Feature Channels: All Journal News

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Patients who received their first opioid prescription for an ankle sprain treated in U.S. emergency departments commonly received prescriptions for anywhere from 15 to 40 pills, according to new research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Those who received 30 or more pills compared to less than 15 pills were twice as likely to fill an additional opioid prescription within three to six months. The authors say the results point to the urgent need for policies and guidelines to address when opioid medications are indicated for minor injuries and to reduce the number of pills supplied for opioid prescriptions.

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In a study published in Scientific Reports, researchers from Magdeburg University (Germany) and The Chinese University of Hong Kong report that for rats and mice, repetitive transorbital alternating current stimulation (rtACS) may help preserve visual neurons from cell death after injury.

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FDA approves brigatinib as a second-line therapy for ALK-positive non-small cell lung cancer

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Sleep is important, but if there is something more important or interesting to do—for example, taking care of a baby, finishing a grant proposal before a deadline, or reading a fascinating book—we may stay up late. Sleep in fruit flies is a lot like human sleep, and like humans, flies can keep themselves awake if there is something important to do. In research published on May 16th in eLife, researchers report discovery of neurons that allow male fruit flies to suppress sleep so they can court female flies.

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A study at the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) found that a novel device can significantly reduce contamination of blood cultures, potentially reducing risky overtreatment and unnecessary use of antibiotics for many patients. This approach could also substantially reduce healthcare costs, according to the study. Thousands of U.S. patients get their blood drawn every day for blood cultures in order to diagnose serious infections such as sepsis, which can be a deadly condition. A small but significant percentage of the blood cultures are contaminated, due in part to skin fragments containing bacteria that are dislodged during a blood draw. This leads to false results that can mislead clinicians into thinking a patient has a potentially serious bloodstream infection. The consequences are costly and put patients at risk.

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Newswise hosts a virtual live press briefing on upcoming journal study with research results concerning a new blood collection technique that reduces contamination of blood samples and improves treatment outcomes.

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Stop-and-go traffic is typically a source of frustration, an unneccesary hold-up on the path from point A to point B. But when it comes to the molecular machinery that copies our DNA into RNA, a stop right at the beginning of the path may actually be helpful. Recent research from the Stowers Institute for Medical Research shows that this stop prevents another machine from immediately following the first, presumably to better control the traffic and avoid later collisions.

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New study shows that bystander CPR is associated with favorable neurological survival for drowning victims in cardiac arrest

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In a small and preliminary clinical trial, Johns Hopkins researchers and their collaborators have shown that an experimental gene therapy that uses viruses to introduce a therapeutic gene into the eye is safe and that it may be effective in preserving the vision of people with wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

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Scientists for the first time have assembled a "disease in a dish" model that pinpoints how a defect in the blood-brain barrier can produce an incurable psychomotor disorder, Allan-Herndon-Dudley syndrome. The findings point to a path for treating this syndrome and hold promise for analyzing other neurological diseases.

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Paper on immunotherapy for head and neck cancer reports favorable results.

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Increased investment in "pharmacovigilance surveillance"—systems to proactively monitor safety problems with new medications—has the potential to avoid harmful drug effects while lowering healthcare costs, according to a study in the June issue of Medical Care. The journal is published by Wolters Kluwer.

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A Cornell College professor just wrapped up a three-year project to research the story behind one Iowa public school’s struggle to deal with diversity and cultural differences following the initiation of a controversial federal program.

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Workplace bullying victims get plenty of advice on how to respond to the situation and make it stop. While well intentioned, much of the advice is impractical or makes the situation worse. Despite the bad advice, most victims said they would tell others to do the same thing.

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By using induced pluripotent stem cells to create endothelial cells that line blood vessels in the brain for the first time for a neurodegenerative disease, University of California, Irvine neurobiologists and colleagues have learned why Huntington’s disease patients have defects in the blood-brain barrier that contribute to the symptoms of this fatal disorder.

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A new WCS study finds that leopards are abundant in tea-garden landscapes in north-eastern India, but that their mere presence does not lead to conflicts with people.

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Hundreds of thousands of children with chronic illnesses who used to die are now surviving their disease and treatment—which is amazing. But their brains are being damaged in the process of keeping them alive. This first ever research quantifies the IQ impact of six main illnesses and looks and the common threads that connect them. It also takes next steps on how psychologists can team up with surgeons/oncologists, etc. to help treat kids and their parents, so they can thrive in school and life.

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A University of Delaware professor teamed with a local high school student on research that found injured plants will send out warning signals to neighboring plants. The signals are sent through airborne chemicals released mainly from leaves, and plants that received them boosted their defenses.

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Beaumont Research Institute investigators are hopeful that their study involving small molecules in saliva will help identify those at risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

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This electron microscope-based imaging technique could help scientists optimize the performance of ionic liquids for batteries and other energy storage devices.

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The team’s findings, published today in eLife, shed light on how immune cells might be harnessed to someday help stimulate tissue regeneration in humans.

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A team of investigators led by Rohit Kohli, MBBS, MS, of Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, has identified key inflammatory cells involved in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease.

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A University of Colorado Cancer Center clinical trial is now recruiting prostate cancer patients who would otherwise be on a watch-and-wait protocol to test the ability of grape seed extract to slow the rise of prostate-specific antigen (PSA), a common marker of prostate cancer progression.

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Compound could serve as basis for drugs to prevent neurological complications of Zika

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Finding will aid global public health officials as they develop early warning systems for dengue, Zika and chikungunya and find ways to reduce the risk of exposure to disease-carrying mosquitoes.

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Sunscreen can be a valuable tool for skin cancer prevention — but only if it’s used correctly. When applying sunscreen, many people make mistakes that could compromise their protection from the sun’s harmful ultraviolet rays, which may increase their risk of skin cancer.

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A team of scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles have used the cells of AHDS patients to recreate not only the disease, but a mimic of the patient’s blood-brain barrier in the laboratory dish using induced pluripotent stem cell technology.

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Penn Medicine’s Pennsylvania Hospital (PAH) and the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP) have received a three-year, $1.35 million grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Health to design an innovative and replicable program for promoting and evaluating safe sleep practices for newborns. The Philadelphia Safe Sleep Awareness for Every Well Newborn (S.A.F.E.) Program will be rolled out to hospitals, ambulatory care settings, communities, and homes and addresses the population-specific problem through nurse, parent and community education, development and dissemination of practice and education resources, and a community partnership with the Maternity Care Coalition (MCC).

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Researchers at Mayo Clinic have identified a possible cause for a rare infection in heart and lung transplant recipients: the donor. The way in which heart and lung transplant recipients acquired a specific species of bacteria, Mycoplasma hominis, had been previously undefined, and the bacterium was difficult to test. Originally, this bacterium was considered to reside exclusively in, and be a potential pathogen of, the area of the reproductive and urinary organs – the genitourinary tract.

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Can playing video games make you a better writer?

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Most transistors are silicon-based and silicon technology has driven the computer revolution. In some applications, however, silicon has significant limitations. Silicon devices are prone to faltering and failing in difficult environments. Addressing these challenges, Jiangwei Liu, from Japan’s National Institute for Materials Sciences, and his colleagues describe new work developing diamond-based transistors this week in the journal Applied Physics Letters, from AIP Publishing.

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A good reputation can be bad for business, according to new research from the University of Georgia.

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A research team in China have developed a new CESL method that introduces tensile stress into both the channel and the drift region, improving overall performance by offering low drift resistance, high cut-off frequency and desirable breakdown characteristics. Their work is described in an article appearing this week in the journal AIP Advances, from AIP Publishing.

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Researchers have developed a new tool for detecting early pancreatic cancer. The tool bounces light off targeted tissue to detect structural changes in the tissue, a method called light-scattering spectroscopy. The researchers performed a series of pilot studies using LSS and accurately distinguished benign cysts, cancerous cysts, and those with malignancy potential 95 percent of the time. The Harvard University team reported their results in the March 13, 2017, issue of Nature Biomedical Engineering.

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As thyroid cancer rates rise, more people are having surgery to remove all or part of their thyroid. A new study suggests complications from these procedures are more common than previously believed.

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Researchers surveyed individuals entering NYC EDM parties about their drug usage, with almost one out of ten participants who reported no “bath salt” use as per the gate question then reported use of one or more drugs in this class, such as methylone, providing evidence of under-reporting.

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Waste material from the paper and pulp industry soon could be made into anything from tennis rackets to cars. Texas A&M AgriLife Research scientist discovers how to make good quality carbon fiber from lignin waste.

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UF/IFAS researchers have discovered that a mandarin hybrid developed by colleagues contains cellular activity – known as metabolites -- that makes it more able to fend off greening than most other types of citrus.

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A recent study finds that “moral enhancement technologies” – which are discussed as ways of improving human behavior – are neither feasible nor wise, based on an assessment of existing research into these technologies.

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A paper-thin, flexible device created at Michigan State University not only can generate energy from human motion, it can act as a loudspeaker and microphone as well, nanotechnology researchers report in the May 16 edition of Nature Communications.

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Adolescent males of color treated for violent injury and discharged from an urban pediatric emergency department overwhelmingly identified a need for mental health care, according to research from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Violence Intervention Program, published today in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

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Vaccinating pregnant mothers year-round against flu in the resource-challenged region of subtropical Nepal reduced infant flu virus infection rates by an average of 30 percent, increased birth weights by 15 percent and resulted in babies having less influenza, according to a study published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases. An international research team says expanding year-round flu vaccinations during pregnancy would also benefit children in other tropical and subtropical parts of the world.

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When the excruciating pain of a pancreas attack sends someone to the hospital, eating is probably the last thing they’re thinking of. For decades, medical teams have kept such patients away from solid food for days. But new research finds that patients who get food early in their illness may get out of the hospital quicker – without any added risk or problems.

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Lung cancer tumors were prevented in mice by a novel small molecule that directly activates a tumor suppressor protein.

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A new Baylor University study shows that interruptions during work and family time come with consequences and benefits. Researchers offer strategies to build on the benefits.

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Ebola outbreaks are set to be managed quickly and efficiently – saving lives – with a new approach developed by an international team of researchers, including the University of Warwick, which helps to streamline outbreak decision-making.

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The carnivorous humped bladderwort plant, Utricularia gibba, is a sophisticated predator. It uses vacuum pressure to suck prey into tiny traps at speeds less than a millisecond. A new genomic analysis shows that, over millions of years, it repeatedly retained and enhanced genetic material associated with its carnivorous nature. These include genes that facilitate the trapping of prey, the digestion of proteins, and the transport of small bits of protein from one cell to another.

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A diverse group of the world's leading experts in marine conservation is calling for a Hippocratic Oath for ocean conservation ― not unlike the pledge physicians take to uphold specific ethical standards when practicing medicine.

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New diagnoses for two types of skin cancer increased in recent years, according to a Mayo Clinic-led team of researchers.

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Researchers examined the mechanisms of B cell immune reconstitution in pediatric patients who had undergone bone marrow transplantation and discovered a disruption in the maturation of B cells – critical to the immune system – preventing the production of antibodies that fight infection.