PCC STEM's Posts

A drug originally developed to stop cancerous tumors may hold the potential to prevent abnormal brain cell growth and learning disabilities in some children, if they can be diagnosed early enough, a new animal study suggests.
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Rising sea levels, melting glaciers, more intense rainstorms and more frequent heat waves are among the planetary woes that may come to mind when climate change is mentioned. Now, researchers say an increased risk of avian influenza transmission in wild birds can be added to the list.
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As an animal develops from an embryo, its cells take diverse paths, eventually forming different body parts -- muscles, bones, heart. In order for each cell to know what to do during development, it follows a genetic blueprint, which consists of complex webs of interacting genes called gene regulatory networks. Biologists have spent the last decade or so detailing how these gene networks control development in sea-urchin embryos. Now, for the first time, they have built a computational model of one of these networks.
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(Phys.org)—When Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory scientist Frances Houle considers the national alarm that has sounded over the shortage of rare earth materials—critical ingredients in a wide range of clean-energy and medical technologies—she tends not to panic.
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(Phys.org)—A smart filter with a shape-shifting surface can separate oil and water using gravity alone, an advancement that could be useful in cleaning up environmental oil spills, among other applications, say its University of Michigan developers.
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Turning the volume up too high on your headphones can damage the coating of nerve cells, leading to temporary deafness, scientists have shown. Earphones or headphones on personal music players can reach noise levels similar to those of jet engines, the researchers said.
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A new 'traffic light' test could be used in primary care to diagnose liver fibrosis and cirrhosis in high risk populations more easily than at present.
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Evolutionary biologists have long puzzled over this because natural selection is expected to have selected for organisms that try to maximize their reproduction. But in industrialized societies around the world, increasing wealth coincides with people deliberately limiting their family size -- the so-called 'demographic transition'. In a new study, researchers reject a popular theory put forward to explain the phenomenon. This 'adaptive' hypothesis proposes that low fertility may boost evolutionary success in the long term by increasing offspring wealth, which in turn eventually increases the number of long-term descendants because richer offspring end up having more children.
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Researchers have made a discovery that challenges a major theory in the field of coral reef ecology. The general assumption has been that the more flexible corals are, regarding which species of single-celled algae they host in coral tissues, the greater ability corals will have to survive environmental stress. However, scientists documented that the more flexible corals are, the more sensitive to environment disturbances they are.
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Why are there so many species of beetles and so few crocodiles? The answer may be ecological limits to species number, scientists report.
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The use of newer drugs, a greater number of effective drugs, and a longer treatment regimen may be associated with improved survival of patients with multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, according to a large study.
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Increasingly humanitarian organizations will find themselves responding to health emergencies provoked by the adverse effects of mining and other extractive industries, setting up a potential clash to do with the core principles and values at the heart of humanitarian medicine, according to an expert.
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