Culture

New research presented at this year's European Congress of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases (ECCMID) in Amsterdam, Netherlands (13-16 April) shows that the early microbiome (population of gut bacteria) in newborn babies is able to predict the risk of the child subsequently becoming overweight. These gut bacteria can also be affected by maternal antibiotic use during pregnancy.

New research presented at this week's European Congress of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases (ECCMID) in Amsterdam, Netherlands (13-16 April) shows that a formulation containing zinc oxide is effective at reducing armpit odour through killing the responsible bacteria, and assists in wound healing. The study was carried out by Professor Magnus S. Ågren, Copenhagen Wound Healing Center, Bispebjerg Hospital, Copenhagen, Denmark (where the study took place) and Khaled Saoud Ali Ghathian, Department of Clinical Microbiology, Hvidovre Hospital, Hvidovre, Denmark and colleagues.

A leading public health expert says the UK should learn lessons from systematic violence reduction work in Cali, Columbia to tackle rising rates of knife crime on British streets. The work in Columbia resulted in significant reductions in homicides between 1995 and 2018.

People can automatically assume that someone who gives less money to charity is less generous, according to new research. The assumption was made in the study when people had no knowledge of how much someone had donated as a percentage of their overall income.

Michigan high school students are going above and beyond the required math curriculum, likely an effect of the state's graduation requirements, finds new research from Michigan State University.

The Michigan Merit Curriculum, which went into effect with the class of 2011 and requires students to take four years of math, at least up to algebra 2, also seems to be influencing more students to enroll in college.

A new report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which uses research by Rutgers University, shows a significant increase in the percentage of 4-year-old children with autism spectrum disorder in New Jersey.

The study found the rate increased 43 percent from 2010 to 2014 in the state.

The report, released April 11, found that about one in 59 children has autism. New Jersey's rate was the highest of the states studied: one in 35. That puts the national rate of autism at 1.7 percent of the childhood population and New Jersey's autism rate at 3 percent.

PULLMAN, Wash. - Washington State University researchers have found a way to make food taste salty but with less of the sodium chloride tied to poor health.

"It's a stealth approach, not like buying the 'reduced salt' option, which people generally don't like," said Carolyn Ross, a Food Science professor at WSU. "If we can stair-step people down, then we increase health while still making food that people want to eat."

11 April 2019, Vienna, Austria: Two independent national studies have reported high rates of liver disease progression and mortality among patients with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease/non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NAFLD/NASH).

11 April 2019, Vienna, Austria: Investigators from a large population-based study conducted in northern England have suggested that exposure to a persistent, low-level environmental trigger may have played a role in the development of autoimmune diseases of the liver within that population.

11 April 2019, Vienna, Austria: A prespecified interim analysis of the ongoing Phase 3 REGENERATE study has confirmed that obeticholic acid (OCA) is effective in the treatment of nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) with liver fibrosis. The 18-month analysis, which was reported today at The International Liver Congress™ 2019 in Vienna, Austria, demonstrated that the 25 mg dose of OCA studied improved fibrosis in almost one-quarter of recipients, with significant improvements also reported in other histological markers of NASH.

Stress related disorders--conditions triggered by a significant life event or trauma--may be linked to a heightened risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD), finds a large Swedish study published in The BMJ today.

The risk of severe and acute CVD events, such as cardiac arrest and heart attack, was particularly high in the first six months after diagnosis of a stress related disorder, and within the first year for other types of CVD.

WASHINGTON, D.C. (April 10, 2019) - About 4 million children worldwide develop asthma each year because of inhaling nitrogen dioxide air pollution, according to a study published today by researchers at the George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health (Milken Institute SPH). The study, based on data from 2010 to 2015, estimates that 64 percent of these new cases of asthma occur in urban areas.

Individual differences in cognitive abilities in children and adolescents are partly reflected in variations in their DNA sequence, according to a study published in Molecular Psychiatry. These tiny differences in the human genome can be used together to create so-called polygenic scores; the sum of a number of genetic variants an individual carries reflecting the genetic predisposition to a particular trait. This includes differences in educational achievement (how well pupils do in English, maths, and science), how many years of education they complete, and their IQ at age 16.

An exceptionally-preserved fossil from Herefordshire in the UK has given new insights into the early evolution of sea cucumbers, the group that includes the sea pig and its relatives, according to a new article published today in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

The oldest publicly-available strain of the cholera-causing bacterial species, Vibrio cholerae, has had its genetic code read for the first time by researchers at the Wellcome Sanger Institute and their collaborators. The bacterium was isolated from a British soldier during World War One (WWI) and stored for over 100 years before being revived and sequenced.