Intermittent fasting, and fasting in general, has been a popular fad health gimmick, but the science isn't on its side. Instead, proponents believe mice are little people so if mice weaned on starvation diets lived longer, people would also.
Cholera outbreaks are on the rise. To prevent and control them, three oral cholera vaccines are currently approved by WHO. A study published in PLOS NTDs examining the immune response to one of them in Haitian adults finds that while the first vaccine round elicits a strong cholera-specific response in the mucosa (the first point of contact with the cholera pathogen), the booster dose after 2 weeks does not appear to stimulate the immune system further.
Cerebellar ataxia is a condition of the cerebellum that causes an inability to coordinate muscle movements. A study publishing June 16 in Cell Reports now describes a new genetic mutation as an additional cause of ataxia in humans and mice. The mutation, in the gene CAPN1, affects the function of the enzyme calpain-1 and causes abnormal brain development. The same genetic mutation is also associated with ataxia in Parson Russell Terrier dogs.
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 - according to a new paper published in PLOS Computational Biology. Scientists, led by Ingo Titze at the University of Utah, show how these two characteristics of various species' larynxes can closely predict the range of frequencies each species can produce. The results reveal the evolutionary roots of how and why voice arose.
Many traits make human beings unique, not the least of which is our ability to cooperate with one another. But exactly how we choose to do that -- particularly with nonfamily members -- can be complicated.
For men, that choice relies partially on perceptions of productivity and material benefit, just as it would have in an ancestral hunter-gatherer society. So finds a new study by UC Santa Barbara psychologists, which appears in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior.
"It's interesting that those mechanisms are designed for the environment of our ancestors, not our current context, yet they affect how people behave today," said lead author Adar Eisenbruch, a Ph.D. candidate in evolutionary psychology.
Researchers at the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science in Japan have shown that torrefied biomass can improve the quality of poor soil found in arid regions. Published in Scientific Reports, the study showed that adding torrefied biomass to poor soil from Botswana increased water retention in the soil as well as --the amount of plant growth.
When high temperatures and the absence of oxygen are used to bring about the decomposition of biomass residue from agricultural products such as grains, the result is a charcoal-rich substance called biochar. Torrefied biomass -- sometimes called bio-coal -- is a type of biochar made at relatively lower temperatures that has recently received attention as a pretreatment method for biomass utilization.
In the lead up to the World Barista Championships, University of Bath scientists say brewing more flavorsome coffee could be as simple as chilling the beans before grinding.
A team from the University working with renowned Bath coffee shop Colonna&Smalls found that chilling roasted beans before grinding resulted in narrower distribution of small particles, which during the brewing process allows access to more flavor from the same amount of coffee.
Coffee is among the most valuable traded commodities globally, worth $17.9T USD to the US economy in 2015 alone. This discovery could have big implications for the coffee industry and might even allow domestic coffee connoisseurs to brew tastier beverages.
The FBI must develop modern technological capacities rather than relying on out-of-date approaches, Susan Landau argues in this Policy Forum, zeroing in on the organization's recent request to Apple to develop software through which to access an iPhone - rather than tackling the issue through its own technological efforts. Had interference by Apple happened, Landau says, it would have weakened the security provided by the phone's encryption, ultimately offering a "key to open not just a single house," Landau writes, "but millions of homes." Such a key could then be coopted by "bad actors," creating major long-term security issues at many levels.
Immunologists and microbiologists from the University of Melbourne's Bio21 Molecular Science and Biotechnology Institute and the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity - a joint venture between the University of Melbourne and Royal Melbourne Hospital - have led a study that defined a new cell type responsible for turning the attack back on the bacteria.
With this discovery, they have dissected the complex roles of legions of immune cells that interact to destroy the bacterium.
Legionella pneumophila is the bacterium that causes legionnaire's disease. The bacterium preferentially grows within pond amoebae, but can 'accidentally' cause serious lung infections in susceptible humans.
Insects transmit diseases when, probing for blood vessels, they inject saliva together with viral, bacterial, or parasitic pathogens into the skin of mammalian hosts. A study in mice published on June 16, 2016 in PLOS Pathogens suggests a critical role of mosquito saliva in the outcome of dengue virus infection.
In tropical regions, Aedes mosquitoes transmit dengue virus (DENV) as well as other closely related viruses such as Zika. DENV infects almost 400 million humans every year. There are four types of DENV. They are referred to as serotypes 1-4 because, following infection, individuals have distinct antibody profiles in their blood serum, resulting from specific immune responses to each of the four virus types.
According a new study, fetal exposure to commonly used SRI drugs may affect brain activity in newborns. The researchers suggest that the effects of drugs on fetal brain function should be assessed more carefully, Indications for preventive medication should be critically evaluated, and non-pharmacological interventions should be the first-line treatment for depression and anxiety during pregnancy.
"We found many changes in the brain activity of SRI-exposed newborns," says Professor Sampsa Vanhatalo, head of the BABA center at the Helsinki University Children's Hospital. "Since the changes did not correlate with the mother's psychiatric symptoms, we have assumed that they resulted as a side effect of maternal drug treatment."
As young people reach adulthood, their preferences for sweet foods typically decline. But for people with obesity, new research suggests that the drop-off may not be as steep and that the brain's reward system operates differently in obese people than in thinner people, which may play a role in this phenomenon.
The new findings are published online June 15 in the journal Diabetes.
SALT LAKE CITY, June 15, 2016 - It's easy to understand why 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.
The classic theory of kin selection holds that "you shouldn't be terribly nice to distant kin because there isn't much genetic payoff," says Doug Jones, an associate professor of anthropology and author of the new study. "Yet what anthropologists have observed over and over is that a lot of people are pretty altruistic toward distant kin."
