Culture

How does Covid-19 affect sperm and thus the next generation´s immune system? Researchers from the University of Bergen are collecting sperm to find the answer.

So far, 50 Covid-19 patients between 30 and 40 have delivered a sperm sample. Students are next in line. The plan is that participants will return after 12 months for more testing.

isThe project aims to see how the infection affects the development of the immune system and, follow-up studies will reveal how Covid-19 will affect the immune system of their future children.

"The immune system is trained by infections of all kinds. We want to study how it is affected by Covid-19 and also if the infection has implication for future generation´s immune systems. That is why we decided to study sperm in addition to whole blood", says Professor Cecilie Svanes, at Centre for International Health, University of Bergen.

This is the first study of its kind on human beings. The Covid-19 pandemic gives researchers a new and unique opportunity to study immune-training and how the infection may have effect on the next generation. Svanes is leading the study together with Professor Rebecca Cox at The Influenza Centre, University of Bergen.

Infections train the immune system

All kinds of infections stimulate reactions in our immune system. The researchers want to find out if Covid-19 trains the immune system in a good or bad way.

"Previous testing on animals have shown that infections can affect a future generation´s immune system in both a negative and a positive way," Svanes says.

Infections by micro-worms, so-called helminths, were found to have a positive effect on the immune system among mouse offspring. Sepsis, on the other hand, had a negative effect on the next generation of mice.

The researchers in the study believe the link between infection, sperm and offspring is the result of epigenetic changes, affecting how the hereditary material is "read and understood" and how the body sbuilds the proteins involved in the immune system. The researchers are studying the messenger-RNA, which translates the DNA to proteins.

"If one compares the hereditary material with a cookbook, the epigenetics is about which of the recipes are to be read. We believe that an infection can affect this process", Svanes explains.

Should maybe wait to have children

The researchers cannot wait for the covid-19 patients to have children, so that they can study any effects of the father's infection on the offspring's immune response. They study and compare sperm and blood from the patients with that taken from a large control group without Covid-19.

The control group are participants in the large European RHINESSA-study, where the participants from seven different countries have been followed over 20 years. The database contains information on how lung health, asthma, allergies and associated diseases have developed over time

"If we find considerable negative changes in sperm, there is a possibility that we will advise people to wait with having children, for, for example, one year after a Covid-19 infection," says Cecilie Svanes.

COVID-19 spreads faster and more widely throughout U.S. households than previously reported, according to new preliminary research from a multicenter study led by Vanderbilt University Medical Center researchers and published in MMWR, a weekly report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

The study, led by Carlos G. Grijalva, MD, MPH, associate professor of Health Policy, and H. Keipp Talbot, MD, MPH, associate professor of Medicine, found that 51% of others living in the home with someone who was positive for COVID-19 also became infected.

"We observed that, after a first household member became sick, several infections were rapidly detected in the household," Grijalva said. "Those infections occurred fast, whether the first sick household member was a child or an adult."

The study found that at least 75% of the secondary household infections occurred within five days of the first person in the household experiencing symptoms.

"This preliminary research is the first to closely follow U.S. households through systematic daily assessments and study the transmission of coronavirus among groups living together under one roof," Talbot said. "Other similar studies have mostly been conducted abroad, and others have made estimates of household transmission using contact tracing data."

Similar studies in the U.S., Europe and Asia have reported that 30%, or less, of household members also became infected.

The preliminary findings from this ongoing study were collected from households in Nashville, Tennessee, and Marshfield, Wisconsin.

Also among the study's findings is that less than half of household members experienced symptoms when they first tested positive, and many reported no symptoms throughout the 7-day daily follow-up period.

The study results underscore the potential for transmission from symptomatic or asymptomatic contact with household members and the importance of quarantine, Grijlava said. Persons aware of recent close contact with an infected person, such as household members, should quarantine at home and monitor for development of symptoms.

As winter approaches, and people start spending more time indoors, it will be important to prepare for potential infections at home.

"In the absence of an efficient approach for identification of infections without regard to symptoms, these findings suggest that prompt adoption of isolation measures as soon as a person feels ill might reduce the probability of household transmission," the authors concluded.

For Black LGBQ+ Americans, Intersectional Experiences Can Hurt -- Or Help, YSPH Study FindsUsing a new method for quantifying intersectional experiences, a new Yale School of Public Health study finds that Black LGBQ+ Americans tend to feel better about themselves after encountering events that affirm their identity.

In the study, which was recently published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, researchers asked 131 Black members of the LGBQ+ community to chronicle their daily experiences for a week and record any times in which their racial and sexual identity was simultaneously challenged or supported -- an intersectional event. What they found was surprising: 31% of all days featured at least one positive experience, and 11% had at least one negative experience. Both types of events were related to changes in psychological well-being, the data showed.

The findings are a major step forward in figuring out how to reduce stigma and improve mental health for Black LGBQ+ Americans, who often struggle to find acceptance, said Skyler Jackson, the study's lead author and an associate research scientist. Jackson is also affiliated with the Center for Interdisciplinary Research on AIDS (CIRA) at Yale.

"I can speak for myself as a Black, gay/queer-identifying person that certainly these identities bring challenges and hardships," Jackson said. "But they also bring opportunities for joy, and culture, connection, and so many other wonderful things."

Unlike in other studies, the researchers looked for experiences that were in some way intersectional, like a enjoying a gathering of Black LGBQ+ people or encountering a racist stereotype from an LGBQ+ community member. Jackson's team also asked participants to not only quantify their intersectional experiences but also describe them every day for a week.

That way, Jackson said, the researchers could get a better understanding of what these events look like and how they shape perceptions of daily life.

The study cannot confirm that these experiences cause shifts in well-being, Jackson added. But the findings do shed light on potential factors: The data suggests that negative intersectional experiences could exacerbate feelings of identity conflict, which can lead to psychological distress among Black LGBQ+ people.

Jackson plans to use his new method to study other subgroups that face complex experiences of stigma, including both multiracial people and gender non-binary individuals. The methodology will be further outlined in an article that will be published in the Journal of Counseling Psychology early next year.

"You feel that these identities -- and the powerful experiences they lead to -- are much more alive when you measure them within a person's everyday life," he said.

The study's findings also have key implications for public health. Participants' responses suggest that spaces that cater to -- and represent -- members of the Black LGBQ+ community can lift their spirits and contribute to their well-being.

"There are these moments where people from marginalized groups have these sort of micro-liberations -- they get free," Jackson said. "Not despite their identities, but because of them."

One in 4,000 people is born without a corpus callosum, a brain structure consisting of neural fibres that are used to transfer information from one hemisphere to the other. A quarter of these individuals do not have any symptoms, while the remainder either have low intelligence quotients or suffer from severe cognitive disorders. In a study published in the journal Cerebral Cortex, neuroscientists from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) discovered that when the neuronal fibres that act as a bridge between the hemispheres are missing, the brain reorganises itself and creates an impressive number of connections inside each hemisphere. These create more intra-hemispheric connections than in a healthy brain, indicating that plasticity mechanisms are involved. It is thought that these mechanisms enable the brain to compensate for the losses by recreating connections to other brain regions using alternative neural pathways.

The corpus callosum develops in utero between the tenth and twentieth week of gestation. Agenesis of the corpus callosum is a congenital brain malformation in which this brain structure fails to develop, resulting in one out of 4,000 babies born without a corpus callosum. When it is missing, nothing replaces this structure measuring about ten centimetres, with the exception of cerebrospinal fluid. This means that the information transmitted from one hemisphere to the other can no longer be conveyed by the neuronal projections from the corpus callosum. &laquoTheir role in a healthy brain,» begins Vanessa Siffredi, a researcher in UNIGE's Faculty of Medicine, &laquois to ensure the functioning of various cognitive and sensorimotor functions». Surprisingly, 25% of people with this malformation have no visible signs; 50% have average intelligence quotients and learning difficulties; and the remaining 25% suffer from severe cognitive disorders.

Mysterious fibres

The scientific literature shows that, in the absence of the corpus callosum, certain fibres designed to serve as a bridge between the hemispheres, known as Probst bundles, bypass the absent brain area and curl up inside each hemisphere. &laquoThe back-up zones vary from one individual to another. And we don't understand their functions,» explains the neuroscientist. The UNIGE scientists - working in collaboration with their colleagues at the University of Melbourne - set out to understand this variability and to examine the role of the fibres. Using MRI brain imaging, they studied the anatomical and functional links between different brain regions of approximately 20 Australian children aged 8 to 17 suffering from agenesis of the corpus callosum.

A salutary role

This approach first made it possible to observe the physical relationships between the different regions of the brain, i.e. their structural links. In children with corpus callosum agenesis, the neural fibres inside each hemisphere are greater in number and of higher quality than in healthy brains. Furthermore, the UNIGE scientists succeeded in determining the correlations between the activity of different brain regions and their functional links. &laquoIf two regions are active together, it means they are communicating with each other,» explains Dr Siffredi. The data shows that intra and inter-hemispheric functional connectivity of brains without the corpus callosum are comparable to those of healthy brains. &laquoRemarkably, communication between the two hemispheres is maintained. We think that plasticity mechanisms, such as the strengthening of structural bonds within each hemisphere, compensated for the lack of neuronal fibres between hemispheres. New connections are created and the signals can be re-routed so that communication is preserved between the two hemispheres.»

Predicting cognitive impairment

The Geneva neuroscientists likewise observed a correlation between the increase in intra-hemispheric connections and cognitive skills. This information is very interesting for clinical work since, as agenesis is currently detected by means of ultrasound during pregnancy, it is often proposed that a pregnancy be terminated. &laquoIn the not-too-distant future, we could imagine using MRI imaging to predict whether the malformation observed by ultrasound runs the risk of being associated with cognitive impairment or not, and so better inform future parents», concludes Dr Siffredi.

Like a specter, the question looms: How risky is trick-or-treating with SARS-Cov-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, in the air -- and possibly on the candy?

In a study published October 30, 2020 in the journal mSystems, researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine and San Diego State University analyzed the viral load on Halloween candy handled by patients with COVID-19.

SARS-CoV-2 is primarily transmitted by respiratory droplets and aerosols. The risk of infection by touching fomites -- objects or surfaces upon which viral particles have landed and persist -- is relatively low, according to multiple studies, even when fomites are known to have been exposed to the novel coronavirus. Nonetheless, the risk is not zero.

"The main takeaway is that, although the risk of transmission of SARS-CoV-2 by surfaces, including candy wrappers, is low, it can be reduced even further by washing your hands with soap before handling the candy and washing the candy with household dishwashing detergent afterwards," said co-senior author Rob Knight, PhD, professor and director of the Center for Microbiome Innovation at UC San Diego. "The main risk is interacting with people without masks, so if you are sharing candy, be safe by putting it in dish where you can wave from six feet away." Knight led the study with Forest Rohwer, PhD, viral ecologist at San Diego State University, and Louise Laurent, MD, PhD, professor at UC San Diego School of Medicine.

For their study, the researchers enrolled 10 recently diagnosed COVID-19 patients who were asymptomatic or mildly symptomatic and asked them to handle Halloween candy under three different conditions: 1) normally with unwashed hands; 2) while deliberately coughing with extensive handling; and 3) normal handling after handwashing.

The candy was then divided into two treatments -- no post-handling washing (untreated) and washed with household dishwashing detergent -- followed by analyses using real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction, the same technology used to diagnose COVID-19 infections in people, and a second analytical platform that can conduct tests on larger samples more quickly and cheaply. Both produced similar findings.

On candies not washed post-handling, researchers detected SARS-CoV-2 on 60 percent of the samples that had been deliberately coughed on and on 60 percent of the samples handled normally with unwashed hands. However, the virus was detected only 10 percent of the candies handled after handwashing.

Not surprisingly, the dishwashing detergent was effective for reducing the viral RNA on candies, with reducing the viral load by 62.1 percent.

They had also planned to test bleach, "but importantly, we noted that bleach sometimes leaked through some of the candy wrappers, making it unsafe for this type of cleaning use," Rohwer said.

The study authors underscored that the likely risk of SARS-CoV-2 transmission from candy is low, even if handled by someone with a COVID-19 infection, but it can be reduced to near-zero if the candy is handled only by people who have first washed their hands and if it is washed with household dishwashing detergent for approximately a minute after collection.

Washington, DC - October 30, 2020 - New research shows that COVID-19 exposure risk from contaminated candy could be successfully mitigated both by washing hands and washing candy using a simple at-home method. A team of researchers published this work today in mSystems, an open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology.

The researchers enrolled 10 recently diagnosed asymptomatic or mildly/moderately symptomatic COVID-19 patients to handle typical Halloween candy (pieces individually wrapped) under three conditions: normal handling with unwashed hands, deliberate coughing and extensive touching, and normal handling following handwashing.

The researchers described how they washed the candy, a simple process, which should be easy for anyone to recreate with household ingredients: In a container big enough to fit the amount of candy you intend to wash, prepare a 1:50 dilution of dish soap detergent (containing Sodium laureth sulfate [SLS] sometimes written as Sodium dodecyl sulfate [SDS]) in water by mixing 3 oz of detergent per gallon of water. Submerge the candy in the solution and agitate to evenly cover all surfaces of the candy wrappers with the detergent solution. Let the candy sit in the detergent solution for no less than 1 minute. Finally, rinse the candy with clean water.

From the candies not washed post-handling, SARS-CoV-2 was detected on 60% of candies that were deliberately coughed on, 60% of candies normally handled with unwashed hands, but only 10% of candies handled after hand washing. Treating candy with dishwashing detergent reduced SARS-CoV-2 load by 62.1% in comparison to untreated candy. Viral RNA load of SARS-CoV-2 was reduced to near zero by the combination of handwashing by the infected patient and ?1 minute detergent treatment after collection.

It is important to note that SARS-CoV-2 is primarily transmitted by respiratory droplets and aerosols. "Taking preventative measures to clean candy is reasonable if one wants to be extra cautious, but the main risk of COVID-19 transmission during trick-or-treating is airborne transmission," said Rodolfo Salido, Ph.D., lead author on the study and research associate in the department of engineering, University of California, San Diego.

The uncertainty and confusion caused by the COVID-19 pandemic is being "widely exploited by terror groups for spinning a plethora of sinister schemes", which could lead to a new tide of violence against people and governments.

This is the claim of a new international study published in the peer-reviewed Global Security: Health, Science and Policy, which analysed terrorist activity and trends across the globe since the pandemic began.

"Despite the overriding media attention to the COVID-19 pandemic and its near-total eclipse of security issues, the terrorism milieu has hardly taken a pause from its deadly pursuits or suspended the execution of its plans," lead author Professor of Psychology Arie Kruglanski from the University of Maryland, explains.

This "milieu" of terrorism so far in 2020 has been considerable. The team of experts note "far from uniting humanity against a common threat," the pandemic has enabled - or at least not stopped - a vast range of incidents.

These include: ISIS attacks in seven countries in March alone; the Islamic State Khorasan Province carrying out a "devastating" attack in a funeral parlour in Afghanistan (24 killed, 68 wounded); Al-Qaeda-affiliated Al Shabab organisation reporting 37 attacks in Somalia and Kenya (52 dead, 35 wounded); and in Mali, al Qaeda-linked Jama'at Nasr al-Islam kidnapping a high-profile opposition leader.

Far-right extremists "have not been 'sitting idle'" either, the study states. So far, in 2020, the far-right has been responsible for 90% of terrorist attacks in the US compared to 66% in 2019.
This includes 50 vehicle ramming attacks since late May, targeting protesters.
There have also been right-wing attacks against anti-lockdown protests in Germany.

Additionally, even though there's been no attribution to any known extremist groups, there has been a significant worldwide rise in cyberattacks - mostly targeting hospitals.

What this suggests is that terror organisations have used the pandemic as a "golden opportunity to tie their messaging to information about the disease and intensify their propaganda for purposes of recruitment and incitement to violence", proclaims Professor Kruglanski.

"The awe of the pandemic notwithstanding, extremist groups have not ceased sowing their own brand of horror. Far from just keeping up their activity despite the pandemic, they are using the pandemic as an opportunity to grow stronger. They are exploiting gaps in security, and the general burdens on societies that the pandemic imposes and are pushing forward their ideologies as a cure for fear, frustration, and panic," he says.

The research group - also consisting of experts from Nanyang Technological University; the International Center for the Study of Violent Extremism; and the George Washington University School of Medicine - have found that terrorists' messages are being pursued through a "diverse, and, often internally inconsistent" blend of communications.

Although these messages differed between each organisation, they unexceptionally included elements characteristic of violence-justifying narratives. The specific contents of these elements varied across the different groups, but included: conspiracy theories, claims of the God's vengeance against its enemies, exhortation to weaponize the virus, and taking advantage of society's weakness by "launching widespread attacks wherever and whenever possible".

ISIS and Al-Qaeda propagandists, for example, in contrast to blaming Western or Chinese powers for creating and spreading the virus as a bioweapon, claimed that the coronavirus is a soldier of Allah sent to avenge the Muslim people's suffering brought about by the US and its allies.

"In this narrative, the coronavirus is seen as a type of plague sent by God that will kill the enemies of Allah, sparing the believing Muslims. In May, ISIS spokesman Abu Hamza al-Qurashi made a speech in which he compared the pandemic to the biblical story of Moses cursing Pharaoh with the 10 plagues until he relented and let God's people go," the authors noted.

What might be even more troubling, the research shows, is grave concerns that jihadists
will learn from the horrific world impact of COVID 19 and "intensify their efforts to switch from the use of complicated devices, bombs, and suicide attacks to biological warfare, and bioterrorism", and the study demonstrates evidence of doctoral-level scientists who had been recruited by ISIS to study scientific journals about biological and chemical advancements.

Summarising, Prof. Kruglanski says: "For both the jihadists and the far righters, the pandemic has offered new opportunities and methods for unleashing violence against the objects of their hate.

"Though everyone's attention is naturally drawn to the immense health and economic challenges that the pandemic poses, we cannot ignore the potential storm of intensified world terrorism that seems to be gathering in its shadows."

Currently, approximately 1.6 million Virginians live in primary care shortage areas and 2.2 million in mental health care shortage areas (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2019), yet only three percent of Virginia's high school career and technical education courses are in the health sciences. As the Commonwealth's population grows and ages and demand for care rises, finding effective models for expanding the pipeline of certified health workers is increasingly urgent.

New research published in the VASCD Journal, A Case Study in Growing the Health Workforce Pipeline in Virginia, seeks to address these critical shortages in Virginia's health care workforce by evaluating collective impact partnership models in Career and Technical Education (CTE) for secondary and postsecondary educators and health care providers. The research was led by Tammie Jones, research manager and PhD candidate in the Department of Health Administration and Policy at the George Mason University College of Health and Human Services.

CTE plays a key role in providing young people with industry-certified technical skills that meet labor market needs. However, there is little empirical evidence about what models of partnership exists and what factors help communities succeed.

Jones and Dr. P.J. Maddox, professor and department chair, evaluated the Claude Moore Scholars technical education and training program model to identify what training, education, and collaboration practices have been most effective in bringing secondary and postsecondary students into the health workforce. The study explored questions such as how are programs leveraging assets and resources, such as qualified instructors and clinical lab space, of health care providers and public schools to establish effective health sciences training and education programs in K-12 and postsecondary institutions and what factors were effective in developing communities of practice?

"The study seeks to inform the future approach to health workforce planning and development and serve as a model to align existing programs to form a collective approach for the state," says Jones.

The program evaluation shows that the partnership models used by the Claude Moore Scholars initiative stimulate growth in Virginia's health workforce pipeline in three important ways: 1) building effective community partnerships between K-12 school systems, community colleges, and health care providers/employers, 2) expanding delivery of health sciences training and education programs in K-12 and postsecondary institutions, and 3) providing resources and support to educators and students in the form of communities of practice.

"Our analysis shows that for the plan to succeed, each of the parties took on very specific yet complementary responsibilities. Alignment between the educators and employers' needs is critical to ensure a smooth transition from the classroom to the workplace," says Jones who evaluated the practices of the Claude Moore Scholars programs in 23 school districts, five higher education institutions, and numerous employers in Virginia.

Evaluation of technical education programs across Virginia identified three models for Scholars program collaborations with communities to address these gaps in local health workforce: the public school systems-led approach; the community college-led model; and the emerging employer-led model. The commonality in the models is how partnering communities work together to identify the high-demand health occupations and then work together to resource and implement training and education programs.

Jones underscores that the Scholars program is successful in developing collaborative partnerships that identify community needs, particularly the needs of the employers that provide health services to those in the community. The paper provides examples of how collective impact partnerships can successfully address the largest barriers to CTE: adequate clinical lab space, qualified teachers, and clinical sites for experiential learning.

A study involving more than 5,000 COVID-19 patients in Houston finds that the virus that causes the disease is accumulating genetic mutations, one of which may have made it more contagious. According to the paper published in the peer-reviewed journal mBIO, that mutation, called D614G, is located in the spike protein that pries open our cells for viral entry. It's the largest peer-reviewed study of SARS-CoV-2 genome sequences in one metropolitan region of the U.S. to date.

The paper shows "the virus is mutating due to a combination of neutral drift -- which just means random genetic changes that don't help or hurt the virus -- and pressure from our immune systems," said Ilya Finkelstein, associate professor of molecular biosciences at The University of Texas at Austin and co-author of the study. The study was carried out by scientists at Houston Methodist Hospital, UT Austin and elsewhere.

During the initial wave of the pandemic, 71% of the novel coronaviruses identified in patients in Houston had this mutation. When the second wave of the outbreak hit Houston during the summer, this variant had leaped to 99.9% prevalence. This mirrors a trend observed around the world. A study published in July based on more than 28,000 genome sequences found that variants carrying the D614G mutation became the globally dominant form of SARS-CoV-2 in about a month. SARS-CoV-2 is the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

So why did strains containing this mutation outcompete those that didn't have it?

Perhaps they're more contagious. A study of more than 25,000 genome sequences in the U.K. found that viruses with the mutation tended to transmit slightly faster than those without it and caused larger clusters of infections. Natural selection would favor strains of the virus that transmit more easily. But not all scientists are convinced. Some have suggested another explanation, called "founder's effects." In that scenario, the D614G mutation might have been more common in the first viruses to arrive in Europe and North America, essentially giving them a head start on other strains.

The spike protein is also continuing to accumulate additional mutations of unknown significance. The Houston Methodist-UT Austin team also showed in lab experiments that at least one such mutation allows spike to evade a neutralizing antibody that humans naturally produce to fight SARS-CoV-2 infections. This may allow that variant of the virus to more easily slip past our immune systems. Although it is not clear yet whether that translates into it also being more easily transmitted between individuals.

The good news is that this mutation is rare and does not appear to make the disease more severe for infected patients. According to Finkelstein, the group did not see viruses that have learned to evade first-generation vaccines and therapeutic antibody formulations.

"The virus continues to mutate as it rips through the world," Finkelstein said. "Real-time surveillance efforts like our study will ensure that global vaccines and therapeutics are always one step ahead."

The scientists noted a total of 285 mutations across thousands of infections, although most don't appear to have a significant effect on how severe the disease is. Ongoing studies are continuing to surveil the third wave of COVID-19 patients and to characterize how the virus is adapting to neutralizing antibodies that are produced by our immune systems. Each new infection is a roll of the dice, an additional chance to develop more dangerous mutations.

"We have given this virus a lot of chances," lead author James Musser of Houston Methodist told The Washington Post. "There is a huge population size out there right now."

Several other UT Austin authors contributed to the work: visiting scholar Jimmy Gollihar, associate professor of molecular biosciences Jason S. McLellan and graduate students Chia-Wei Chou, Kamyab Javanmardi and Hung-Che Kuo.

The UT Austin team tested different genetic variants of the virus's spike protein, the part that allows it to infect host cells, to measure the protein's stability and to see how well it binds to a receptor on host cells and to neutralizing antibodies. Earlier in the year, McLellan and his team at UT Austin, in collaboration with researchers at the National Institutes of Health, developed the first 3D map of the coronavirus spike protein for an innovation that now factors into several leading vaccine candidates' designs.

The researchers found that SARS-CoV-2 was introduced to the Houston area many times, independently, from diverse geographic regions, with virus strains from Europe, Asia, South America and elsewhere in the United States. There was widespread community dissemination soon after COVID-19 cases were reported in Houston.

This study was supported by the Fondren Foundation, Houston Methodist Hospital and Research Institute, the National Institutes of Health, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the Welch Foundation, the National Science Foundation and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. Ilya Finkelstein is a CPRIT scholar in cancer research, funded by the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas.

An earlier version of the paper was posted last month to the preprint server medRxiv.

In ecosystems around the globe, the danger of being a common or widespread species is the tendency to be overlooked by conservation efforts that prioritize rarity.

In forests, the most common species can be essential to ecosystem structure and function, which crumble with the decline of these pivotal trees, known collectively as foundation species.

In an effort to identify forest foundation species and elevate their conservation status before they disappear, a unique research collaboration between Chinese and American scientists has synthesized long-term biodiversity data from 12 immense forest study plots spanning 1,500 miles, from China's far north to its southern tropics.

Their results, published today in the journal Ecology, point to maple trees - long appreciated for their autumn foliage and the syrup that graces our tables - as potential foundation species in both China and North America.

The study comes on the heels of the latest "Red List" published by Botanic Gardens Conservation International, which showed that 36 out of the 158 maples species worldwide - nearly a quarter of all maples - are at high risk of extinction in the near future in the wild. Fourteen of those high-risk species exist only in China.

"Foundation species are the species upon which ecosystems are built and supported, just like the foundation of your house," explains Aaron Ellison, Senior Research Fellow at the Harvard Forest and a co-author of the study. "But they can be so common that they hide in plain sight, overlooked because they lack the cachet and appeal of rarities."

The study was led by Xiujuan Qiao, an Associate Professor at the Wuhan Botanical Garden of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, who spent all of 2019 in residence at the Harvard Forest facilitating this global collaboration. She adds, "We should pay more attention to foundation species, identifying and protecting them before their inevitable decline."

DES PLAINES, IL -- Mobile smartphone technology can accelerate first responder dispatch and may be instrumental to improving out of hospital cardiac arrest (OCHA) survival. That is the conclusion of a study published in the October 2020 issue of Academic Emergency Medicine (AEM), a journal of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine (SAEM).

The lead author of the study is Dr. Clement Derkenne, an emergency physician in the emergency medical department, Paris Fire Brigade, Clamart, France. The findings of the study are discussed in a recent AEM podcast, We Didn't Start the Fire, But Can Antiacid Monotherapy Stop the Fire?

In France, the introduction of the mobile application "Staying Alive" (a free mobile smartphone application, available in 18 languages and compatible with all operating systems) improved healthcare delivery and OHCA survival outcomes within one year in the Greater Paris area (July 2017 to 2018).

The application allows registered first responders, commonly referred to as "Bons Samaritains" (BS), located near an OHCA scene, to be alerted via a "push notification." Upon acknowledgment of the notification, available BS are directed toward the scene of OHCA and receive a map of AEDs in the area.

SA is available on all smartphone platforms and uses geolocalization services to flag nearby AEDs. It was first integrated to the Paris Fire Brigade Greater Paris Area CPR protocols in 2017.

The study researchers concluded that smartphone apps that match trained responders to nearby cardiac arrest victims may be a valuable way to improve response times in out of hospital cardiae arrest; however, their impact on clinical outcomes and overall cost effectiveness remains unclear.

CAMBRIDGE, MA - October 27, 2020-- In a preprint paper, "Impact of Glucose-Lowering Drugs on Mortality and Other Adverse Outcomes in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes Admitted for COVID-19," researchers conclude a neutral effect on mortality and other adverse outcomes. Though, given the close relationship between diabetes and COVID-19, they call for more prospective studies.

In their peer reviews of the study, Susanna Hofmann (Division Head, Helmholtz Diabetes Center) and Tamaryn Fox (Internal Medicine, Albert Einstein Medical Center) write in MIT Press Journal Rapid Reviews: COVID-19 that the study is reliable, but would require further research. Their conclusion: "While this study is strong, drugs used during the hospital stay were not noted, making these conclusions hard to generalize."

Fox notes the need for this type of research: "There is a paucity of evidence concerning the impact of glucose-lowering drugs and their effect on those infected with COVID-19; thus, this study is relevant and brings insight to this ever-growing topic."

While Hofmann notes the study may be useful to point of care providers, writing, "Importantly, the authors report here valuable information how glucose-lowering drugs taken by [Type 2 Diabetes] patients at home affect hospital stay outcomes. This knowledge may come in very handy at hospital admission and for the treatment strategy during the hospital stay of these patients."

The RR:C19 Editorial Board highlights this research saying, "With Type 2 Diabetes being a known risk factor of COVID-19 and affecting millions worldwide, it is urgent to know whether the use of glucose lowering medications contributes to a patient's risk of mortality or ICU admission if they are diagnosed with COVID-19. In this study, administering commonly-administered drugs did not pose additional risk of ICU admission or hospital death as a result of COVID-19."

ORIGINAL RESEARCH PROJECT

Impact of Glucose-Lowering Drugs on Mortality and Other Adverse Outcomes in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes Admitted for COVID-19

Pérez-Belmonte, Luis Miguel and Torres-Peña, José David and López-Carmona, María D. and Ayala-Gutiérrez, M. Mar and Fuentes-Jiménez, Francisco and Jorge Huerta, Lucía and Alonso Muñoz, Jaime and Rubio-Rivas, Manuel and Madrazo, Manel and Guzmán Garcia, Marcos and Vicente Montes, Beatriz and Fernández Sola, Joaquim and Ena, Javier and Gonzalez Ferrer, Ruth and Mella Pérez, Carmen and Ripper, Carlos J. and Napal Lecumberri, Jose Javier and El Attar Acedo, Iris and Plaza Canteli, Susana and Fuente Cosío, Sara and Amorós Martínez, Francisco and Cortés Rodríguez, Begoña and Pérez-Martínez, Pablo and Ramos-Rincón, José M. and Gómez-Huelgas, Ricardo and Group, SEMI-COVID-19 Network.

Find peer reviews and information about this study at Rapid Reviews website.

Peer review 1 by Susanna Hofmann - Evidence Scale Rating: Reliable

Peer review 2 by Tamaryn Fox - Evidence Scale Rating: Potentially informative

Summary of reviews: Glucose-lowering medications have a neutral effect on mortality and adverse outcomes in those with Type 2 Diabetes hospitalized. While this study is strong, drugs used during the hospital stay were not noted, making these conclusions hard to generalize.

To learn more about this project and its editorial board, or to sign up for future news and alerts, visit rapidreviewscovid19.mitpress.mit.edu.

Since the earliest study about nursing faculty and students attitudes and beliefs about caring for people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHIV) in the early 1990's, there have only been 17 additional studies. Knowledge in this area of study is still lacking to fill some gaps in understanding attitudes towards people living with the disease. Primary investigators, Dr. Juan Leyva (Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona), Dr. Patrick Palmieri (Universidad Norbert Wiener and A.T. Still University), and Dr. Joan Edwards (Texas Woman's University) sought to understand HIV-related attitudes of nursing faculty in three continents from six countries (Canada, Colombia, England, Peru, Spain, and the United States) and how it correlates to three dimensions of prejudice, stereotypes and discrimination. The collaborators have published their research in an article, Attitudes toward caring for people living with HIV/AIDS: Across-sectional study of nursing faculty in six countries, in The Open AIDS Journal.

"Although prior research largely focused on nursing students, the findings from this study will result in a stigma-reduction intervention for nursing faculty at schools of nursing" says Dr. Juan Levya. The two-year project was supported by the Center for Global Nursing at Texas Woman's University. Founding director, Dr. Joan Edwards, commented "this research was part of an international collaboration to advance positive social change in South America through nursing research." The Center actively supports postdoctoral scholars and develops international researchers through mentored research projects in low- and middle-income countries.

The researchers found that HIV-related stigma about caring for PLHIV are slightly positive with notable differences between countries. Apart from Peru, and to a lesser extent neighboring Colombia, the results are consistent with other findings from a few smaller studies. The results can be explained, among other reasons, by the high HIV-related stigma in South America and the pervasive discrimination experienced by the LGBTQ community. Although myths and knowledge deficits about HIV/AIDS remain problematic, the results appear to be influenced by nationality in terms of prejudices, stereotypes, and discrimination.

Faculty attitudes about caring for PLHIV can impact student attitudes and the care they provide. According to Dr. Palmieri, "nursing faculty attitudes can become part of an informal curriculum where implicit learning is impregnated with personal values." The researchers note that in terms of HIV/AIDS education, faculty might not be comfortable teaching what they do not understand. The researchers conclude that theory-derived, evidence-informed interventions need to be developed to advance the knowledge and attitudes of nursing faculty about caring for people living with HIV. The researchers plan to attempt to address negative attitudes with a stigma-reduction intervention based on the information from similar studies.

On the eve of the November 3 election, Bright Line Watch--the political science research project of faculty at the University of Rochester, the University of Chicago, and Dartmouth College--finds that experts are concerned about substantial risks to the legitimacy of the election, including potential problems in the casting and counting of votes, the Electoral College, and in the resolution of electoral disputes.

Meanwhile, among the US public surveyed, a majority of those who support Trump--as well as a plurality of those who oppose him--believe voter fraud to be far more prevalent than the evidence shows.

These are among the findings of the watchdog group's latest (October 2020) surveys.

"It's really disconcerting that the myth of voter fraud is so broadly accepted," says Gretchen Helmke, professor of political science at Rochester and one of the founders of Bright Line Watch. "There is absolutely no systematic evidence to support any of the various claims made about widespread voter fraud, yet more than three quarters of Trump supporters continue to believe that this is a real danger, as do more than 20 percent of Trump opponents."

Helmke says that this myth has long been used as a pretext for laws that suppress votes. "In the short run," she adds, "it also potentially allows Trump to sow doubt and chaos about any election results that do not go his way."

The group's immediate past survey, released in August, found the health of democracy in the United States at its lowest point since Bright Line Watch began tracking its performance in 2017.

As they had done before, the group fielded two separate surveys in October: one to political experts and one to a representative sample of the US population.

As in previous surveys, the team asked each group to assess the quality of US democracy overall and to rate the performance on 30 distinct democratic principles. Additionally, the Bright Line Watch team asked the experts to rate the likelihood of 28 election scenarios that could produce political crises, while they polled the public about the legitimacy of different 2020 election results, their confidence that votes will be counted fairly, their beliefs about voter fraud, and their willingness to tolerate political violence.

Key findings

The experts anticipate a flood of online misinformation and potentially destabilizing rhetoric from President Trump during and after November 3.

The experts see substantial risks of scenarios that could threaten the election, including potential problems in the casting and counting of votes, the Electoral College, and in the resolution of electoral disputes.

The experts rate President Trump's statement that the 2020 election should be delayed and his refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of power as the most important and abnormal of the 169 events they have rated over the course of his presidency.

Americans are generally confident their votes will be counted as intended at the local level and as voters intend in their states, but somewhat less confident in the process at the national level.

Only 44 percent of Trump supporters say they would regard a Biden victory as legitimate and only 34 percent of Trump opponents said they would view a Trump victory as legitimate.

Both supporters and opponents of President Trump recognize that the election result may not be clear on November 3. Majorities of both groups say they are prepared to recognize outcomes that differ from the initial count on election night as legitimate.

Trump's supporters and opponents have starkly different beliefs about the prevalence of voter fraud in US elections.

Most Americans, regardless of political affiliation, reject the use of violence to advance political goals, but substantial minorities are willing to condone violence and incivility.

Americans' confidence that their government protects them from political violence and guarantees their right to peaceful protest has declined since March.

The result of their survey of the American public shows a clear partisan divide over the allegation of possible voter fraud: the percentage of Americans who believe that thousands of each type of illegal votes are cast in elections ranges from 41 to 50 percent overall. However, it never rises above 29 percent among those who disapprove of President Trump, whereas the percentages range from 67 percent (voting more than once) to 78 percent (non-US citizens voting or stealing or tampering with ballots) among Americans who approve of Trump.

2020 election nightmare scenarios

The team asked the experts to rate the likelihood of a catalogue of potential crises scenarios.

The scenarios rated as most likely concern potential problems on Election Day, such as widespread false claims on social media about the integrity of the election, and misleading reports about long lines and delays at the polls.

The experts also ranked near the top several items directly related to President Trump--that he would decry as false an anticipated "blue shift" as mail-in ballots are counted and instead insist that the initial totals on election night were correct; that he would encourage violence and intimidation during voting or ballot counting; and that he would refuse to concede the 2020 election after having been declared to have lost by the Associated Press.

Bright Line Watch's experts also predicted that the disqualification of mail-in ballots will surpass 5 percent in at least one state, that early vote counts, which are expected to underrepresent mail ballots, will lean Republican, and that at least one candidate will declare victory before the Associated Press regards the outcome as sealed.

"Our experts rate President Trump's discussion of delaying the election and refusal to commit to the peaceful transfer of power as the most important and abnormal of his presidency," says Brendan Nyhan, professor of government at Dartmouth College, and one of the founders of Bright Line Watch. "This finding reinforces the need for concern about democratic stability in this election and in the future."

Decaying jellyfish blooms fuel the rapid growth of just a few strains of seawater bacteria, effectively keeping this organic material within the water column food web, reveals a new study published in Frontiers in Microbiology. This research furthers our understanding of how marine ecosystems are impacted by jellyfish blooms, which have been observed to be happening on a more frequent basis.

"When jellyfish blooms decay, the sinking detritus is likely to be a temporary but significant source of food for marine microorganisms," says Dr Tinkara Tinta, author of this research, based at the Marine Biology Station Piran, National Institute of Biology, Slovenia. "We show that organic matter leaching from decaying jellyfish is rapidly consumed by a few opportunistic fast-growing bacteria that in turn will provide food for other marine animals in the water column."

The problem with jellyfish

Observed increases in jellyfish populations in several marine ecosystems around the world have been blamed on climate change and the degradation of marine ecosystems. These blooms can be vast and have serious consequences.

"Large jellyfish blooms block cooling intakes of coastal power and desalinization plants, interfere with ship operations, and cause damage to the tourism, fishing and aquaculture industries," says Gerhard J. Herndl , co-author of this study, and a Professor at the Department of Functional and Evolutionary Ecology in the University of Vienna. "It is therefore important to fully understand the role and impact of these blooms on the marine ecosystem. To date, very few studies have examined the link between jellyfish detritus and its most probable consumers and degraders, marine microorganisms."

Bacteria - small but mighty

Using state-of-the-art analytical tools and techniques, the researchers investigated the detailed composition of a decaying bloom of Moon Jellyfish from the northern Adriatic Sea and how quickly bacteria in the seawater responded to this potential food source.

"We identified a small number of key microbes that consumed the jellyfish detritus very quickly, rapidly multiplying in the process. Temporarily, these bacteria will form an important component of the water column food web, feeding plankton that are then consumed by larger marine animals. These findings also imply the amount of food reaching the seafloor, the organic material from jellyfish detritus, is effectively reduced by just a few strains of bacteria in the water column," elaborates Dr Tinta.

Expanding the study

Professor Herndl explains that while the results of this study fills some of the knowledge gaps surrounding the impact of large jellyfish blooms on marine food webs, more research is needed.

"There are many jellyfish species and other gelatinous organisms, such as salps and comb jellies, which can form large blooms with the potential for causing similar temporary changes in the food web. In addition, not all ecosystems where they occur are alike and these differences may not support the same strains of bacteria. Our investigation can be used as a template and expanded to other gelatinous animals and marine habitats, so that we have a better appreciation of their wider impact on the marine ecosystem."