Focus: Hidden - Missouri

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A team of researchers from Washington University in St. Louis have helped discover a new chemical method to immobilize uranium in contaminated groundwater, which could lead to more precise and successful water remediation efforts at former nuclear sites.Researchers in the lab of Daniel Giammar, the Walter E. Browne Professor of Environmental Engineering in the School of Engineering & Applied Science, ran a series of experiments in a laboratory setting using water containing uranium — present in contaminated groundwater at various sites in the United States as a legacy of Cold War-era processing and waste disposal activities associated with nuclear materials production.

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Elizabeth Loboa, dean of the MU College of Engineering, and her team recently tested new methods to make the process of tissue engineering more cost effective and producible in larger quantities. Tissues could help patients suffering from wounds caused by diabetes and circulation disorders, patients in need of cartilage or bone repair and to women who have had mastectomies by replacing their breast tissue.

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Researchers from the University of Missouri (MU) report high levels of EDC activity in the surface water near a hydraulic fracturing wastewater disposal facility in West Virginia. Scientists warn that this level of activity may be associated with negative health effects in aquatic organisms, other animals and humans.

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Agencies that serve people with HIV in the U.S. are at the forefront of delivering medical care, shelter, psycho-social counseling and other services to their vulnerable clients. These services are offered through a mix of different types of agencies, including local health departments, state government agencies, non-profits and faith-based organizations. Collaboration among these various entities is essential for holistically serving the needs of their clients. Now, a University of Missouri researcher has published two studies after studying collaboration among these types of agencies in Baltimore, a severely HIV-affected city. Her research offers suggestions for improving HIV prevention, treatment and care and provides an innovation in measuring collaboration among agencies.

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On April 5, Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant signed into law House Bill 1523, a controversial “religious freedom” bill, which says that the state government cannot punish public employees, social service providers and businesses that refuse to provide services to people because of a religious opposition.

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The University of Missouri Sinclair School of Nursing today announced they have received nearly $20 million in funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Centers for Medicare &Medicaid Services (CMS) to expand their Missouri Quality Initiative for Nursing Homes. Through this program the Sinclair School of Nursing is working to create a national model for senior care and significantly reduce national health care spending.

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The August 2014 death of unarmed Michael Brown at the hands of Ferguson, Mo., police officer Darren Wilson captivated the nation and touched off a heated debate about the nature of law enforcement in the United States.A new book edited by Kimberly Norwood, professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis School of Law, and of African & African American Studies in Arts & Sciences, explores the underlying fault lines that cracked and gave rise to the eruption in Ferguson.

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According to the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, a torn anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL, is one of the most common knee injuries. Approximately 200,000 Americans experience a torn ACL each year, and more than half undergo surgical repairs. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri School of Medicine have developed a model to show that a newer surgical technique results in a stronger, more natural ACL repair.

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A research team at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has established a mouse model for testing of vaccines and therapeutics to battle Zika virus. The mouse model mimics aspects of the infection in humans, with high levels of the virus seen in the mouse brain and spinal cord and in the testes of male mice.

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Cell size is a critical trait for improved yields of algal biofuels

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A Saint Louis University scientist, Jane McHowat, Ph.D., will study how smoking impacts cardiac health beyond injury to the body’s arteries by damaging the heart muscle itself.

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The number of health information technology venders has increased from 60 to more than 1,000 since 2008. However, many scholars have expressed concerns that such services are flooding the market without proper development, making hospitals more susceptible to adopting dysfunctional IT systems that are not geared toward the original goal of improving patient care. Now, a University of Missouri School of Medicine researcher has identified three IT capabilities hospitals should have that lead to higher rates of employee productivity and flexibility. The researcher said greater employee productivity leads to improved patient care in U.S. hospitals.

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For more than 80 years scientists have thought that cancer cells fuel their explosive growth by soaking up glucose from the blood, using its energy and atoms to crank out duplicate sets of cellular components. But is this really true? Work in a metabolomics laboratory at Washington University in St. Louis suggests not.

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According to the World Health Organization, 37 million people are living with HIV. Antiviral medications are used to control the disease and prevent its progression to AIDS. Although antivirals improve health and increase survival for people with HIV, their use also has been linked to the development of cardiovascular disease. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri School of Medicine have identified an enzyme that may reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease caused by HIV medications.

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In the paper, SLU scientist Alessandro Vindigni, Ph.D., details several coping strategies cells use when they face replication stress: the cellular version of choosing yoga, meditation or a trip to the movies after a stressful event.

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Alexandra Asaro, a graduate student at Washington University in St. Louis has been named the 2016 William H. Danforth Plant Science Fellow.

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Viruses that infect bacteria are among the most abundant life forms on Earth. Indeed, our oceans, soils and potentially even our bodies would be overrun with bacteria were it not for bacteria-eating viruses, called bacteriophages, that keep the microbial balance of ecological niches in check.

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April is Autism Awareness Month, an opportunity to promote autism awareness and acceptance for the tens of thousands who are facing an autism diagnosis. With one in 68 children living with autism in the U.S., the need for awareness and research is significant. Stephen Kanne, assistant professor and executive director of the Thompson Center for Autism and Neurodevelopmental Disorders at the University of Missouri says early detection and ongoing research are key in helping those living with autism.

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Funded by Ultragenyx Pharmaceuticals, Saint Louis University’s Fran Sverdrup, Ph.D., will continue promising research to find a treatment for a form of muscular dystrophy.

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More and more physicians are becoming parents during their medical residency training. While most residency programs offer support for resident physicians during pregnancy, no formal ways to support parenting residents exist beyond the immediate birth of their children. Following a recent study of conflicts with work and family life, a University of Missouri School of Medicine researcher suggests that supportive residency training programs are needed to assist physicians who are managing demanding work and personal lives.

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SLU scientists identify a group of proteins as new and important players in the mechanism that causes pancreatic scarring, which is associated with chronic pancreatitis.

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An engineering team at Washington University in St. Louis developed a cellular kill switch, a sensor that rewards hard working cells and eliminates their lazy counterparts. The high-tech engineering fix could help improve production of biofuels and pharmaceuticals.

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A Washington University in St. Louis engineer has found a new way to control chemical oscillation that could help regulate biorhythms involving the heart, brain and circadian cycles.

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For the first time, researchers at the Stowers Institute have mapped where recombination occurs across the whole genome of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster after a single round of meiosis.

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Patients with a rare, genetic form of diabetes often are misdiagnosed as having type 2 diabetes because the two share symptoms. But new research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis suggests that treating such patients with therapies designed for type 2 diabetes is potentially harmful and that treatment guidelines need to change.

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President Barack Obama’s nomination to the Supreme Court, Judge Merrick Garland, could make senate Republicans think twice about stonewalling the nomination process, especially as the presidential election nears, said Greg Magarian, constitutional law expert at the School of Law at Washington University in St. Louis.“President Obama may have decided that the Democratic candidates didn’t need a nomination fight to animate the base,” Magarian said.

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Intimate partner violence (IPV), has become a prevalent health care issue. Instances of assault, battery, rape, stalking and emotional abuse in relationships can be difficult for nurses to handle as they often lack the appropriate training to feel confident enough to screen patients for IPV. A new training program developed in the Sinclair School of Nursing at the University of Missouri, provides a powerful tool to better equip nurses in assisting victims of IPV. The Sinclair School of Nursing is the first program in the U.S. to implement such a simulation in their undergraduate curriculum, and the results from the program indicate it could become a national model for training nurses.

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While cynics may scoff at the United Nations'; March 20 observance of International Happiness Day, a positive psychology researcher at Washington University in St. Louis says it's high time for happiness to be taken seriously. "Happier people live longer, get sick less often, are more productive at work, more engaged in their communities, more likely to help those in need, and enjoy higher-quality relationships." said Tim Bono, who teaches courses on the psychology of happiness in Arts & Sciences at Washington University.

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Hearing loss is the third most common chronic illness for older adults. It can impact everyday life and can significantly affect a person’s health and safety if gone untreated. Hearing aids are the most common treatment for hearing loss. However, in 2005 more than 325,000 hearing aids, less than four years old were unused according to a previous study in the Hearing Journal. Now, a new hearing aid adjustment program created by Kari Lane, assistant professor at the Sinclair School of Nursing at the University of Missouri, may help increase hearing aid use for those who need them.

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Research shows that bacteria can be beneficial to body processes such as digestion; however, some bacteria housed in the human body may cause disease. These specialized communities of bacteria in the body are known as microbiomes. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri have discovered a microbiome in the male reproductive tract in mice that harbors harmful bacteria. In fathers, some bacteria may initiate diseases, such as prostatitis, that can result in later prostate cancer.

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A new data sharing consortium is helping scientists more quickly share and benefit from findings in their field.

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According to the American Heart Association, ischemic strokes account for nearly 90 percent of all strokes. They occur when a blocked artery prevents blood from getting to the brain and usually result in long-term disability or death. Now, a team of researchers led by the University of Missouri School of Medicine has developed a new, real-time method of imaging molecular events after strokes ― a finding that may lead to improved care for patients.

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Modern genetic tools could save an ancient icon of the Mojave

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Ajay Jain, M.D., a pediatric hepatologist and gastroenterologist, received a $703,620 grant from the National Institutes of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases to continue studying strategies for PN-associated injury.

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Approximately 14 percent of men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer at some point in their lifetimes, according to the National Institutes of Health. Radiation therapy traditionally has been a primary treatment for the cancer, but one-fourth of men have a recurrence of prostate cancer within five years after the therapy. Now, a University of Missouri School of Medicine researcher has found that a complex procedure to remove the prostate achieves excellent long-term survival for men after radiation therapy has failed.

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As the Republican Party continues to roll toward selecting its presidential nominee, some party leaders and members of the media have begun to speculate about the possibility of a brokered convention.Such a move almost certainly would hurt the Republicans in the general election, said election law and constitutional law expert Greg Magarian, professor of law at Washington University in St.

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Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis's Olin Business School found that scheduling takes the fun out of free time.

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An imbalance of certain gut microbes appears to be the underlying cause of a frequently fatal intestinal illness in premature babies, according to new research led by Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

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Understanding non-homeostatic eating — or eating that is driven more by palatability, habit and food cues — and how it works in the brain may help neuroscientists determine how to control cravings, maintain healthier weights and promote healthier lifestyles. Scientists at the University of Missouri recently discovered the chemical circuits and mechanisms in the brain that separate food consumption from cravings. Knowing more about these mechanisms could help researchers develop drugs that reduce overeating.

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A new study of gut bacteria in premature infants reveals the vast scope of the problem of antibiotic resistance and gives new insight into the extreme vulnerability of these young patients, according to researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

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As scientists look for replacements for our dwindling stock of antibiotics, the evolution of resistance is never far from their minds. Washington University in St. Louis biologist R. Fredrik Inglis explored the ability of bacteria to become resistant to a toxin called a bacteriocin by growing them for many generations in the presence of the toxin.

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A new study from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has identified two genes that, when altered in specific ways, either promote or undermine cardiovascular health. The findings may help guide efforts to design new preventive drugs, similar to the way statins now are prescribed to lower “bad” cholesterol to reduce the risk of heart disease.

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Jianlin Cheng has been in the business of protein structure prediction since before coming to the University of Missouri College of Engineering in 2007. And thanks to new funding from the National Institutes of Health, he’s looking at ways to take his research even further. Cheng, an associate professor of computer science, and his co-PI — John Tanner, professor of biochemistry at MU — recently received a four-year, $1.3 million grant from NIH (project number 2R01GM093123-05A1) to continue their research on integrated prediction and validation of protein structures.

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A new poverty risk calculator, co-developed by Mark Rank of the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis, can determine an individual's risk of poverty based on four basic factors: race, education, marital status and age.

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New research sheds light on how the rhythms of daily life are encoded in the brain. Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have discovered that different groups of neurons, those charged with keeping time, become active at different times of day despite being on the same molecular clock.

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Sleep may be one of the most important factors for well-being; yet, according to the CDC, one in three adults does not get enough. Lack of sleep can lead to potential cognitive declines, chronic diseases and death. Now, research from the University of Missouri finds that older adults who have trouble sleeping, could benefit from participating in social activities, in particular attending religious events.

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According to the CDC, approximately one in 68 children is diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) each year. These children have difficulties with social communication and social interaction and require specific interventions in terms of education and health care. The Training Experts in Autism for Missouri (TEAM) program run by Jena Randolph and Karen O’Connor, assistant research professors in the Thompson Center for Autism and Neurodevelopmental Disorders at the University of Missouri, is making significant strides to implement quality training for educators and health professionals working with children with autism across Missouri.

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Fluoroscopy makes guiding a catheter through a blood vessel possible. However, fluoroscopy, a form of real-time moving X-ray, also exposes the patient to radiation. Now, a University of Missouri School of Medicine researcher has evaluated technology that may be used to replace fluoroscopy, eliminating the need for X-ray during cardiac ablation procedures.

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When judging the character of a friend, co-worker or potential romantic partner, pay attention to little acts of kindness or cruelty because these are likely part of a consistent behavioral pattern, suggests new research from Washington University in St. Louis.

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Extreme heat can pose several health risks, such as dehydration, hyperthermia and even death, especially during sustained periods of high temperatures. However, a uniform definition of a heat wave doesn’t exist. As a result, public health agencies may be unsure of when to activate heat alerts, cooling centers and other protective measures. A University of Missouri School of Medicine researcher has developed a uniform definition of a heat wave that may help public health agencies prepare for extreme temperatures.