Culture
A high proportion of staff working in intensive care units during the COVID-19 pandemic have experienced mental health conditions, according to a new study.
In a study of 515 healthcare staff working in intensive care units (ICUs) across seven countries, the researchers found that on average 48 percent of participants showed signs of mental health conditions - depression, insomnia and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Their mental health was assessed using a detailed questionnaire and a clinical scoring system.
A new approach to analysing the development of magnetic tangles on the Sun has led to a breakthrough in a longstanding debate about how solar energy is injected into the solar atmosphere before being released into space, causing space weather events. The first direct evidence that field lines become knotted before they emerge at the visible surface of the Sun has implications for our ability to predict the behaviour of active regions and the nature of the solar interior.
A protein involved in making cells move offers a clue to how certain types of cancer metastasize and develop into secondary tumours, according to new research from the University of Warwick.
Scientists from Warwick Medical School have demonstrated for the first time that levels of this protein can increase and decrease the movement of a cell, including cancer cells - suggesting that they could play a role in the spread of tumours.
According to the latest cosmological models, large spiral galaxies such as the Milky Way grew by absorbing smaller galaxies, by a sort of galactic cannibalism. Evidence for this is given by very large structures, the tidal stellar streams, which are observed around them, which are the remains of these satellite galaxies. But the full histories of the majority of these cases are hard to study, because these flows of stars are very faint, and only the remains of the most recent mergers have been detected.
Pregnancy-induced diabetes, also known as gestational diabetes, is a common metabolic complication of pregnancy. The disorder carries a significant risk of adverse obstetric outcome. Additionally, it is associated with a high risk of recurrence, progression to maternal type 2 diabetes as well as an elevated risk of obesity in foetuses exposed to hyperglycaemia during gestation.
In the context of meditation practice, meditators can experience a state of "pure awareness" or "pure consciousness", in which they perceive consciousness itself. This state can be experienced in various ways, but evidently incorporates specific sensations as well as non-specific accompanying perceptions, feelings, and thoughts. These are just some of the findings of the most extensive survey of meditators ever conducted on the experience of pure consciousness. The findings of the survey recently have been published in PLOS ONE.
TORONTO, ON - Researchers at the University of Toronto have developed an innovative tool to aid in the investigation of how we perceive and remember visual experiences.
The new tool, referred to as a "scene wheel," will help researchers study how accurately we construct mental representations of visual experiences for later retrieval -- for example, how well an eyewitness recalls details of a crime or accident.
Natto, a fermented soybean dish often served for breakfast in Japan, originated at the turn of the last millennium but may hold an answer to a modern problem: COVID-19, according to a new study based on cell cultures.
Researchers from HSE University have discovered nucleotide sequences characteristic of microRNA isoforms (microRNAs with errors). The discovery will help predict errors in microRNA behaviour and create drugs that can detect targets (such as viruses) more effectively. The results of the study have been published in the RNA Biology journal.
URBANA, Ill. - No one wants to live near a toxic plant. Toxic-releasing facilities such as paper, pulp, and other manufacturing plants negatively affect human health, environmental quality, and property values. And communities with lower income and educational attainment are more likely to house such facilities.
Since mandatory reporting about toxic facilities became publicly available in 1990, affected communities have increasingly expressed concern through the media, and engaged in targeted collective action and "toxic torts" lawsuits for health and environmental damages.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. -- Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have designed a new class of molten sodium batteries for grid-scale energy storage. The new battery design was shared in a paper published today in the scientific journal Cell Reports Physical Science.
Scientists have developed a new way to model and map the health of coral reef ecosystems using data collected on the Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation's Global Reef Expedition. This innovative method, presented today at the International Coral Reef Symposium (ICRS), can determine which natural and anthropogenic factors are most likely to lead to persistently vibrant coral and fish communities. Their findings can help scientists identify the reefs most likely to survive in a changing world.
Safe and effective vaccines offer hope for an end to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the possible emergence of vaccine-resistant SARS-CoV-2 variants, as well as novel coronaviruses, make finding treatments that work against all coronaviruses as important as ever. Now, researchers reporting in ACS' Journal of Proteome Research have analyzed viral proteins across 27 coronavirus species and thousands of samples from COVID-19 patients, identifying highly conserved sequences that could make the best drug targets.
UT Southwestern researchers have identified an immune protein tied to the rare neurodegenerative condition known as Niemann-Pick disease type C. The finding, made in mouse models and published online in Nature, could offer a powerful new therapeutic target for Niemann-Pick disease type C, a condition that was identified more than a century ago but still lacks effective treatments.
Although Enterococcus faecalis is usually an innocuous member of the bacterial community in the human gut, it can also cause several infections, including liver disorders. The bacteria produce cytolysins, which are molecules that destroy cells. In a new study, researchers have uncovered how they do so.