Focus: Hidden - Utah

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Researchers at the University of Utah School of Medicine and ARUP Laboratories in Salt Lake City unravel the mystery behind a rare Zika-related death in an adult, and unconventional transmission to a second patient in a correspondence published online on September 28 in the New England Journal of Medicine. Details point to an unusually high concentration of virus in the first patient’s blood as being responsible for his death. The phenomenon may also explain how the second patient may have contracted the virus by casual contact with the primary patient, the first such documented case.

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Utah’s iconic Rainbow Bridge hums with natural and man-made vibrations, according to a new University of Utah study, published September 21 in Geophysical Research Letters. The study characterizes the different ways the bridge vibrates and what frequencies and energy sources cause the rock structure to resonate. The vibrations are small, according to geology and geophysics professor Jeff Moore, but the study provides a baseline measure of the bridge’s structural integrity and shows how human activities can rattle solid rock.

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New analysis unveiled today by University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law professor Christopher L. Peterson outlines why there is a legally sufficient case to impeach Donald Trump under the U.S. Constitution on charges related to fraud and racketeering for prior conduct if he is elected president.

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The Huntsman Center for Health Outcomes and Population Equity (HOPE) will focus on discovering new ways to prevent and treat cancer among underserved populations.

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Bucking national trends, a new study reports on a program that is making a difference in healthcare quality and cost. Developed by University of Utah Health Care (UUHC), the so-called value driven outcomes (VDO) program breaks down health procedure costs to the level of each bandage and minutes of nursing time. After addressing inefficiencies exposed in three common procedures - joint replacement, in-hospital laboratory testing, and sepsis management – patients fared better and costs fell by up to 11 percent. The results were published online in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) on Sept. 13.

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University of Utah researchers have found that the structure of an insulin molecule produced by predatory cone snails may be an improvement over current fast-acting therapeutic insulin.

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Loss of megaherbivores such as elephants and hippos can allow woody plants and non-grassy herbs and flowering plants to encroach on grasslands in African national parks, according to a new University of Utah study, published September 12 in Scientific Reports.

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Computer scientists from the University of Utah will be working with researchers from New York University’s Tandon School of Engineering and the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) to develop OpenSpace, an open-source 3-D software for visualizing NASA astrophysics, heliophysics, planetary science and Earth science missions for planetariums and other immersive environments. The software also will be developed for use in schools and on home computers.

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A factor found in umbilical cord blood could become the basis for developing new drugs to fight harmful inflammation, University of Utah School of Medicine researchers report. When given to mice, the newly discovered factor countered signs of inflammation and sepsis, such as fever, fluctuations in respiratory rate, and death. The factor circulates in the blood of newborns for about two weeks after birth and is not found in older babies or adults, according to the study published online Sept. 6, 2016, in The Journal of Clinical Investigation.

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Squirting a simple saline solution into the nose twice a day could alleviate chronic nosebleeds just as effectively as spraying with any one of three different medications, reports a study led by Kevin Whitehead, M.D., F.A.H.A., at the University of Utah School of Medicine and published online in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). The research highlights that there could be benefit to even the simplest of interventions.

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A major new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association shows that delivering integrated mental and physical healthcare in team-based primary care settings at Intermountain Healthcare results in better clinical outcomes for patients, lower rates of healthcare utilization, and lower costs.

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The building, which marks its first anniversary on Aug. 31, received the certification this month as result of its sustainability features and green design. The law school is currently the highest achieving LEED platinum higher education project in Utah based on the number of points award by green building evaluators.

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Contrary to traditional expectations of unbalanced sex ratios, places with more men than women do not typically experience higher rates of family and social instability, according to a University of Utah study.

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The new testing method is a significant improvement for patients because it utilizes a simple blood sample, eliminating the need for a much more invasive lung biopsy that was previously required to test for the genetic mutation.

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The research is among the first compelling evidence that such face-to-face serious games can foster social learning and cultivate shifts in people’s perspectives and attitudes about complex public policy and planning issues, such as climate change adaptation.

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McCormack worked on planning for security issues on a committee for the 2002 Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, Utah. He is also a legal scholar who has done work on global justice and terrorism issues.

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University of Utah anthropologists counted the number of carbon-dated artifacts at archaeological sites and concluded that a population boom and scarce food explain why people in eastern North America domesticated plants for the first time on the continent about 5,000 years ago.

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The University of Utah joins Vanderbilt, Duke universities in effort to make clnical trials more efficient and get translational research into clinical use faster.

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New study of patients who survive Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) finds their subsequent quality of life has more to do with lifestyle factors than how sick they were in the hospital.

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Engineers from the University of Utah and the University of Minnesota have discovered that interfacing two particular oxide-based materials makes them highly conductive, a boon for future electronics that could result in much more power-efficient laptops, electric cars and home appliances that also don’t need cumbersome power supplies.

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NantHealth, Inc., (Nasdaq: NH), a leading next-generation, evidence-based, personalized healthcare company, today announced that it has partnered with the University of Utah in analyzing the entire genomic profiles of at least 1,000 individuals who have a history of rare and life-threatening diseases and conditions in their respective families. The landmark project will focus on researching the genetic causes of 25 conditions, including, breast, colon, ovarian, and prostate cancers, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), chronic lymphocytic leukemia, autism, preterm birth, epilepsy, and other hereditary conditions. Genomic sequencing will be conducted with unique, comprehensive molecular tests offered by NantHealth.

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Unfortunately, loss of plant and animal habitat leads to local species extinctions and a loss of diversity from ecosystems. Fortunately, not all of the extinctions occur at once. Conservation actions may still be able to save threatened species, according to William Newmark, a vertebrate zoologist at the Natural History Museum of Utah at the University of Utah.

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New Wikipedia-like web site created by University of Utah alumnus aims to better connect legal resources to those who need it —while also giving law students around the country a fresh way to improve their legal research and writing skills in the classroom.

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University of Utah Distinguished Professor Gerald Stringfellow, a former dean of the U’s College of Engineering and a pioneer in LED technology, has been awarded a top research prize for his career-long work in the process for making light-emitting diodes, an important milestone for LED TVs, cellphone screens, high-efficiency solar cells, computer monitors and a new wave of LED light bulbs.

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University of Utah School of Computing professor Sneha Kumar Kasera and his team of researchers are tasked with creating a system that allows cellphone and laptop users to help detect and locate someone who is stealing bandwidth on radio frequency waves.

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How much water does your lawn really need? A University of Utah study re-evaluated lawn watering recommendations by measuring water use by lawns in Los Angeles. The standard model of turfgrass water needs, they found, lacked precision in some common urban southern California conditions, like the Santa Ana winds, or in the shade.

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University of Utah mathematicians showed it is theoretically possible to design ideal climbing ropes to safely slow falling rock and mountain climbers like brakes decelerate a car. They hope someone develops a material to turn theory into reality.

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Doctors and scientists at Intermountain Medical Center in Salt Lake City printed and used a 3D kidney to help save a patient's organ during a complicated tumor-removal procedural.

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University of Utah biologists working in Turkey discovered two surprising facts about a group of 16 brown bears: First, six of the bears seasonally migrated between feeding and breeding sites, the first known brown bears to do so. Second, and more sobering, the other 10 bears stayed in one spot all year long: the city dump.

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Vocal cords are able to produce a wide range of sound frequencies because of the larynx’s ability to stretch vocal cords and the cords’ molecular composition.

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University of Utah materials science and engineering associate professor Mike Scarpulla and senior scientist Kirstin Alberi of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory have developed a theory that adding light during the manufacturing of semiconductors — the materials that make up the essential parts of computer chips, solar cells and light emitting diodes (LEDs) — can reduce defects and potentially make more efficient solar cells or brighter LEDs.

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Natural selection favors people who help close kin at their own expense: It can increase the odds the family’s genes are passed to future generations. But why assist distant relatives? Mathematical simulations by a University of Utah anthropologist suggest “socially enforced nepotism” encourages helping far-flung kin.

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When new HIV particles bud from an infected cell, the enzyme protease activates to help the viruses infect more cells. Modern AIDS drugs control the disease by inhibiting protease. Now, University of Utah researchers showed that if they delay the budding of new HIV particles, protease itself will destroy the virus instead of helping it spread. That that might lead to new AIDS drugs in a decade.

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New research from University of Utah researcher Nicholas H. Wolfinger explores counterintuitive trends in the link between premarital sex and marital stability.

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On Wednesday, June 8 and Thursday, June 9 U Honors College Dean Sylvia Torti will be in Southern California for two alumni gathering and student recruitment events. Torti can be reached by media to discuss the value of a college degree, deeply-engaged learning experiences for undergraduates and providing students with unique, hands-on experiences through Praxis Labs, which are year-long, project-based courses at the U's Honors College.

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Eye cancer took the life of author and neurologist Oliver Sacks last year, bringing attention to the rare, hard-to-treat disease. Now, a team led by scientists at Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah report in Cancer Cell that a mutation that causes the cancer relies on a protein, ARF6, to distribute cancer-promoting signals. Further, treatment with a drug made against the protein inhibits eye tumors formation.

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A Utah mountainside collapsed 4,800 years ago in a gargantuan landslide known as a “rock avalanche,” creating the flat floor of what is now Zion National Park by damming the Virgin River to create a lake that existed for 700 years.

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Scientists at the University of Utah, ARUP Laboratories, and IDbyDNA, Inc., have developed ultra-fast, meta-genomics analysis software called Taxonomer that dramatically improves the accuracy and speed of pathogen detection. In a paper published today in Genome Biology, the collaborators demonstrated the ability of Taxonomer to analyze the sequences of all nucleic acids in a clinical specimen (DNA and RNA) and to detect pathogens, as well as profile the patient’s gene expression, in a matter of minutes.

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Spring snowpack, relied on by ski resorts and water managers throughout the Western United States, may be more vulnerable to a warming climate in coming decades, according to a new University of Utah study.

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Older Americans with some hearing loss shouldn’t feel alone if they have trouble understanding British TV sagas like “Downton Abbey.” A small study from the University of Utah suggests hearing-impaired senior citizens have more trouble than young people comprehending British accents when there is background noise.