Spotlight News Stories

Whole exome sequencing identifies cause of metabolic disease

Sequencing a patient's entire genome to discover the source of his or her disease is not routine – yet. But geneticists are getting close.

Genetics created 6 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Hearing metaphors activates brain regions involved in sensory experience

When a friend tells you she had a rough day, do you feel sandpaper under your fingers? The brain may be replaying sensory experiences to help understand common metaphors, new research suggests.

Neuroscience created 6 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

US recommends routine HPV vaccination for boys

US health authorities on Friday urged all boys age 11-12 to get a routine vaccination against the most common sexually transmitted disease, human papillomavirus, or HPV.

Health created 11 hours ago | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

New procedure repairs severed nerves in minutes, restoring limb use in days or weeks

American scientists believe a new procedure to repair severed nerves could result in patients recovering in days or weeks, rather than months or years. The team used a cellular mechanism similar to that used by many invertebrates ...

Neuroscience created 17 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (14) | comments 7 | with audio podcast

New technology to tackle treatment-resistant cancers

Free-flowing cancer cells have been mapped with unprecedented accuracy in the bloodstream of patients with prostate, breast and pancreatic cancer, using a brand new approach, in an attempt to assess and control the disease ...

Cancer created 13 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 2 | with audio podcast


Gene related to fat preferences in humans found

A preference for fatty foods has a genetic basis, according to researchers, who discovered that people with certain forms of the CD36 gene may like high-fat foods more than those who have other forms of this gene.

Genetics created 12 hours ago | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Soy isoflavone supplements did not provide breast cancer protections

Soy isoflavone supplements did not decrease breast cancer cell proliferation in a randomized clinical trial, according to a study published in Cancer Prevention Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Resear ...

Cancer created 12 hours ago | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

A new study shows how to boost the power of pain relief, without drugs

(Medical Xpress) -- Placebos reduce pain by creating an expectation of relief. Distraction—say, doing a puzzle—relieves it by keeping the brain busy. But do they use the same brain processes? Neuromaging suggests ...

Psychology & Psychiatry created 16 hours ago | popularity 4 / 5 (2) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

What patients talk about when they talk about doctors

(Medical Xpress) -- An analysis of hundreds of reviews posted to physician-rating sites on the Internet revealed that patients generally give their doctors favorable reviews in this forum. If they complain, it is generally ...

Health created 15 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Diet high in processed meat linked to increased diabetes risk in populations with high diabetes rate

(Medical Xpress) -- Diabetes risk is increased in men and women who eat a diet that is high in processed meats, according to a study published online this week in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.  Processed ...

Health created 16 hours ago | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Could brain size determine whether you are good at maintaining friendships?

(Medical Xpress) -- Researchers are suggesting that there is a link between the number of friends you have and the size of the region of the brain – known as the orbital prefrontal cortex – that ...

Neuroscience created Feb 02, 2012 | popularity 3 / 5 (11) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

Short-term memory is based on synchronized brain oscillations

Scientists have now discovered how different brain regions cooperate during short-term memory.

Neuroscience created Jan 31, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (10) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

Researchers: Societal control of sugar essential to ease public health burden

Sugar should be controlled like alcohol and tobacco to protect public health, according to a team of UCSF researchers, who maintain in a new report that sugar is fueling a global obesity pandemic, contributing to 35 million ...

Health created Feb 01, 2012 | popularity 2.6 / 5 (8) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

Facebook is not such a good thing for those with low self-esteem

(Medical Xpress) -- In theory, the social networking website Facebook could be great for people with low self-esteem. Sharing is important for improving friendships. But in practice, people with low self-esteem seem to behave ...

Psychology & Psychiatry created Jan 31, 2012 | popularity 4.2 / 5 (5) | comments 8 | with audio podcast

Researchers rewrite textbook on location of brain's speech processing center

Scientists have long believed that human speech is processed towards the back of the brain's cerebral cortex, behind auditory cortex where all sounds are received -- a place famously known as Wernicke's area ...

Neuroscience created Jan 30, 2012 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (15) | comments 6 | with audio podcast

Just another pretty face: Professor investigates neural basis of prosopagnosia

For Bradley Duchaine, there is definitely more than meets the eye where faces are concerned.

Psychology & Psychiatry created Feb 01, 2012 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (6) | comments 6 | with audio podcast

Malaria kills twice as many as previously thought: study

New research published in this week's edition of The Lancet shows that malaria kills 1.2 million people worldwide each year: twice as many as previously thought. Furthermore, while many believe most malaria deaths occur ...

Diseases created Feb 02, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Got creative block? Get out of your office and go for a walk

(Medical Xpress) -- The next time you're in need of creative inspiration, try thinking outside the box—or cubicle.

Psychology & Psychiatry created Jan 31, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (5) | comments 4 | with audio podcast

Here is what real commitment to your marriage means

What does being committed to your marriage really mean? UCLA psychologists answer this question in a new study based on their analysis of 172 married couples over the first 11 years of marriage.

Psychology & Psychiatry created Feb 01, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

New study confirms that mom's love good for child's brain

School-age children whose mothers nurtured them early in life have brains with a larger hippocampus, a key structure important to learning, memory and response to stress.

Psychology & Psychiatry created Jan 30, 2012 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (9) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Early intervention may curb dangerous college drinking

The first few weeks of college are a critical time in shaping students' drinking habits. Now Penn State researchers have a tailored approach that may help prevent students from becoming heavy drinkers.

Health created Jan 30, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Engineer builds robot based on crab to remove stomach cancers

(PhysOrg.com) -- In a bit of science that has a genuine wow factor, doctors and a mechanical engineer from Singapore's National University Hospital and Nanyang Technological Institute have teamed together to build a small ...

Research created Feb 02, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 2 | with audio podcast report

New study uncovers probable mechanism underlying resveratrol activity

National Institutes of Health researchers and their colleagues have identified how resveratrol, a naturally occurring chemical found in red wine and other plant products, may confer its health benefits. The authors present ...

Research created Feb 02, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (5) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Gene regulator in brain's executive hub tracked across lifespan

For the first time, scientists have tracked the activity, across the lifespan, of an environmentally responsive regulatory mechanism that turns genes on and off in the brain's executive hub. Among key findings ...

Genetics created Feb 02, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Decoding brain waves to eavesdrop on what we hear

Neuroscientists may one day be able to hear the imagined speech of a patient unable to speak due to stroke or paralysis, according to University of California, Berkeley, researchers.

Neuroscience created Jan 31, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

New evidence touch-sensing nerve cells may fuel 'ringing in the ears'

We all know that it can take a little while for our hearing to bounce back after listening to our iPods too loud or attending a raucous concert. But new research at the University of Michigan Health System ...

Neuroscience created Feb 01, 2012 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (4) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Seeing really is believing

(Medical Xpress) -- Want to know why sports fans get so worked up when they think the referee has wrongly called their team's pass forward, their player offside, or their serve as a fault?

Psychology & Psychiatry created Feb 01, 2012 | popularity 4 / 5 (5) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Scientists demonstrate effective new 'biopsy in a blood test' to detect cancer

Scientists from The Scripps Research Institute, Scripps Health, and collaborating cancer physicians have successfully demonstrated the effectiveness of an advanced blood test for detecting and analyzing circulating ...

Cancer created Feb 02, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Identical twins reveal mechanisms behind aging

In a recent study led by Uppsala University, the researchers compared the DNA of identical (monozygotic) twins of different age. They could show that structural modifications of the DNA, where large or small DNA segments ...

Genetics created Feb 02, 2012 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (13) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Football findings suggest concussions caused by series of hits

A two-year study of high school football players suggests that concussions are likely caused by many hits over time and not from a single blow to the head, as commonly believed.

Health created Feb 02, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

More News Stories

Researchers weigh methods to more accurately measure genome sequencing

Lost in the euphoria of the 2003 announcement that the human genome had been sequenced was a fundamental question: how can we be sure that an individual's genome has been read correctly?

Why two new studies represent important breakthrough in Alzheimer's disease research

Two different research groups have independently made the same important discoveries on how Alzheimer's disease spreads in the brain. The groups' findings have the potential to give us a much more sophisticated understanding ...

Latest illnesses point to raw milk's popularity

(AP) -- An outbreak of bacterial infections on the East Coast illustrates the popularity of raw, unpasteurized milk despite strong warnings from public health officials about the potential danger.

In sub-Saharan Africa, a shorter walk to water saves lives

In the fight against child mortality in the developing world, simple things make a big difference. A new study by Stanford researchers recently published online by the journal Environmental Science and Te ...

Rare mutations may help explain aneurysm in high-risk families

An innovative approach to genome screening has provided clues about rare mutations that may make people susceptible to brain aneurysms, predisposing them to brain bleeds, according to preliminary late-breaking research presented ...

PHYSorg.com

Amazon fungi found that eat polyurethane, even without oxygen

Scientists chart high-precision map of Milky Way's magnetic fields

Renowned physicist invents microscope that can peer at living brain cells

New kind of high-temperature photonic crystal could someday power everything from smartphones to spacecraft

Hackers intercept FBI, Scotland Yard call (Update)

Discovery of extremely long-lived proteins may provide insight into cell aging

Scientists snare 'superprawn' off New Zealand

Photovoltaic panels made from plant material could become a cheap alternative to traditional solar cells

Searching for a solid that flows like a liquid

Coral growth in Western Australia found to be thriving in warmer water


New drug doesn't improve disability among stroke patients

A new drug that showed promise in animal studies and an early clinical trial didn't improve disability among stroke patients, according to late-breaking research presented at the American Stroke Association's International ...

New device performs better than old for removing blood clots

An experimental blood clot-removing device outperformed the FDA-approved MERCI; retriever device, according to late-breaking science presented at the American Stroke Association's 2012 International Stroke Conference.

Lower levels of sunlight link to allergy and eczema

Increased exposure to sunlight may reduce the risk of both food allergies and eczema in children, according to a new scientific study published this week.

Researcher says six factors can help you lead a longer, better life

(Medical Xpress) -- Spanish explorer Ponce de León searched for the "Fountain of Youth" in hopes of finding eternal life. And while Peter Martin, director of Iowa State University's gerontology program, ...

Decoding keys to a healthy life

For 74 years, one of the longest-running studies of normal adult development has been examining not disease and illness, but what may be life’s magic question: How can you live long and happy?

Dieting with the denomination, determination

As a brand new year gets underway, people all over America are resolving to better manage their weight and have a more healthy 2012. According to a new study, those starting new weight loss programs may be surprised to find ...

Climate-change effects on malaria risk

A new study suggests that climate change, driven by greenhouse-gas emissions and land-use changes, will cause patterns of malaria infection to change over the next 50 years.

Lifestyle changes can help prevent 30% of cancers: WHO

More than 30 percent of cancers can be prevented by lifestyle changes, the World Health Organization said Friday, on the eve of World Cancer Day.


Surface of Mars an unlikely place for life after 600 million year drought, say scientists

Japanese entrepreneurs aim for Silicon Valley

Global extinction: Gradual doom is just as bad as abrupt

Collective action: Occupied genetic switches hold clues to cells' history

Mission to land on a comet

Genetic information migrates from plant to plant

Classic portrait of a barred spiral galaxy

EU probes new Google privacy policy

NASA's Juno spacecraft refines its path to Jupiter

Do black holes help stars form?

Dry conditions spurred advanced photosynthesis

Repulsive gravity as an alternative to dark energy (Part 2: In the quantum vacuum)

Repulsive gravity as an alternative to dark energy (Part 1: In voids)

New super-earth detected within the habitable zone of a nearby star

Wireless power could revolutionize highway transportation, researchers say

Engineers build first sub-10-nm carbon nanotube transistor


Depression link to heart disease not affected by medication

People with major depression and anxiety are 75% more likely to have a heart rate condition linked to cardiovascular disease – regardless of whether they are taking antidepressants, new research shows.

'Gatekeeper' protein helps immune cells to sound a warning after encountering signs of tumor growth or infection

When the body’s own cells turn into ticking time bombs, as in cases of viral infection or cancerous transformation, a mechanism known as ‘cross-presentation’ enables the immune system’s ...

New technique successfully dissolves blood clots in the brain and lowers risk of brain damage after stroke

(Medical Xpress) -- Johns Hopkins neurologists report success with a new means of getting rid of potentially lethal blood clots in the brain safely without cutting through easily damaged brain tissue or removing large pieces ...

Kids heading for diabetes could change their future

(Medical Xpress) -- New research suggests exercise early in life could fend off diabetes and heart disease, even for those predisposed to such diseases.

Fall monitoring device could end standoffs, keep seniors safer

(Medical Xpress) -- It’s a scenario played out all too frequently: Adult children, worried about the safety of their aging parents, foist devices on them to monitor their safety. And their parents, resentful ...

Targeting tumors may help stop spread of breast, other cancers

(Medical Xpress) -- Cancer that has spread from the site of an original tumor to other places in the body is often viewed as a death sentence. But if there are just a few of those secondary tumors, called metastases, some ...

Regular use of vitamin and mineral supplements could reduce the risk of colon cancer: study

Could the use of vitamin and mineral supplements in a regular diet help to reduce the risk of colon cancer and protect against carcinogens? A study published in the Canadian Journal of Physiology and Pharmacology (CJPP) found that ra ...

We are getting fatter, whichever way we turn

We are getting fatter - no matter which way we look at it, a Deakin University analysis of two popular obesity testing methods has found.

Coughing and other respiratory symptoms improve within weeks of smoking cessation

If the proven long-term benefits of smoking cessation are not enough to motivate young adults to stop smoking, a new study shows that 18- to 24-year olds who stop smoking for at least two weeks report substantially ...

Komen drops plans to cut Planned Parenthood grants

(AP) -- The Susan G. Komen for the Cure breast-cancer charity on Friday abandoned plans to eliminate grants to Planned Parenthood. The startling decision came after three days of virulent criticism that resounded across ...

Schooling protects fleeing children from disease

Refugee children have scant access to medical care and are particularly vulnerable to disease. Fresh research results from the University of Copenhagen show that just a few hours of schooling a week may have a pronounced ...

World Cancer Day points to prevention

Health care organizations from around the globe will come together on Saturday, Feb. 4 to promote cancer prevention as part of this year's World Cancer Day.


Mouse to elephant? Just wait 24 million generations

Airborne robot swarms are making complex moves (w/ video)

Self-guided bullet prototype can hit target a mile away

Quantum physicists shed new light on relation between entanglement and nonlocality

Earth's energy budget remained out of balance despite unusually low solar activity

Food crops damaged by pollution crossing continents

Climate-driven heat peaks may shrink wheat crops

Northern forests may be losing their ability to trap carbon

Researchers move graphene electronics into 3D

Brain capacity limits exponential online data growth

Hubble zooms in on a magnified galaxy

Scientists rediscover self-healing silicone mechanism from the 1950s

Astronomers solve mystery of vanishing energetic electrons in Earth's outer radiation belt

Australia -- land of the koala, kangaroo... and elephant

First plants caused ice ages: research

NASA hopes to test new spaceship in 2014

Nasa study solves case of Earth's 'missing energy'

UT biosolar breakthrough promises cheap, easy green electricity

Blip in night sky tells story of cosmic catastrophe

Driving the green: New study suggests that electric-powered trucks will save money for businesses

New study may answer questions about enigmatic Little Ice Age

Sexual healing? Not likely

Solar eclipse over the USA

Pythons apparently wiping out Everglades mammals

Archaeologists discover unique 'wing' shaped building

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