Body

EVANSTON, Ill. --- "Information overload" may be an exaggerated way to describe today's always-on media environment. Actually, very few Americans seem to feel bogged down or overwhelmed by the volume of news and information at their fingertips and on their screens, according to a new Northwestern University study.

The study was published in the journal The Information Society.

Alexandria, Va., USA – In a study titled "Prevalence of Periodontis in Adults in the United States: 2009 and 2010," lead author Paul Eke, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, estimates the prevalence, severity and extent of periodontitis in the adult U.S population using data from the 2009 and 2010 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) cycle. The study is published in the Journal of Dental Research, the official publication of the International and American Associations for Dental Research (IADR/AADR).

Pregnant women who are highly exposed to common environmental chemicals - polyfluoroalkyl compounds (PFCs) - have babies that are smaller at birth and larger at 20 months of age, according to a study from Emory University's Rollins School of Public Health published online in the August 30 edition of Environmental Health Perspectives.

Corals are an invaluable part of the marine ecosystem, fostering biodiversity and protecting coastlines. But they're also increasingly endangered. Pathogenic bacteria, along with pollution and harmful fishing practices, are one of the biggest threats to the world's coral populations today.

Bethesda, MD — Scientists have moved closer toward helping people grow big, strong muscles without needing to hit the weight room. Australian researchers have found that by blocking the function of a protein called Grb10 while mice were in the womb, they were considerably stronger and more muscular than their normal counterparts. This discovery appears in the September 2012 issue of The FASEB Journal.

BOSTON -- Two papers led by scientific teams from the Cancer Genetics Program at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) shed new light on the genetic mechanisms underlying cellular energy and metabolism and, at the same time, highlight both the challenges and opportunities of genetic approaches to cancer treatment.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Most doctors treat Lyme disease with antibiotics for two to four weeks after diagnosis, but if symptoms persist after that, medical guidelines recommend against antibiotic retreatment. That recommendation may not be warranted. A newly published statistical review of the four studies upon which those guidelines are based reports flaws in design, analysis, and interpretation that call into question the strength of the evidence against retreatment.

AUSTIN, Texas — Reliance on supernatural explanations for major life events, such as death and illness, often increases rather than declines with age, according to a new psychology study from The University of Texas at Austin.

The study, published in the June issue of Child Development, offers new insight into developmental learning.

SEATTLE – African Americans have higher blood levels of a protein associated with increased heart-disease risk than European Americans, despite higher "good" HDL cholesterol and lower "bad" triglyceride levels. This contradictory observation now may be explained, in part, by a genetic variant identified in the first large-scale, genome-wide association study of this protein involving 12,000 African American and Hispanic American women.

Scientists' discovery of an important step in the body's process for healing wounds may lead to a new way of treating inflammation.

A study published today in Current Biology details how an international team of researchers led by Monash University's Australian Regenerative Medicine Institute (ARMI) discovered the mechanism, which shuts down the signal triggering the body's initial inflammatory response to injury.

A new study published in the journal Respirology reveals that water pipe smoking, such as hookah or bong smoking, affects lung function and respiratory symptoms as much as cigarette smoking.

Most users of water pipes and many physicians believe that smoking through a water pipe filters out the toxic components of tobacco and is considerably less harmful than smoking cigarettes.

A team of researchers at the Medical College of Wisconsin and Children's Hospital of Wisconsin Research Institute defined a new treatment for a potentially fatal lung disease in patients with a primary immunodeficiency known as common variable immunodeficiency (CVID).The findings are published in the Journal of Clinical Immunology.

PASADENA, Calif.—As an animal develops from an embryo, its cells take diverse paths, eventually forming different body parts -- muscles, bones, heart. In order for each cell to know what to do during development, it follows a genetic blueprint, which consists of complex webs of interacting genes called gene regulatory networks.

"Patients with PAD experience foot pain, called 'claudication,' while walking," adds Gautam Shrikhande, M.D., assistant professor of surgery, and director of the Vascular Laboratory at Columbia's Medical Center. "This pain continues, even at rest, as the disease progresses. In more advanced stages, PAD patients develop sores or ulcers that won't heal. Then, cell death, a.k.a. 'gangrene,' occurs and amputation is often the only solution. It's extremely important to diagnose PAD early, because medication and lifestyle changes can alleviate the disease."

Reservoirs near the mouth of the Susquehanna River just above Chesapeake Bay are nearly at capacity in their ability to trap sediment. As a result, large storms are already delivering increasingly more suspended sediment and nutrients to the Bay, which may negatively impact restoration efforts.

Too many nutrients rob the Bay of oxygen needed for fish and, along with sediment, cloud the waters, disturbing the habitat of underwater plants crucial for aquatic life and waterfowl.