http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress provides the latest news from University of Massachusetts Amherst (Medical Xpress)—In one of the earliest experiments using a humanoid robot to deliver speech and physical therapy to a stroke patient, researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst saw notable speech and physical therapy gains and significant improvement in quality of life. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-03-robot-delivered-speech-physical-therapy.html Medical research Thu, 21 Mar 2013 08:23:30 EST news283072996 Women who reported eating a diet rich in iron were 30 to 40 percent less likely to develop pre-menstrual syndrome (PMS) than women who consumed lower amounts, in a study reported this week by researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst School of Public Health and Health Sciences and Harvard. It is one of the first to evaluate whether dietary mineral intake is associated with PMS development. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-women-iron-intake-pre-menstrual-syndrome.html Obstetrics & gynaecology Tue, 26 Feb 2013 10:00:01 EST news281090929 Recently, large studies have identified some of the genetic basis for important common diseases such as heart disease and diabetes, but most of the genetic contribution to them remains undiscovered. Now researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst led by biostatistician Andrea Foulkes have applied sophisticated statistical tools to existing large databases to reveal substantial new information about genes that cause such conditions as high cholesterol linked to heart disease. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-biostatisticians-genes-linked-heart-disease.html Genetics Wed, 06 Feb 2013 17:00:01 EST news279387816 (Medical Xpress)—Until recently, medical researchers had little hope of experimentally manipulating naïve T cells to study their crucial roles in immune function, because they were largely impenetrable, says polymer scientist Gregory Tew: "So far off limits we could not readily get inside to investigate their workings." http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-scores-advance-t-cells.html Medical research Thu, 11 Oct 2012 12:47:45 EST news269178411 University of Massachusetts Amherst researchers, experts in revealing molecular structure by X-ray crystallography, have identified two new small "chaperone" molecules that may be useful in treating the inherited metabolic disorder known as Schindler/Kanzaki disease. This offers hope for developing the first ever drug treatment for this very rare disease. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-biochemists-path-molecular-chaperone-therapy.html Medical research Tue, 09 Oct 2012 10:38:50 EST news268997920 Shelly Peyton, a chemical engineer at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, says scientists know that breast cancer will spread to many different types of tissues in the body, and that this migration is the key reason the cancer is deadly. What they don't know is why some forms of the cancer move to the brain, while others seek out bone or lung tissues. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-10-chemical-breast-cancer-bone-brain.html Cancer Wed, 03 Oct 2012 07:46:01 EST news268469114 Parents may feel it's clear that missing a nap means their young children will be grumpy and out-of-sorts, but scientists who study sleep say almost nothing is known about how daytime sleep affects children's coping skills and learning. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-preschool-naps.html Health Fri, 14 Sep 2012 14:40:25 EST news266852418 Medical devices save countless lives, and increasingly functions such as data storage and wireless communication allow for individualized patient care and other advances. But after their recent study, an interdisciplinary team of medical researchers and computer scientists warn that federal regulators need to improve how they track security and privacy problems in medical devices. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-07-medical-device-cybersecurity-experts.html Other Thu, 19 Jul 2012 17:00:03 EST news261932159 Results of a new study reported recently by psychology researcher Lisa Scott and colleagues at the University of Massachusetts Amherst confirm that although infants are born with equal abilities to tell apart people within multiple races, by age 9 months they are better at recognizing faces and emotional expressions of people within groups they interact with most. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-infants-year.html Psychology & Psychiatry Wed, 02 May 2012 15:20:01 EST news255190433 Though the human genome has been sequenced, scientists are still trying to figure out how the accomplishment can help people, for example, how it can be used to treat disease. As University of Massachusetts Amherst geneticist Jacob Mayfield notes, "It was easy to think of the human genome as the big prize, but what we realize now is, it’s just a foot in the door." http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-geneticist-tool-genes-important-disease.html Genetics Tue, 01 May 2012 04:35:30 EST news255064747 (Medical Xpress) -- Kinesiology researcher Barry Braun of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and colleagues recently reported unexpected results of a study suggesting that exercise and one of the most commonly prescribed drugs for diabetes, metformin, each improves insulin resistance when used alone, but when used together, metformin blunted the full effect of a 12-week exercise program in pre-diabetic men and women. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-drug-exercise-diabetes.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Tue, 06 Dec 2011 05:44:21 EST news242372650 (Medical Xpress) -- Neuroscientists have long known that memory, sleep quality and sleep duration deteriorate with age, yet sleep enhances two major types of learning in young people. To date, few investigations have looked at whether cognitive decline is related to decreases in sleep quality and quantity in older adults. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-benefit-older-adults-young-people.html Neuroscience Mon, 14 Nov 2011 06:53:43 EST news240476013 As Northeast residents begin to clean up after recent torrential rains, a University of Massachusetts Amherst environmental health scientist is urging people to throw open their windows and doors and remove wet household items as quickly as possible to avoid one of the worst effects of warm-weather flooding: Mold. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-08-health-problems-homes-quickly-air.html Health Wed, 31 Aug 2011 07:25:47 EST news233994129 While most adult Americans report feeling more cheerful, content and other positive emotions as they reach their middle and later years, a subset who have more neurotic personality traits do not share in that trend toward greater satisfaction with age, according to a recent analysis by psychology researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Purdue University. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-08-people-neurotic-personality-traits-older.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 30 Aug 2011 07:41:10 EST news233908759 Results of a large study among older women suggest that those who ate more of the "sunshine vitamin" were less likely to experience depression symptoms than women who consumed less of the vitamin, according to findings published this week by Elizabeth Bertone-Johnson at the University of Massachusetts Amherst School of Public Health and Health Sciences, with colleagues from several other U.S. academic centers. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-08-vitamin-d-foods-depression-older.html Health Fri, 26 Aug 2011 07:08:57 EST news233561226