We're bombarded with information at all times, so much that if we had to try and process it all times, we'd be paralyzed. Our cerebellum does information damage control by filtering out what changes. Evolution made it possible for us to conserve energy while still processing anomalies quickly.
In the kidney, injured cells can be kicked into reparative mode by a gene called Sox9, according to a new paper. Sox9 also plays a key role in the normal development of the kidney and the authors found that surviving injured cells switch on the Sox9 gene as a response to kidney damage.
This regenerates the injured cellular lining of the nephron, the functional unit of the kidney, and repairs the kidney after acute kidney injury (AKI).
By recruiting the majority of the surviving cells of the epithelium to aid in the timely repair of a severely injured organ, the kidney's Sox9 strategy contrasts with the stem cell-based repair strategy of many other organ systems.
Women who undergo implant based female sterilization have a significantly heightened risk of reoperation following complications, suggests a large study published in The BMJ this week.
Female sterilization is one of the most common contraception methods worldwide. Laparoscopic sterilization has been the primary method for decades. It is a surgical procedure that clips, stitches or burns the fallopian tubes to prevent pregnancy.
Hysteroscopic sterilization was developed more recently and involves implanting the "Essure" device to block the fallopian tubes. It does not require general anaesthetic or surgery unlike laparoscopic sterilization.
The likelihood of a transgender person attempting suicide is very high and a new study examined factors that may prevent them. Its conclusions also inform medical and mental health professionals who work with transgender clients.
For a survey of "suicide protective factors" among transgender adults, the scholars recruited 133 transgender individuals living in Canada, ranging in age from 18 to 75, who responded to questions through an online, anonymous survey about their thoughts on and attempts at suicide. Nearly 45 percent of respondents said they had had a suicide plan at least once in their lives; 26 percent indicated they had attempted suicide at least once. The majority of the study participants indicated they experienced suicidal thoughts.
A new study of newborns treated with hypothermia for hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE) - a condition that occurs when the brain is deprived of an adequate oxygen supply - confirms its neuroprotective effects on the brain.
Therapeutic hypothermia or targeted cooling of the brain is the first therapy for neuroprotection in neonates with HIE. Without treatment, these babies often develop cerebral palsy or other severe complications. World-wide, nearly one million babies will die and another million will be left with disabilities.
A new study shows that surface water temperature in the Chesapeake Bay is increasing more rapidly than air temperature, signaling a need to look at the impact of warming waters on one of the largest and most productive estuaries in the world. The study was completed by Haiyong Ding and Andrew Elmore of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science's Appalachian Laboratory.
"I was surprised that the pattern of increasing water temperature was so clear," said study co-author Andrew Elmore. "If you take any group of five years, they are generally warmer than the previous five years. A consistent warming trend happening over a really large portion of the Bay."
Scientists using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have produced new maps of Jupiter -- the first in a series of annual portraits of the solar system's outer planets.
Collecting these yearly images -- essentially the planetary version of annual school picture days for children -- will help current and future scientists see how these giant worlds change over time. The observations are designed to capture a broad range of features, including winds, clouds, storms and atmospheric chemistry.
Already, the Jupiter images have revealed a rare wave just north of the planet's equator and a unique filamentary feature in the core of the Great Red Spot not seen previously.
Researchers have been able to watch the interior cells of a plant synthesize cellulose for the first time by tricking the cells into growing on the plant's surface.
"The bulk of the world's cellulose is produced within the thickened secondary cell walls of tissues hidden inside the plant body," says University of British Columbia Botany PhD candidate Yoichiro Watanabe, lead author of the paper published this week in Science.
"So we've never been able to image the cells in high resolution as they produce this all-important biological material inside living plants."
Much like the flapping of a windsock displays the quick changes in wind's speed and direction, called turbulence, comet tails can be used as probes of the solar wind - the constant flowing stream of material that leaves the sun in all directions.
According to new studies of a comet tail observed by NASA's Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory, or STEREO, the vacuum of interplanetary space is filled with turbulence and swirling vortices similar to gusts of wind on Earth. Such turbulence can help explain two of the wind's most curious features: its variable nature and unexpectedly high temperatures.
Scientists engineered stem cells to better understand the mechanisms behind a form of leukemia caused by changes in a key gene.
Past work had established that inherited changes in the DNA code for the gene PTPN11 cause Noonan syndrome, a genetic disease that comes with a high risk for the blood cancer called juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia (JMML). The mechanisms behind the disease, and what influences its severity, were unknown going into the current study.
In addition, the only current treatment for JMML, a bone marrow transplant to replace the hematopoietic stem cells that become blood cells, is effective in only 50 percent of patients. This has further spurred efforts to understand related disease mechanisms as a step toward designing better treatments.
Antipsychotic drugs are initiated in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) more frequently than in the general population - already 2-3 years before the Alzheimer's diagnosis, according to a new study from the University of Eastern Finland. Most commonly, antipsychotics were initiated during the six months following the Alzheimer's diagnosis; however, the incidence of new antipsychotic users was high also later on.
A new challenges prevailing wisdom by identifying the atmosphere as the driver of a decades-long climate variation known as the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation (AMO) and offering new insight on the causes and predictability of natural climate variations, which are known to cause wide-ranging global weather impacts, including increased rainfall, drought, and greater hurricane frequency in many parts of the Atlantic basin.
For decades, research on climate variations in the Atlantic has focused almost exclusively on the role of ocean circulation as the main driver, specifically the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, which carries warm water north in the upper layers of the ocean and cold water south in lower layers like a large conveyor belt.
Scientists have developed a blood test that could help pair cancer patients with the most suitable therapy for their disease and then track the tumor's progress to see if the treatment is working, according to research published today (Thursday) in Clinical Cancer Research.
Using the blood test throughout a patient's treatment gives a 'running commentary' of what is happening to tumors - giving scientists the lowdown on how well the treatment is working, how the cancer is changing and whether it is becoming resistant to treatment. It is the first time a blood test has been used in this way during clinical trials of targeted drugs, proving that the technique can monitor cancer simply and quickly.
