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.
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- When countries, rich or poor, support breastfeeding through meaningful investments and programs, it has an impact on their bottom line and the health of women and children. The Lancet Breastfeeding Series, released today, finds that globally, the costs of lower cognitive ability associated with not breastfeeding amount to more than $300 billion each year, a figure comparable to the entire global pharmaceutical market. About 820,000 child deaths could be prevented annually (about 13 percent of all under-5 child deaths) by improving breastfeeding rates, in addition to the lives already saved by current breastfeeding practices.
A ground-breaking study has confirmed the long held assumption that camouflage protects animals from the clutches of predators, and offers insights into the most important aspects of camouflage.
The research, by scientists from the Universities of Exeter and Cambridge, investigated the camouflage of ground-nesting birds in Zambia, using sophisticated digital imaging to demonstrate how they would appear from the perspective of a predator.
The team found that animals or eggs that matched the pattern or contrast of the surrounding landscape were less likely to be eaten by their natural predators.
The study is published in leading journal Scientific Reports on Friday, January 29 2016.
Research at King's College London has revealed subtle brain differences in adult males with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), which may go some way towards explaining why symptoms persist into adulthood in some people with the disorder.
ASD affects around 1 in 100 people in the UK and involves a spectrum of conditions which manifest themselves differently in different people. People with ASD can have varying levels of impairment across three common areas, which might include: deficits in social interactions and reciprocal understanding, repetitive behaviour and narrow interests, and impairment in language and communication.
Detecting molecular alterations in early breast cancer development is key in the development of more effective cancer prevention and early detection strategies. New research funded by The Eve Appeal and the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme, published today in science journal Nature Communications shows clear evidence that DNA changes are already present in the healthy tissue from women with breast cancer.
WORCESTER, MA - A study published in the journal Science found that activation in pregnant mice of a particular immune response, similar to what may occur with certain viral infections during pregnancy, alters the brain structure of the mouse offspring and causes behavioral changes, reminiscent of those observed in humans with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
Several past human studies have suggested a correlative link between maternal viral infection during pregnancy and risk of autism spectrum disorder. Mouse models have been created and used to study how maternal immune activation influences autism-like behavior, but the mechanism underlying this was not known until now.
When you don't have much money, you have to prioritize, and that is a key issue that the wealthy elites who set off on insurance reform forgot to factor in. Massachusetts, which the Federal government claimed was a model for its Affordable Care Act, now has to spend 40 percent of its budget so that 25 percent of people can have even basic health care. That is not sustainable.
What is a great way to ensure that conservation has no support at all from the public? Hand nature over to centralized bureaucrats and create environmental groups full of lawyers to sue to make sure people are treated as the enemy.
Or just have centralized government tell people what to do, as in the communist dictatorship China.
Yet there is a better way. Communists love cold, hard cash just like capitalists, and conservation programs that compensate citizens for changing habitat-damaging behavior really work, according to results of a program in China that aims to restore forests and habitat for the endangered giant panda.
Since astronomers discovered the Smith Cloud, a giant gas cloud plummeting toward the Milky Way, they have been unable to determine its composition, which would hold clues as to its origin. University of Notre Dame astrophysicist Nicolas Lehner and his collaborators have now determined that the cloud contains elements similar to our sun, which means the cloud originated in the Milky Way's outer edges and not in intergalactic space as some have speculated.
What if polycystic kidney disease (PKD) could be combatted with a strategy as simple as dieting? Such a finding would surely be welcome news to the 12 million people worldwide with the genetic disease.
New research from UC Santa Barbara suggests that reducing food intake may slow the growth of the cysts that are symptomatic of PKD, an inherited disorder in which clusters of cysts develop in the kidneys.
A study by biologist Thomas Weimbs and colleagues has demonstrated that in mouse models, a modest decrease in food intake resulted in substantially diminished cyst growth. The findings appear in the American Journal of Physiology - Renal Physiology.
The moon was formed by a violent, head-on collision between the early Earth and a "planetary embryo" called Theia approximately 100 million years after the Earth formed, UCLA geochemists and colleagues report.
Scientists had already known about this high-speed crash, which occurred almost 4.5 billion years ago, but many thought the Earth collided with Theia (pronounced THAY-eh) at an angle of 45 degrees or more -- a powerful side-swipe (simulated in this 2012 YouTube video). New evidence reported Jan. 29 in the journal Science substantially strengthens the case for a head-on assault.
Folic acid has long been touted as an important supplement for expectant mothers, to prevent defects in the baby’s developing brain and spinal cord. It is added as a supplement to breads, pastas, rice and cereals to help ensure that women are exposed to sufficient amounts of this nutrient even before they know they’re pregnant.
Imagine communicating with your bank, the IRS or your doctor by way of an Internet that was actually secure, where if any bad actor were to try to eavesdrop you would know immediately. Such is the promise of secure quantum communication, and has been since it was 'almost ready' starting in the 1990s.
For quantum communication to become the standard, technical challenges still lie ahead. To make progress toward devices that can send and receive quantum data, researchers at Stanford University have created a novel quantum light source.
