for parents to have “the talk” about sexual health with their kids, but parents of LGBTQ children feel especially uncomfortable and unequipped when they try to educate them about sex and dating, reports a new Northwestern Medicine study.The study examined parents’ attitudes toward talking about sexual health with their lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer teens (LGBTQ).

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A study from Indiana University has found differences in the brains of athletes who participate in contact sports compared to those who participate in noncontact sports.

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How do plants “know” it is time to flower? A new study uncovers exactly where a key protein forms before it triggers the flowering process in plants.

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A national working group led by an investigator at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) has developed a Consensus Statement intended to inform safe prescribing of opioids for hospitalized adults with acute pain.

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A blood test may have the potential to speed accurate diagnosis – and proper treatment – of bipolar disorder in children, new research suggests. Researchers found that children with bipolar disorder had higher blood levels of a protein associated with vitamin D compared to children without mood disorders.

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Alcohol use disorder (AUD) is a complex trait, both in its causes and characteristics. Individuals’ sensitivity to alcohol can predict their risk of adverse alcohol outcomes like AUD. Further, AUD runs in families, reflecting in part a genetic component. Alcohol sensitivity includes multiple sub-types whose characteristics (phenotypes) reflect the genetic and environmental factors that interact to produce the disorder. This critical review examines phenotypes related to a person’s response to alcohol, with an emphasis on specific gene variants that potentially impact alcohol sensitivity.

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Rats who were dosed with nicotine during their adolescence grew up to drink alcohol more often than those who weren’t exposed to nicotine or were only exposed to it during adulthood. Exposure to nicotine at a young age changed the neuronal circuitry in the rat brain’s reward pathways

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Through a detailed genetic study of kinship, an international team is the first to demonstrate that just like human societies, beluga whales appear to value culture as well as their ancestral roots and family ties. They have demonstrated that related whales returned to the same locations year after year, and even generation after generation.

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In public-health campaigns to boost support for improvements in the mental health system, messages that link mental illness to violence may be counterproductive, according to a study from researchers at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

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In a review article published April 5 in the New England Journal of Medicine, scientist Andrew Feinberg, M.D., calls for more integration between two fields of DNA-based research: genetics and epigenetics.

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Studying mice and cells from patients, vision researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis found that as immune cells called macrophages get older, they are more likely to contribute to inflammation and abnormal blood vessel growth in the back of the eye. This can damage vision in patients with age-related macular degeneration.

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Kyle Quinn, assistant professor of biomedical engineering at the University of Arkansas, has published a review highlighting recent advances in autofluorescence imaging and discussing its role in evaluating cell metabolism.

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Most aid provided to low- and middle-income countries is focused on controlling communicable diseases, like malaria, HIV, and other infectious diseases. However, according to new comprehensive analysis published April 4 in The Lancet, the focus should really be on controlling non-communicable diseases, like cancer, stroke, and heart disease – which are actually keeping the poorest communities poor, and negatively impacting economic development in these countries.

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In a mouse study, a drug that has helped millions of people around the world manage their diabetes might also help people ready to kick their nicotine habits.

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Findings of a new study organized by the Permafrost Carbon Network (PCN) suggest that putting more effective greenhouse gas controls in place for the rest of this century could help mitigate the effects of climate change on the release of carbon from thawing soils of the northern permafrost region.

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To catch chemistry in action, scientists at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory use the shortest possible flashes of X-ray light to create “molecular movies” that capture the motions of atoms in chemical reactions and reveal new details about the most fundamental processes in nature.

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Poverty increases the risk of death and disability from non-communicable diseases, such as cancer, heart disease, stroke and diabetes in low- and middle-income countries, a new systematic review shows. Researchers also found evidence that developing an NCD increases the risk of falling into poverty in these countries.

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Bubbles are a linchpin of nuclear engineering, helping to explain the natural world, predict safety issues and improve the operation of the existing and next-generation nuclear fleet. High-performance supercomputers like Mira, located at Argonne, are helping researchers understand the phenomena of bubbling behavior more quickly.

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Quantum fluids may mix in very weird ways, according to new computer simulations of exotic states of matter known as Bose-Einstein condensates.

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Marylyn D. Ritchie, PhD, a nationally regarded geneticist and expert in using big data and machine-learning methods to improve human health, has been appointed as director, Center for Translational Bioinformatics, Institute for Biomedical Informatics (IBI) in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania

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People with Parkinson’s disease who show signs of depression may actually have a condition called demoralization, according to a study published in the April 4, 2018, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. That study found demoralization may be common in Parkinson’s disease.

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Survival of childhood cancers dramatically improved through national cooperative group research and care protocols; specialists call for the same model to improve outcomes of early life epilepsies.

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Physical activity has long been known to reduce depression and anxiety, and is commonly prescribed to prevent or cure negative mental health conditions.

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Researchers have learned to combine up to eight different metals in a single tiny, uniformly mixed nanoparticle.

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For children with severe cerebral palsy (CP), surgery for scoliosis (sideways curvature of the spine) significantly improves the quality of life (QoL) for them and their caregivers, reports a study in the April 4, 2018, issue of The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery. The journal is published in partnership with Wolters Kluwer.

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Physicians and researchers at the USC Roski Eye Institute have collaborated with other California institutions to show that a first-in-kind stem cell–based retinal implant is feasible for use in people with advanced dry age-related macular degeneration.

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Ammonia is an essential component of fertilizers that support the world’s food production needs, and currently production relies on non-renewable fossil fuels and has limited applications for only large, centralized chemical plants.

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UNC School of Medicine researchers have identified mutations to the bacterium Neisseria gonnorrhoeae that enable resistance to ceftriaxone that could lead to the global spread of ceftriaxone-resistant “superbug” strains.

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Researchers have developed a radically new approach to growing in the lab adult-like human heart muscle from human induced pluripotent stem cells in only four weeks. They compressed the development timeframe into a faster, more complete transition to cardiac maturity than any other team has done so far. They formed cardiac tissues from early-stage iPSC-derived cardiomyocytes, soon after the initiation of spontaneous contractions, by subjecting the cells encapsulated in hydrogel to increasingly intense physical conditioning.

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Using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers were able to use the same sort of trigonometry that surveyors use to precisely measure the distance to NGC 6397, one of the closest globular clusters to Earth. The only difference is that the angles measured in Hubble’s camera are infinitesimal by earthly surveyors’ standards.

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Researchers are now able to use induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) to form a model of human adult-like cardiac muscle by introducing electric and mechanical stimulation at an early stage.

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Findings suggest humans’ talent for relational learning doesn’t depend on language

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People have a 50 percent higher risk of death if they suffer a shocking financial loss

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An advance by UCLA neuroscientists could lead to a better understanding of astrocytes, a star-shaped brain cell believed to play a key role in neurological disorders like Lou Gehrig’s, Alzheimer’s and Huntington’s disease.

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A mother’s “basic instinct” to grab her wandering offspring and return them to the nest depends on a specific set of brain cell signals, a new study in mice finds.

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超过一半的美国医生表示他们在工作中曾经有过度劳累的问题。 今天，Mayo Clinic和其他领先的医疗中心发表了“医生健康章程”，作为医疗机构的一个 预期模型不仅要最大限度地减少和管理医生的劳累过度，而且还要促进医生的健康福利。 《美国医学会杂志》（JAMA）在线发表了该章程。该章程已经得到许多主要医疗机构（包括美国医学协会和美国医学院协会）的赞成或支持。

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The findings could shed light on sickle cell diseases and other disorders where red blood cells are deformed.

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Cornell researchers have become the first to control atomically thin magnets with an electric field, a breakthrough that provides a blueprint for producing exceptionally powerful and efficient data storage in computer chips, among other applications.

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New study results demonstrate that the use of tourniquets improves survival in civilian trauma victims.

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MRIs show that babies with fragile X syndrome had less-developed white matter compared to infants that did not develop the condition. Imaging various sections of white matter from different angles can help researchers focus on the brain circuitry important for proper neuron communication.

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Tweeting praise or criticism gives you more power - and can pose a greater potential threat - than you may know, according to Michigan State University research. Researchers looked at the "GamerGate" controversy to uncover how one angry social media user inspired thousands to join its movement, amplify its messages, cyberbully innocent users and ultimately get thousands more to participate … without the users even knowing it.

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Climate change could disrupt a critical fueling-up stage for migratory birds just as they’re preparing to depart on their autumn journeys to Central America, according to research published in the journal Ecology Letters.