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A promising new biomarker that appears in patients before stomach cancer develops may help with early detection of the disease and improve patient response to therapy, according to findings in a study led by University of Arizona Health Sciences researchers.

The biomarker can be detected through a simple blood test, saving time and lowering costs. Currently, stomach cancer diagnosis requires endoscopic collection of stomach tissue through a biopsy procedure, and then analysis by pathology.

Published in Gut, the journal of the British Society of Gastroenterology, the study was led by Juanita L. Merchant, MD, PhD, chief of the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology at the UArizona College of Medicine - Tucson, a cancer biology program researcher at the UArizona Cancer Center and an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine.

The biomarker, MiR130b, is a microRNA - or small non-coding RNA molecule that can play an important role in regulating gene expression, affecting disease development and progression. MiR130b can be produced by a group of immune cells called myeloid-derived suppressor cells (MDSCs), commonly associated with infections caused by Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori), a bacteria associated with ulcers. These particular cell types in the stomach correlate with early, preneoplastic changes (before a tumor develops) that can lead to gastric cancer long after an H. pylori infection has passed.

The study included collaboration with Yana Zavros, PhD, associate head for research in the College of Medicine - Tucson's Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine and the Cancer Center's shared resource director for Tissue Acquisition Cellular and Molecular Analysis.

"Even though you get can get rid of the bacteria, oftentimes the infection itself already has initiated a cascade of events that inevitably may lead to cancer," Dr. Zavros said. "That is why early detection is so important."

A Blood Test Instead of a Procedure

The study arose out of basic science mouse models that simulated changes in the stomach similar to that caused by H. pylori. This led the researchers to identify MiR130b in the mouse models, and they also detected the same microRNA in the plasma of human patients that either had precancerous changes or those that already had progressed to cancer.

"This was a retrospective study," said Dr. Merchant, who is a member of the university's BIO5 Institute. "It is very exciting because now we can begin looking at this biomarker more prospectively in different patient populations."

Although less common in the United States, the National Cancer Institute reports gastric (stomach) cancer is the third most common cause of cancer-related deaths in the world. The findings, however, could have major implications for Arizona's rural areas and Hispanic and Native American populations, which are at greater risk for developing gastric and other gastrointestinal (GI) cancers, because these diseases often are caused by dietary and environmental factors and may go undetected for long periods.

Dr. Merchant's lab has a "sub-project" in the Cancer Center's U54 grant (Partnership for Native American Cancer Prevention) to study detection of the microRNA described in the Gut paper in members of Native American populations with H. pylori.

"This molecular signature (the microRNA - MiR130b) that we discovered may help us see if patients have changes in their mucosa (the membrane that lines the stomach) related to having H. pylori," Dr. Merchant said. "And a blood sample would be less invasive and then could be a way to make the decision whether we need to bring a patient in for an endoscopy."

Broader Implications for Treatment

Once diagnosed, gastric cancer can be difficult to treat. Immunotherapies with proven effectiveness in treating other types of cancer are not as successful against most GI cancers, including stomach cancer. The researchers believe these new findings in gastric cancer may help to address why other GI cancers also are resistant to therapy.

"The underlying mechanism by which a patient may not respond well in gastric cancer may be applicable in other organs as well" Dr. Zavros said. "The way the cells interact with each other to render that patient resistant to therapy may be quite similar between gastric, pancreatic and colon cancers."

Dr. Merchant added: "There may be dual-purposes. We can look at it as a biomarker to help us from a diagnostic perspective, but we also can look at therapies that can be developed based on what this microRNA itself is targeting."

Another project funded by the Cancer Center's "Sparking Bench-to-Bedside Team Science Project" award is building from results of this study to explore therapies for pancreatic and gastric cancer. The investigators are exploring the tumor microenvironment, in particular the immune cell MDSCs, referred to previously, that appears to dampen the chemotherapeutic response to immunotherapies.

The project relies heavily on Dr. Zavros' "BioDroid" program, which develops miniature organs in the lab with a realistic microanatomy, also known as organoids. These are used in collaboration with the Tissue Acquisition Repository for Gastrointestinal and HEpaTic Systems (TARGHETS), created by Dr. Merchant. TARGHETS is a GI/Hepatology biorepository that collects samples from patients who undergo endoscopy.

Both Drs. Zavros and Merchant are looking to the BioDroid and TARGHETS efforts to reveal additional information that will allow them to develop new approaches to address resistance of gastric cancer to immunotherapies.

"We want to find a way to reprogram the cancer cells or the immune cells within that patient's tumor environment to make the patient more responsive to the therapy," Dr. Zavros said. "A biomarker gives us a place to start."

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) affects more than 70,000 children in the United States and the prevalence is rising. In fact, 25% of the 3.1 million individuals with IBD present before 21 years of age. There is no cure for IBD, and treatment often includes medication to block a molecule that causes inflammation in the intestines called tumor necrosis factor (TNF). Unfortunately, the TNF-blocking therapy doesn't work for many children and its therapeutic effects can be short-lived.

In a new study in Cell Reports, investigators at The Saban Research Institute at Children's Hospital Los Angeles have uncovered a role that TNF and its receptor play in intestinal health that will lead to a better understanding of TNF. This could positively impact future treatments for patients with IBD.

Children with IBD, a broad term which includes Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis, can experience abdominal pain and weight loss, which can impact a child's growth. Patients with these conditions often have elevated levels of TNF in their bloodstream and intestines.

"Increased expression of TNF is one of the body's first responses to infection or injury," says D. Brent Polk, MD, a physician and investigator who studies intestinal development and associated disorders. "In many patients, antibodies that block TNF are effective, but most patients don't benefit from the therapy long term."

Sometimes, says Dr. Polk, patients initially show improvement, but then the treatment stops working. Oddly, some children even develop IBD when they receive anti-TNF therapy for an unrelated condition, such as juvenile arthritis.

Dr. Polk's investigations take a different approach to studying IBD. Instead of viewing TNF signaling as either pro- or anti-IBD, his work examines whether there is a range of TNF levels that maintain intestinal health.

"We know that TNF signaling leads to inflammation," he says, "but when we blocked the TNF receptor in a pre-clinical model of IBD, it led to early-onset colitis. So, it's not a simple matter of blocking TNF outright. The body is really fine tuned to maintain health."

His study shows that the timing of TNF signaling and which receptors are activated developmentally could be more important than merely the levels of the inflammatory molecule.

"It's not that TNF signaling is 'good' or 'bad,'" explains Dr. Polk. "It's more complicated than the field previously understood." He says that TNF does cause inflammation in the intestines, but it also appears to play a protective role, especially early in life.

The study is preclinical but has important implications for patients. Future therapies depend on a better understanding of how molecules like TNF function. Work like Dr. Polk's could lead to treatments that give relief to all children with IBD.

KINGSTON, R.I., -- October 20, 2020 -- For the first time, researchers have mapped the biological diversity of marine sediment, one of Earth's largest global biomes. Although marine sediment covers 70% of the Earth's surface, little was known about its global patterns of microbial diversity.

A team of researchers from the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), the University of Hyogo, the University of Kochi, the University of Bremen, and the University of Rhode Island delineated the global diversity of microbes in marine sediment. For the study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Tatsuhiko Hoshino, senior researcher at JAMSTEC, and his colleagues including URI Graduate School of Oceanography Professor Steven D'Hondt analyzed 299 samples of marine sediment collected as core samples from 40 sites around the globe. Their sample depths ranged from the seafloor to 678 meters below it. To accurately determine the diversity of microbial communities, the authors extracted and sequenced DNA from each frozen sample under the same clean laboratory condition.

The 16S rRNA gene sequences (approximately 50 million sequences) obtained through comprehensive next-generation sequencing were analyzed to determine microbial community composition in each sample. From these 50 million sequences, the research team discovered nearly 40,000 different types of microorganisms in marine sediment, with diversity generally decreasing with depth. The team found that microbial community composition differs significantly between organic-rich sediment of continental margins and nutrient-poor sediment of the open ocean, and that the presence or absence of oxygen and the concentration of organic matter are major factors in determining community composition.

By comparing their results to previous studies of topsoil and seawater, the researchers discovered that each of these three global biomes--marine sediment, topsoil, and seawater--has different microbial communities but similar total diversity. "It was an unexpected discovery that microbial diversity in the dark, energy-limited world beneath the seafloor is as diverse as in Earth's surface biomes," said Hoshino.

Furthermore, by combining the estimates of bacterial and archaeal diversity for these three biomes, the researchers found that bacteria are far more diverse than archaea--microbes distinct from bacteria and known for living in extreme environments--on Earth.

"In this respect as well, microbial diversity in the dark realm of marine sediment resembles microbial diversity in the surface world," said D'Hondt. "It's exciting to glimpse the biological richness of this dark world."

To efficiently infect human cells, SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is able to use a receptor called Neuropilin-1, which is very abundant in many human tissues including the respiratory tract, blood vessels and neurons. The breakthrough discovery was made by a German-Finnish team of researchers led by neuroscientists Mika Simons ,Technical University of Munich, Germany and virologist Giuseppe Balistreri, University of Helsinki, Finland.

Why is the new coronavirus so infectious?

"That SARS-CoV-2 uses the receptor ACE2 to infect our cells was known, but viruses often use multiple factors to maximize their infectious potential" says Dr. Giuseppe Balistreri, head of the research group Viral Cell Biology at the University of Helsinki involved in the study.

Unlike other respiratory viruses, SARS-CoV-2 infects also the upper respiratory system including the nasal mucosa and consequently spreads rapidly. "This virus is able to leave our body even when we simply breath or talk", Balistreri adds. "The starting point of our study was the question why SARS-CoV, a coronavirus that led to a much smaller outbreak in 2003, and SARS-CoV-2, spread in such a different way even if they use the same main receptor ACE2", explains Ravi Ojha, a young researcher in the Balistreri's team, and one of the main contributors of the study.

A mysterious extra key on the virus surface

To understand how these differences can be explained, in collaboration with the team of Professor Olli Vapalahti, University of Helsinki, the researchers took a look at the viral surface proteins, the spikes, that, like hooks, anchor the virus to the cells. Balistreri reveals that "when the sequence of the SARS-CoV-2 genome became available, at the end of January, something surprised us. Compared to its older relative, the new coronavirus had acquired an 'extra piece' on its surface proteins, which is also found in the spikes of many devastating human viruses, including Ebola, HIV, and highly pathogenic strains of avian influenza, among others. We thought this could lead us to the answer". In collaboration with giant virologist Ari Helenius, ETH Zurich, Switzerland, and cancer biologists Professor Tambet Teesalu, University of Tartu, Estonia, the mystery was solved: the extra key binds to neuropilin-1.

Together, the coordinated team of international researchers, including more than 30 scientists from Germany, Finland, Estonia and Australia, looked at whether neuropilins were important for infection by SARS-CoV-2. Their experiments now support this hypothesis. Interestingly, an independent team of scientists at the University of Bristol , UK, has obtained similar results and confirmed that the virus spike binds directly to neuropilin-1 (Ref. DOI: 10.1126/science.abd3072). The two studies complement each other.

New antiviral strategy in making

By specifically blocking neuropilin-1 with antibodies, the researchers were able to significantly reduce infection in laboratory cell cultures. "If you think of ACE2 as a door lock to enter the cell, then neuropilin-1 could be a factor that directs the virus to the door. ACE2 is expressed at very low levels in most cells. Thus, it is not easy for the virus to find doors to enter. Other factors such as neuropilin-1 might help the virus finding its door", says Balistreri.

Balistreri cautiously concludes "it is currently too early to speculate whether blocking directly neuropilin could be a viable therapeutic approach, as this could lead to side effects. This will have to be looked at in future studies. Currently our laboratory is testing the effect of new molecules that we have specifically designed to interrupt the connection between the virus and neuropilin. Preliminary results are very promising and we hope to obtain validations in vivo in the near future."

BROOKLYN, New York, Tuesday, October 20, 2020 - A new report from The Governance Lab (The GovLab) at NYU's Tandon School of Engineering launched today at an event at the Nesta Centre for Collective Intelligence, has found organizations that tap the wisdom of the crowd are better at solving many of the problems that trouble governments, including those exacerbated by COVID-19 -- from air pollution and chronic illness, to sustainable development, climate change and disaster response.

The report, entitled Using Collective Intelligence to Solve Public Problems, examined global examples of how public institutions are using new technology to take advantage of the collective action and collective wisdom of people in their communities and around the world to address problems like climate change, loneliness and natural disaster response. The GovLab has also published 30 case studies to show how leaders have designed the most successful projects. These include Lakewood, Colorado, whose Sustainable Neighborhoods Program has engaged more than 20,000 residents in running 500 sustainability events and projects. SynAthina from Athens, Greece is a platform where 443 civic groups have posted 4,050 activities, enabling residents to collectively revitalize their city. Founded in Kenya in 2007 as an election monitoring tool, Ushahidi (Swahili for "Testimony") has been used for 150,000 "crowdmapping" projects to rescue victims from the Haitian earthquake in 2010, prevent forest fires in Italy and Russia, and crowdsource incidents of sexual harassment in Egypt, among other campaigns in 160 countries.

The report is part of a broader "Collective Intelligence to Solve Public Problems" project that includes the 30 original case studies, an online course, a podcast, report and design guide all aimed at helping leaders respond to problems more efficiently and inclusively.

"As novel challenges continue to present themselves around the world, it is becoming increasingly apparent that traditional ways of solving problems are outdated and ineffective," said Beth Simone Noveck, director of The GovLab. "Through this research, we have observed that institutions which choose to work more openly and collaboratively with local organizations and citizens are better able to respond to public problems, including emergencies and crises such as the challenges brought on by COVID-19."

The accompanying practical guide Collective Intelligence: A Checklist for the Public Sector lays out nine questions which serve as a checklist for those who aim to design a collective intelligence initiative. The questions focus thinking on how to tap the capabilities of the crowd that are relevant for solving the problem at hand and help to ensure public engagement is meaningful and impactful.

Matt Ryan, Senior Fellow at The GovLab and report co-author, said: "The speed, scale and complexity of public problems, combined with the trust crisis confronted by many public institutions, make using the skills and knowledge of 'the crowd' much more than a 'nice-to-have'. For serious public policy makers and service providers it's a necessity."

New Rochelle, NY, October 20, 2020--Synthetic estrogens from pharmaceuticals contaminate rivers and threaten the health of humans and fish. An effective and cost-efficient method for removing synthetic estrogen from bodies of water has been demonstrated in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Engineering Science. Click here (http://doi.org/10.1089/ees.2020.0048) to read the article now.

The researchers compared non-modified and modified forms of bentonite, a natural, low-cost absorbent that can remove pharmaceutical micropollutants from water bodies.

One particular bentonite complex "can be considered a promising low-coast modified absorbent for the removal of 17α-ethinylestradiol and, potentially, of other relevant pharmaceutical organic micropollutants from wastewater environments," state Carla Daniel, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, and coauthors.

Manajit Hayer-Hartl, head of the research group "Chaperonin-assisted Protein Folding", has a long-standing interest in the central enzyme of photosynthesis called Rubisco. Her team has already reported on many of the interacting partners of Rubisco that are required for the folding and assembly of this highly abundant protein. In the current study, they have elucidated how Rubisco activase works. As the name indicates, this enzyme is critical for repairing Rubisco once it has lost its activity. The study was published in Cell.

The enzyme Rubisco catalyzes the assimilation of CO2 from the atmosphere into organic matter. This is the central step in photosynthesis that generates sugar molecules for the production of essentially all biomass. Despite its pivotal role, Rubisco works relatively slowly and is easily inhibited by sugar products. By improving the function of Rubisco Hayer-Hartl hopes to be able to boost the process of photosynthesis. The goal is to address the growing global demand for food and reduce the current greenhouse gas-induced climate change.

The enzyme Rubisco activase, Rca, is present in plants, algae and certain cyanobacteria. Rca is a ring-shaped complex of six subunits with a central pore. How exactly Rca interacts with the inhibited Rubisco and releases the bound sugar from the active site pocket of Rubisco, restoring its CO2 fixing activity, was unclear until now. With the help of biochemistry, crystallography and cryo-electron microscopy, Hayer-Hartl & colleagues have now succeeded in deciphering the molecular mechanism of a cyanobacterial Rca.

They discovered that the Rca grabs the N-terminal tail of Rubisco and by pulling and pushing actions, using the energy of ATP, opens the active site pocket. This results in the release of the inhibitory sugar molecule. In cyanobacteria Rubisco is packaged into specialized micro-compartments called carboxysomes, in which a high concentration of CO2 is generated to facilitate the function of Rubisco.

In an earlier study, Hayer-Hartl showed how Rubisco is recruited into carboxysomes via interactions with the SSUL domains of the scaffolding protein CcmM. Interestingly, the researchers now found that Rca is recruited into carboxysomes using a very similar trick. The Rca hexamer also contains SSUL domains that dock onto Rubisco during carboxysome formation. This makes sure that enough Rca is present inside carboxysomes to perform its essential repair function. Thus, Rca not only functions in Rubisco activation but also mediates its own recruitment into carboxysomes.

Manajit Hayer-Hartl concludes: "Rca is absolutely required for Rubisco to function optimally. Deciphering its mechanism and dual function in cyanobacteria will further help us to make photosynthesis more effective in the future. Hopefully, this will get us closer to our ultimate goal, to increase agricultural productivity".

Nearly one-third of students who reported misusing prescription opioids as high school seniors between 1997 and 2000, but did not have a history of medical use, later used heroin by age 35, according to a University of Michigan study.

The research also found that 21% of seniors in the same period, who misused prescription opioids and later received an opioid prescription, went on to use heroin by age 35, said lead researcher Sean Esteban McCabe, professor and director of the Center for the Study of Drugs, Alcohol, Smoking and Health at the U-M School of Nursing.

"It is a very timely study given the number of adolescents and young adults who were overprescribed opioids and who are now aging into adulthood," he said. "We need to follow these generations to assess their risk for developing later problems."

Researchers focused on 25 cohorts of high school seniors between 1976 and 2000, following them from age 18 to age 35. They used data from 11,012 individuals from the national Monitoring the Future study, funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Unlike earlier cohorts, individuals from the 1997-2000 cohorts who reported prescription opioid misuse had a dramatically increased risk for later heroin use, compared to students who didn't misuse prescription opioids. The 1997-2000 cohorts included 1,059 individuals.

This likely reflects the trend of overprescribing opioids, said study co-author Philip Veliz, research assistant professor at the School of Nursing.

"There was an increase in opioid prescribing in the 1990s and 2000s that contributed to the opioid epidemic," he said. "Health professionals and the larger public health community owe it to these individuals to understand the downstream effects of overprescribing and develop effective interventions."

The researchers were surprised by the large uptick in heroin use among the more recent cohorts, and the findings partially explain why opioid overdoses have skyrocketed, Veliz said.

"These prevalence estimates of heroin use are very high, considering the general population annual estimates are less than 1%," McCabe said. "And anyone in the study with a history of heroin use at baseline was excluded, which makes the findings more conclusive."

Based on national estimates, the number of people in the United States using heroin has increased from 373,000 in 2007 to 808,000 in 2018. The largest increase in heroin use over this time period has occurred among adults aged 26 and older.

Although the vast majority of prescription opioid exposure does not lead to heroin use, heroin incidence and prevalence rates were significantly greater among those who reported prescription opioid misuse, the researchers say.

Previous data show that only 1% of individuals who reported past-year prescription opioid misuse had used heroin before prescription opioids, whereas approximately 80% of those who reported past-year heroin use had misused prescription opioids before starting heroin.

So what's the takeaway for parents and health care professionals?

"There are several generations who were overprescribed controlled medications with high misuse potential, such as opioids," McCabe said. "Prescribing fewer opioids and the correct dosage is only one piece to the puzzle.

"The solution requires a much more comprehensive plan that includes better education, screening and interventions to reach high-risk individuals who often fly under the radar in many health care settings. We all played a role in creating the opioid crisis and we owe it to these individuals to address the problem."

It has recently been described that infection by some enteroviruses - a genus of viruses that commonly cause diseases of varying severity - could potentially trigger diabetes, although its direct effect 'in vivo' as well as its mechanism of action at the molecular level were unknown. Now, a team of researchers from the Growth Factors, Nutrients and Cancer Group, led by Nabil Djouder at the Spanish National Cancer Research Centre (CNIO), demonstrates for the first time in Cell Reports Medicine how the enterovirus coxsackievirus type B4 (CVB4) could induce diabetes. These findings can be a fundamental step to open the way to the search of new therapeutic strategies.

The researchers also point out that the finding could be of relevance for the COVID-19 pandemic, since clinical information indicates a possible relationship between SARS-CoV-2 viral infection and diabetes. Djouder and his team suggest that since receptor of SARS-CoV-2 is expressed in the endocrine pancreas, it could operate and lead to diabetes in a similar way that CVB4 does, independently of immune reactions.

Molecular mechanisms of failure in insulin production

Coxsackieviruses belong to the family of Enterovirus, which also includes poliovirus and echovirus, and which can cause from mild flu-like illnesses to more serious illnesses such as myocarditis, pericarditis, meningitis, or pancreatitis. It was suspected that these viruses can cause diabetes in humans, but molecular mechanisms were unknown.

With the aim of finding and describing these mechanisms, the CNIO researchers worked with animal models engrafted with human pancreatic cells infected by CVB4, as well as with human and mouse insulin-producing cells, also infected with this virus.

What they observed was that CVB4 infection induces deregulation of URI, a protein that regulates the normal functions of numerous cellular activities. "In this case, URI downregulation triggers a cascade of molecular events leading to modification of the genome via hypermethylation and silencing of Pdx1. This is a gene critical for the identity and the function of beta cells present in the endocrine pancreas, at the so-called Islets of Langerhans, and responsible for the production and secretion of insulin, a hormone that decreases blood glucose levels," explains Nabil Djouder, lead author of the work published in Cell Reports Medicine. "PDX1 silencing causes the loss of the identity and function of the beta cells, which become more like alpha cells, in charge of increasing blood glucose levels, and hence leading to hyperglycemia and subsequent diabetes, independently of any immune reactions."

The researchers demonstrated their findings by using various genetically engineered mouse models and genomic studies. They show that loss of URI in mouse pancreata alters beta cell identity and function, leading to diabetes. Furthermore, they observed that diabetic mice that overexpress URI in beta cells are more tolerant to glucose. Finally, they demonstrated in several pancreata from diabetic patients that expression of URI, PDX1 and viral particles correlates in beta cells, highlighting a causal link between enterovirus infection and diabetes in humans.

The CNIO results could help advance knowledge about the pathological effects of the virus causing the current pandemic: "Similarly to our investigations on enteroviruses, some recent clinical observations have associated SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for COVID-19, to diabetes in infected patients," explains Djouder. "Since the receptor of SARS-Co-V2 is present in beta cells, it would be interesting to study if this virus also alters URI function and silences the expression of PDX1 to affect beta-cell function, promoting diabetes."

The researchers also suggest that, following these results, a possible prevention and therapeutic strategy would be to use, in combination with anti-viral therapies, inhibitors against DNA methylase transferase, a protein responsible for the hypermethylation of the genome and silencing of Pdx1. Indeed, Djouder's team demonstrated that this class of inhibitors reinstated PDX1 expression and glucose tolerance in diabetic mice. Several of these inhibitors have already been licensed for clinical use in cancer treatments, which could speed up their application in these cases.

How can the partisan divide be bridged when conservatives and liberals consume the same political content, yet interpret it through their own biased lens?

Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, Stanford University and Johns Hopkins University scanned the brains of more than three dozen politically left- and right-leaning adults as they viewed short videos involving hot-button immigration policies, such as the building of the U.S.-Mexico border wall, and the granting of protections for undocumented immigrants under the federal Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.

Their findings, published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal, show that liberals and conservatives respond differently to the same videos, especially when the content being viewed contains vocabulary that frequently pops up in political campaign messaging.

"Our study suggests that there is a neural basis to partisan biases, and some language especially drives polarization," said study lead author Yuan Chang Leong, a postdoctoral scholar in cognitive neuroscience at UC Berkeley. "In particular, the greatest differences in neural activity across ideology occurred when people heard messages that highlight threat, morality and emotions."

Overall, the results offer a never-before-seen glimpse into the partisan brain in the weeks leading up to what is arguably the most consequential U.S. presidential election in modern history. They underscore that multiple factors, including personal experiences and the news media, contribute to what the researchers call "neural polarization."

"Even when presented with the same exact content, people can respond very differently, which can contribute to continued division," said study senior author Jamil Zaki, a professor of psychology at Stanford University. "Critically, these differences do not imply that people are hardwired to disagree. Our experiences, and the media we consume, likely contribute to neural polarization."

Specifically, the study traces the source of neural polarization to a higher-order brain region known as the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, which is believed to track and make sense of narratives, among other functions.

Another key finding is that the closer the brain activity of a study participant resembles that of the "average liberal" or the "average conservative," as modeled in the study, the more likely it is that the participant, after watching the videos, will adopt that particular group's position.

"This finding suggests that the more participants adopt the conservative interpretation of a video, the more likely they are to be persuaded to take the conservative position, and vice versa," Leong said.

Leong and fellow researchers launched the study with a couple of theories about how people with different ideological biases would differ in the way they process political information. They hypothesized that if sensory information, like sounds and visual imagery, drove polarization, they would observe differences in brain activity in the visual and auditory cortices.

However, if the narrative storytelling aspects of the political information people absorbed in the videos drove them apart ideologically, the researchers expected to see those disparities also revealed in higher-order brain regions, such as the prefrontal cortex. And that theory panned out.

To establish that attitudes toward hardline immigration policies predicted both conservative and liberal biases, the researchers first tested questions out on 300 people recruited via the Amazon Mechanical Turk online marketplace who identified, to varying degrees, as liberal, moderate or conservative.

They then recruited 38 young and middle-aged men and women with similar socio-economic backgrounds and education levels who had rated their opposition or support for controversial immigration policies, such as those that led to the U.S.-Mexico border wall, DACA protections for undocumented immigrants, the ban on refugees from majority-Muslim countries coming to the U.S. and the cutting of federal funding to sanctuary cities.

Researchers scanned the study participants' brains via functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) as they viewed two dozen brief videos representing liberal and conservative positions on the various immigration policies. The videos included news clips, campaign ads and snippets of speeches by prominent politicians.

After each video, the participants rated on a scale of one to five how much they agreed with the general message of the video, the credibility of the information presented and the extent to which the video made them likely to change their position and to support the policy in question.

To calculate group brain responses to the videos, the researchers used a measure known as inter-subject correlation, which can be used to measure how similarly two brains respond to the same message.

Their results showed a high shared response across the group in the auditory and visual cortices, regardless of the participants' political attitudes. However, neural responses diverged along partisan lines in the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex, where semantic information, or word meanings, are processed.

Next, the researchers drilled down further to learn what specific words were driving neural polarization. To do this, they edited the videos into 87 shorter segments and placed the words in the segments into one of 50 categories. Those categories included words related to morality, emotions, threat and religion.

The researchers found that the use of words related to risk and threat, and to morality and emotions, led to greater polarization in the study participants' neural responses.

An example of a risk-related statement was, "I think it's very dangerous, because what we want is cooperation amongst the cities and the federal government to ensure that we have safety in our communities, and to ensure that our citizens are protected."

Meanwhile, an example of a moral-emotional statement was, "What are the fundamental ethical principles that are the basis of our society? Do no harm, and be compassionate, and this federal policy violates both of these principles."

Overall, the research study's results suggest that political messages that use threat-related and moral-emotional language drive partisans to interpret the same message in opposite ways, contributing to increasing polarization, Leong said.

Going forward, Leong hopes to use neuroimaging to build more precise models of how political content is interpreted and to inform interventions aimed at narrowing the divide between conservatives and liberals.

EAST LANSING, Mich. - Strategies meant to motivate people in the workplace may have unintended consequences -- depending on who's in charge. Recent research from Michigan State University and Ohio State University shows that empowerment initiatives aren't necessarily the answer for business leaders hoping to motivate their employees.

"People tend to think of empowerment in uniformly positive ways," said Nicholas Hays, study co-author and associate professor of management in MSU's Eli Broad College of Business. "After all, humans crave independence and control so giving it to them at work should be a good thing. However, as people feel increasingly autonomous, they can also become unmoored from others' needs, expectations and social norms."

Hays explained that, in recent decades, companies have increasingly implemented various forms of empowerment initiatives that assume empowered leaders will translate into empowered workers.

The paper -- published in Journal of Applied Psychology -- found that, when properly implemented, empowerment initiatives can lead to heightened motivation, productivity and creativity. However, whether these initiatives are effective at all levels of the organization depends on the management style of the person implementing them.

Hays - along with Broad College of Business colleague, Russell E. Johnson, MSU Foundation Professor of management, and Hun Whee Lee, assistant professor of management at Ohio State University and lead author of the study -- found that superiors who value being respected will respond to empowerment initiatives by, in turn, empowering their workers. But, superiors who value being in charge will, somewhat ironically, respond to empowerment initiatives by closely controlling, dominating and managing their employees.

The researchers conducted three separate studies measuring outcomes of empowerment initiatives that considered personality trait data and leader behavior.

"We found that leaders who really care about being respected by their subordinates tend to react to empowerment initiatives by 'paying it forward' with certain behaviors. This could include things like allowing subordinates to set their own goals or decide how to accomplish tasks," Lee said. "In contrast, leaders who prefer to be in control and tell others what to do tend to react to these initiatives by doubling down on their desire for control. This is when we see things like micromanaging or setting specific goals for subordinates."

If an employee is uncomfortable with a superior's leadership style, the researchers say it may be beneficial to have a candid conversation between worker and boss.

"Many leaders are receptive to feedback and want to provide employees what they need to succeed at work," Hays said. "If that doesn't work, looking for different groups to join - either within an organization and with a different supervisor or even by changing organizations altogether - is sometimes the best option."

And in the unprecedented workplace environment of 2020, Hays also offered insight into what he believes the paper's findings may indicate for employees in real time.

"To the extent that leaders prioritize dominance and being in charge, they may go out of their way to micromanage employees by, for example, monitoring their online status and requesting frequent check-ins," Hays said. "I wouldn't necessarily characterize this as abusing an empowerment initiative, but certainly could rub employees the wrong way."

On the southern exterior wall of the Dome of the Rock, a very important Islamic shrine in Jerusalem's Old City, there are two marble slabs, both carved from the same stone and placed side by side to form a symmetrical pattern, that depicts two birds. In a recent article published in the Journal of Near Eastern Studies, "Solomon and The Petrified Birds on the Dome of the Rock," author Elon Harvey explores the history of this marble decoration and describes how different narratives about Solomon and two birds contributed to the multiple understandings of this imagery.

According to this article, there are six factors that contribute to the significance of the birds' imagery: (1) it breaks the symmetry that characterizes the Dome of the Rock's southern wall; (2) it is placed in the southern entrance, which is the main entrance to the Dome of the Rock; (3) there are no other depictions of animals or living creatures on the Dome of the Rock; (4) the imagery bears resemblance to carved depictions of birds in Frankish structures in the region; (5) the imagery has remained in the same spot for at least 350 years in spite of extensive renovations; and (6) the techniques for producing symmetrical imagery from marble point suggest a Byzantine and, perhaps, Christian origin.

In terms of narratives that describe the significance of the two birds, the earliest account is attributed to Evliya Celebi in 1672, who described it as an imagery that shows a "miracle of God." In the 18th century, Elzear Horn, a Franciscan missionary, described local accounts that tells the story of a stonecutter who found the two birds "formed... by nature itself."

A main departure from these two accounts, however, is found in later narratives that emphasize the story of Solomon and the two birds. Two 19th century accounts by Lievin de Hamme and Ermette Pierotti, respectively, describe the birds as magpies who defied Solomon's orders to contribute to the building of the Temple, and, as a result, were petrified as a punishment. In the beginning of the 20th century, James Edward Hanauer noted a local tale that describes how Solomon punished a male bird for boasting to a female bird: because the male bird boasted that he himself could tear down all of Solomon's edifices, Solomon turned both birds into stone. Later on, Haim Schwarzbaum, a 20th century folklorist, demonstrated that Hanauer's tale is a narrative with Sufi origins dating back to the beginning of the 10th century CE.

According to this article, however, Schwarzbaum's work points towards older Sufi narratives that date back to, at the latest, the 9th century C.E. These Sufi narratives are recorded by three figures: al-Qushayr, al-Kahra'iti, and Abu Tahir al-Silafi. In these versions, the birds were not petrified as a punishment. Rather, even after a male bird boasted to a lover that he can single-handedly topple the Dome of Solomon, Solomon acknowledged the bird's plea that the words of lovers should not be held against them. Afterall, those attempting to impress their love interests tend to get carried away with their words.

In conclusion, this article suggests that the legend of Solomon and the birds developed over time until it was finally associated with the Dome of the Rock. As the author argues, stories about the two birds demonstrate that "Sufi traditions and the figure of Solomon were still very influential in shaping the appearance and conception of the Dome of the Rock."

Artificial light abnormally increases mosquito biting behavior at night in a species that typically prefers to bite people during the day, according to research from the University of Notre Dame that was published in The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.

Increased biting by Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, which normally fly and bite in the early morning and during the afternoon, highlights the concern that increasing levels of light pollution could impact transmission of diseases such as dengue fever, yellow fever, chikungunya and Zika.

"This is potentially a very valid problem that shouldn't be overlooked," said Giles Duffield, associate professor in the Department of Biological Sciences, who is also affiliated with the Eck Institute for Global Health and the Neuroscience and Behavior Program. Unlike other species that may emerge from the forest to feed on humans and animals, Aedes aegypti evolved with humans and prefers to feed on them.

"They live and breed in the vicinity of houses, so the chances of Aedes aegypti being exposed to light pollution are very likely," he added.

To conduct the experiment, the study's first author, Samuel S. C. Rund, a staff scientist in the Department of Biological Sciences, allowed mosquitoes in cages to bite his arms under controlled conditions, including during the day, at night or at night while exposed to artificial light. The female mosquitoes -- the only ones that bite -- were twice as likely to bite, or blood-feed, at night when they were exposed to artificial light. Twenty-nine percent of the mosquitoes in the control group, which had no light, fed at night, while 59 percent of the mosquitoes exposed to artificial light blood-fed.

The findings will help epidemiologists better understand the true risk of disease transmission by this species. The discovery could also lead to more recommendations for bed net use. Usually mosquito bed nets are used at night to ward off bites from a different genus of mosquitoes, Anopheles, but because Aedes aegypti were shown to be stimulated by artificial light, mosquito nets could also be used in areas with a likelihood of disease transmission even with limited Anopheles activity.

"The impact of this research could be huge, and it probably has been overlooked," Duffield said. "Epidemiologists may want to take light pollution into account when predicting infection rates."

Duffield and his collaborators plan to experiment with additional variables of artificial light to further study Aedes aegypti biting activity. These variables include the duration of light, its intensity and color, and the timing of the biting -- whether early at night or later. The team is also interested in the molecular genetic pathways that might be involved with biting activity, after noticing that not every mosquito in the population under study was interested in biting at night even with artificial light.

"So, we think there is a genetic component within the Aedes aegypti species," Duffield said.

The COVID-19 pandemic has left many people with chronic health conditions relying on telemedicine rather than seeing their doctor in person when necessary or putting off important visits entirely because they fear being infected.

Ann M. Nguyen, an assistant research professor at Rutgers Center for State Health Policy at the Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research, who recently published a paper on safety measures at physician offices, discusses what people should know about visiting their doctor and why putting off appointments that need to be done in person could lead to other health problems.

What can patients do to assess the safety of their doctor's office when making an appointment?

The physician's office should be appointment-only and have clear safety protocols posted online, outside of their office or described over the phone. While making an appointment, the office staff should walk patients through those safety protocols, such as asking them to wear a mask to the in-person visit and to come alone unless a companion is necessary for their physical or emotional health. Staff should ask COVID-19 screening questions over the phone. Any information that can be collected over the phone or online, such as insurance information, should be done before the appointment.

What are doctors' offices doing to ensure safety during in-person visits?

Contact is limited as much as possible. Intake forms are completed online or over the phone. Offices offer early-morning appointments for high-risk patients to lessen exposure, discourage or stop walk-in appointments and stagger in-person visits to allow time for rooms and equipment to be cleaned.

Patients wait outside or in their car until the doctor is ready to see them. While they wait, an office staff member asks COVID-19 screening questions and checks their temperature. The office staff member also offers to do part of the visit at the curbside or in the parking lot if possible, such taking blood pressure. If patients must go into a waiting room, the offices limit the number of people to allow for social distancing. During the visit, office staff and the doctor maintain a six-foot distance when possible. Equipment and rooms are marked as sanitized. Hand sanitizer is available. Everyone in the office is wearing personal protective equipment, including other patients.

What precautions should people take for lab work?

Patients should call labs before booking appointments since many have slowed response times and capacity or have focused on coronavirus testing. People with chronic conditions especially should ask the labs and/or their doctors for tips on the best times to visit and how the lab separates patients seeking routine lab work from those with appointments for coronavirus testing.

How have doctors' offices otherwise restructured operations for safety?

Following every patient visit, the equipment and examination rooms are sanitized. To reduce contact, offices have set up patient portals for questions. Doctor's office staff who can perform their jobs at home are not in the office. Also, since primary care clinics need to have a close pulse on their community, they can keep in direct communication with local and state health agencies to monitor evolving conditions.

A review of dozens of studies by researchers at Oregon Health & Science University and Oregon State University suggests that people may shed virus for prolonged periods, but those with mild or no symptoms may be infectious for no more than about 10 days. People who are severely ill from COVID-19 may be infectious for as long as 20 days.

That's in line with guidance provided by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, confirming recommendations for the length of time people should isolate following infection with SARS-CoV-2.

The review published in the journal Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology.

"Detection of viral RNA may not correlate with infectivity since available viral culture data suggests shorter durations of shedding of viable virus," the authors write.
"Additional data is needed to determine the duration of shedding of viable virus and the implications for risk of transmission."

Researchers decided to conduct the review to gain more information on transmission and to help inform infection control practices, said co-author Monica Sikka, M.D., assistant professor of medicine (infectious diseases) in the OHSU School of Medicine.

"Even though people can shed virus for a prolonged period of time, the studies we reviewed indicated that live virus, which may predict infectiousness, was only detected up to nine days in people who had mild symptoms," Sikka said.

The researchers identified 77 studies worldwide, including 59 that had been peer-reviewed, and combed through the results. All studies reported assessments of viral shedding using standard methods to identify the virus by replicating it through a process called polymerase chain reaction, or PCR.

"Although PCR positivity can be prolonged, culture data suggests that virus viability is typically shorter in duration," the authors write.