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The emergence of MRSA (Staphylococcus aureus), dubbed a 'superbug' due to its resistance to many antibiotic drugs, has resulted in the glycopeptide antibiotic Vancomycin being commonly prescribed for patients in hospital.

However, MRSA's resistance to drugs has led to concerns of a 'creeping minimum' in the concentration of the dosage required to treat infection. In adults, nomograms are used to calculate the correct dosage of Vancomycin based on a patient's weight and creatinine levels.

In many countries strokes are seen as a lower priority when compared to other diseases despite their public health impact. This is partly due to a lack of readily accessible data to make the case for the development of national stroke strategies. The International Journal of Stroke reports on the efforts of a global team to launch a repository housing the latest published information on the impact of strokes worldwide.

London, LA (07 January 2013). Much the same way individuals are encouraged to know their blood pressure and cholesterol numbers to maintain a healthy lifestyle, a new editorial in the Journal of Psychopharmacology urges the European public to know and monitor their alcohol intake number using a simple 10 point plan.

Low gut microbial diversity in the intestines of infants can increase the risk for asthma development. These are the findings of the age 7 follow-up in a multi-year study led by researchers at Linköping University.

In 2011 the results of a comprehensive survey of the intestinal microbiota of allergic and healthy children were published. In the samples from the infancy period, the degree of variation and diversity of the bacteria strains was significantly lower among those who had developed allergic eczema when they were two years old.

Scientists at the University of Copenhagen have gained new insight into how both early embryonic cells and embryonic stem cells are directed into becoming specialised cell types, like pancreatic and liver cells. The results have just been published in the scientific journal eLife.

Dinosaur fossils are exceptionally rare in the Arabian Peninsula. An international team of scientists from Uppsala University, Museum Victoria, Monash University, and the Saudi Geological Survey have now uncovered the first record of dinosaurs from Saudi Arabia.

What is now dry desert was once a beach littered with the bones and teeth of ancient marine reptiles and dinosaurs.

Research by the University of Exeter Medical School has revealed two new genetic causes of neonatal diabetes.

1. Mediterranean diet reduces diabetes incidence without calorie restriction, exercise, or weight loss

With the emergence of metamaterials and transformation optics in the past few years, invisibility has become a scientific possibility that has attracted sustainable research interest. Recently, a review paper, entitled "Invisibility cloak from forward design to inverse design", published in SCIENCE CHINA Information Sciences, 2013, Vol. 56, reviewed design methodologies and experimental developments of the invisibility cloak from a practical perspective. The recent transition from a forward cloaking design to inverse cloaking design was also addressed.

A new study reveals that racism may impact aging at the cellular level. Researchers found signs of accelerated aging in African American men, ages reporting high levels of racial discrimination and who had internalized anti-Black attitudes. Findings from the study, which is the first to link racism-related factors and biological aging, are published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

This news release is available in Portuguese.

This news release is available in Portuguese.

Women are currently underrepresented among speakers at scientific meetings, both in absolute terms and relative to their representation among attendees, but a new study suggests one way to address this deficit. An analysis of 460 scientific symposia to be published in mBio®, the online open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology reveals that the inclusion of at least one woman on a convening committee increases the proportion of female speakers by as much as 86% and significantly reduces the likelihood the session would have an all-male list of speakers.

The use of color-coded "traffic light" food labels and changes in the way popular items are displayed appear to have produced a long-term increase in the choice of more healthful food items among customers in a large hospital cafeteria. A Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) team reports in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine that the previously reported changes in the proportions of more and less healthy foods purchased in the months after their program began have persisted up to two years after the labeling intervention was introduced.

January 7, 2014 — (BRONX, NY) — More women are choosing science careers, yet women are notoriously underrepresented in senior academic positions—often because they abandon their careers due to pessimism about advancement. New research suggests that putting more women in decision-making roles on the teams that organize symposia could offer a simple, effective step forward.

Watchful waiting or ear tube surgery? It is a decision faced by millions of families of children with recurrent or chronic otitis media with effusion (non-infected fluid in the middle ear) each year. Out of concern regarding long-term effects like hearing loss and potential developmental delays, about a million such families choose ear tubes annually, opting for surgery that carries risks of its own.