Body

Cincinnati, OH, October 3, 2014 -- Increasing rates of adolescent obesity and the likelihood that obesity will carry forward into adulthood, have led to various preventive initiatives. It has been suggested that family meals, which tend to include fruits, vegetables, calcium, and whole grains, could be protective against obesity. In a new study scheduled for publication in the Journal of Pediatrics, researchers studied whether frequent family meals during adolescence were protective for overweight and obesity in adulthood.

In the field of medicine there has often been a divide between those who focus on modern medicine and those who prefer alternative practices. But pediatrician Sunita Vohra is a firm believer there should be room for both.

Tel Aviv — The incidence of type 1 childhood diabetes has been increasing rapidly worldwide. If blood sugar levels aren't well-controlled, juvenile diabetes can affect nearly every organ of a child's body. And while long-term complications of the disease develop gradually, they may become disabling and even life-threatening. The exact cause of juvenile diabetes has eluded scientists, but a new study from Tel Aviv University suggests a likely trigger before birth.

As global life expectancy increases, adults want to maintain healthy and active lifestyles well into retirement. In fact, research shows that adults think, feel and behave five to ten years younger than their actual age.1-2 But new findings from a review paper published in Age and Ageing show that approximately one out of three adults age 50 and older suffer from sarcopenia, a condition that could interfere with aging adults' ability to live a full and active life.3

October 3, 2014 – Children who require long-term parenteral nutrition are at risk of a potentially devastating complication called intestinal failure-associated liver disease (IAFLD).

TORONTO, October 3, 2014 – Ache, agony, distress and pain draw more attention than non-pain related words when it comes to people who suffer from chronic pain, a York University research using state-of-the-art eye-tracking technology has found.

Previously undiscovered secrets of how human cells interact with a bacterium which causes a serious human disease have been revealed in new research by microbiologists at The University of Nottingham.

The scientists at the University's Centre for Biomolecular Sciences have shed new light on how two proteins found on many human cells are targeted by the human pathogen Neisseria meningitidis which can cause life-threatening meningitis and septicaemia.

Many of those who are genetically predisposed to develop atrial fibrillation, which dramatically raises the risk of stroke, can be identified with a blood test. This is shown by new research from Lund University in Sweden.

The number of people affected by atrial fibrillation is rising rapidly, partly as a result of the ageing population.

By creating a global database an international consortium of scientists has increased the detailed knowledge of the variation in the cattle genome by several orders of magnitude. The first generation of the new data resource, which will be open access, forms an essential tool for scientists working with cattle genetics and livestock history. The results are published in an article in the prestigious scientific journal Nature Genetics.

Microfluidic tools for precision measurements of cell migration speed reveal that migratory speed of individual cells changes stochastically from parent cells to their descendants, while the average speed of the cell population remains constant through successive generations.

Social network analysis could improve knowledge sharing in the healthcare sector, according to research results published in the International Journal of Collaborative Enterprise.

BELLINGHAM, Washington, USA -- New applications of structures and materials that replicate complex yet efficient arrangements that have evolved in nature over millennia are featured in a special section on biomimetic and bioinspired materials for applications in biophotonics in the October issue of the Journal of Biomedical Optics. The journal is published by SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics, in the SPIE Digital Library. Several of the peer-reviewed articles are accessible via open access.

They base their findings on 1221 Danish men between the ages of 18 and 28, all of whom underwent a medical examination to assess their fitness for military service, which is compulsory in Denmark, between 2008 and 2012.

As part of their assessment, the military recruits were asked how much alcohol they drank in the week before their medical exam (recent drinking); whether this was typical (habitual); and how often they binge drank, defined as more than 5 units in one sitting, and had been drunk in the preceding month.

There is some evidence to suggest that alcohol impairs the workings of the immune system, both in terms of the initial protective inflammatory response to infection and the development of subsequent immunity.

And habitual drinking is known to increase susceptibility to bacterial pneumonia, septicaemia, tuberculosis and viral hepatitis. The researchers therefore wanted to find out if there was any association between drinking patterns and susceptibility to HPV infection.

Ovarian tissue and egg freezing to preserve fertility should no longer be reserved for cancer patients, and healthy women should also be offered these options to safeguard their future chances of conceiving a child, say world renowned fertility experts writing in a new Series on fertility preservation, published in The Lancet [Paper 3].