Culture

CATONSVILLE, MD, June 23, 2020 - The weight loss industry in the United States is vast and generates about $20 billion each year from over 100 million dieters. Commercial weight loss programs design customer-focused program policies to shape and optimize satisfaction and development. These two metrics are tied to how well a program does and the success of the customers in that program. New research in the INFORMS journal Marketing Science finds one key to success is making sure you have the right role model for dieters.

There are plenty of dieters given the rates of obesity in the United States. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the prevalence of obesity is 40% among young adults ages 20-39 years, 45% among middle-aged adults 40-59 years old, and 43% among adults age 60 and older.

The study, "Inspiration from the 'Biggest Loser': Social Interactions in a Weight Loss Program," conducted by Kosuke Uetake of Yale University and Nathan Yang of McGill University, finds weight loss among average-performing peers has a negative effect on an individual's weight loss, while the weight loss of the top performer among peers is positive.

The study looks at a weight loss database that tracks individual participants' meeting attendance and progress in a large national weight loss program.

"Not all peers are alike, and thus, each peer's impact on others within the group can't be the same. Social support from peers plays an important role in weight loss. We investigate the impact that peer weight loss has on an individual's weight loss success," said Uetake, a professor in the Yale School of Management.

The results show that the average weight loss among peers has a negative effect on an individual's own future weight loss. While in contrast, weight loss of the top performer has a positive effect on an individual's own future weight loss.

"These findings should impact how weight loss program employees should promote the past successes of their participants. The successes among average participants may act as a discouraging benchmark that roughly one-half of the participants will fail to reach, whereas the successes among top performers may act as an encouraging target that does not alienate as many of the participants," continued Uetake.

This work looks to implement policy changes to help dieters reach their goals. One way the study suggests doing that is by using the weight loss successes of top performers to provide inspiration to the group and perhaps avoid using the overall group's success as the benchmark.

The vast majority of Irish adults – 82% – are willing to download a contact tracing app to their smartphone to curb the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new research carried out by a team from Lero, the Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Software, University of Limerick (UL) and National University of Ireland Galway (NUI Galway). However, respondents also expressed several privacy concerns, including that the Government, tech firms or hackers might use the information gathered for other purposes after the pandemic.

In the survey, “A National Survey of attitudes to COVID-19 Digital Contact Tracing in the Republic of Ireland”, 98% of the more than 8,000 respondents stated that they understood the concept of contact tracing and 96% stated that informing the HSE of your close contacts is important if you develop COVID-19.

Lero’s Dr Jim Buckley said the response was very heartening considering that researchers from the University of Oxford estimated that, if 56% of people were to download an ideal contact tracing app in the UK, this would be enough to control the disease by itself.

It seems, Dr Buckley said, the primary driver for people’s willingness to download a public-health-backed, contact tracing app during the current crisis is a desire to help others and “for the greater good”. However, he noted, “studies in other jurisdictions have suggested that the actual adoption rate typically lags behind the take-up rate suggested by surveys performed in advance of contact-tracing apps’ launches. Therefore, there is no room for complacency and eliminating the disease requires a high degree of participation from the public and evidence-based app development.”

This Science Foundation Ireland funded research also shows 51% of respondents indicated they “definitely will install” the app if it becomes available, 31% indicated they “probably will install” the app. Ten per cent reported they “may or may not install” the app.

People preferred the idea of a Bluetooth app, with just 31% stating that they would prefer an app that uses geolocation technology. One of the survey authors Dr Michael O’Callaghan, general practitioner and researcher at the UL School of Medicine, said the results offer a good insight into people’s concerns relating to a contact tracing app.

“41% of respondents could see no reason not to install the app. The remaining 59% of respondents selected at least one option from a list of 10 options. ‘I worry technology companies will use this as an excuse for greater surveillance after the pandemic’ was selected by 41% of these, ‘I worry the government would use this as an excuse for greater surveillance after the pandemic’ was chosen by 33% and ‘I worry that my phone would be more likely to get hacked’ was selected by 1,742 (22%) of respondents. It is important, therefore, that those particular concerns be addressed if we are to ensure the greatest possible adoption of this technology,” Dr O’Callaghan said.

“Clear timelines on when this app would be wound down and how Bluetooth technology will allow information to be exchanged between phones are important messages that need to be communicated widely,” he added.

Dr O’Callaghan also said while the international evidence suggests that contact tracing apps are best employed as complementary to a manual tracing process, this study indicates a significant majority of the Irish general public are currently willing to download an app which aims to augment the contact tracing process.

Professor Liam Glynn, Professor of General Practice at UL’s School of Medicine and co-founder of #COVIDWATCHIRL, stressed that app download and ongoing use are two separate challenges. To ensure both occur, it will be essential to generate and communicate ongoing evidence to the general public and all other stakeholders that this app is useful to our country’s contact tracing efforts.

“It may be beneficial to keep the public informed on key data relating to the app, including downloads, active users and numbers of cases where the app has helped contact tracing efforts etc. People have indicated a clear willingness to help, but experience from other countries shows that intent to download does not always translate into actually downloading and using contact tracing apps. Allowing the general public to see in real-time the public health benefits of this app may help maintain public interest,” he said.

“Data from other countries suggest a significant response from early adopters, followed by a swift plateauing. However, these countries are reducing transmission and overall healthcare burden from COVID-19 effectively, so societal concern is likely to be declining. With the considerable uncertainty that prevails over the COVID-19 pandemic, it seems prudent for all countries to continue contact tracing app development and deployment,” he added.

According to Dr Jim Buckley of Lero and UL, analysis of free-text responses in the survey also yielded interesting insights.

“Concerns regarding battery life and Bluetooth led some respondents to suggest that a means to automatically enabling Bluetooth when users leaves their home or workplace should be integrated into the app. Another suggestion involved setting times for the app to be active, which could be entered by the user in advance according to their work, travel or shopping schedule,” he said.

The UK's definition of a 'close contact'--15 or more minutes within 2 metres of distance--used for its coronavirus track and trace system, should curb the spread of COVID-19 infection, indicates research published online in the Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health.

But this will be at the cost of having to trace many uninfected people. And its ultimate success depends on the rapid detection and isolation of the contacts traced, say the researchers.

Although focused on containing the early stages of the COVID-19 outbreak in the UK, the study findings have clear implications for the current use of the test and trace system, they emphasise.

Contact tracing is especially effective in the early stages of an outbreak when treatment options are limited, say the researchers. It has been used before in the UK: 2009 flu pandemic; Ebola virus in 2014; and monkeypox in 2018. And it has long been used to stave off onward transmission of sexually transmitted infections.

Contact tracing is known to curb the spread of infections that are symptomless and take some time to be passed on. But it's not clear how effective it might be for new pathogens that spread quickly, such as SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19 infection.

To explore this further, the researchers drew on information supplied by respondents to a survey, asking them to state how many encounters they had had with others on a given day, as well as the context and duration of those encounters.

For the purposes of this study, the researchers defined an encounter with another person as a face to face conversation or skin on skin touch within a distance of 3 metres.

In all, 5802 respondents reported over 50,000 separate encounters, enabling the authors to conclude that over a period of 14 days the average number of contacts was 217, although around 3% of respondents reported more than 1000 contacts during that time.

Of these, around one in four (27%; 59 contacts) met the UK definition of a close contact.

The researchers then used preliminary estimates of COVID-19 spread and the SEIR model, which captures the rate that people move from being Susceptible to infection, to Exposed to it, to Infectious, to Recovered, to predict the numbers of people in close contact with an infected person and traceable within two weeks.

They calculated that for every infected source person, an average of 36 (61%) close contacts could be identified and therefore traced, and that fewer than 1 in 6 infected people would generate any subsequent untraced infectious contacts.

But any one person is likely to have many encounters that are shorter than 15 minutes, such as when commuting or shopping, for example, and which would therefore fall outside the definition of a close contact. "Although unlikely to become infected [they] may pose a risk due to their greater abundance," warn the researchers.

And they predict that around 15% of infected cases would "generate at least one unidentified secondary case which would need detecting by other means" while 1 in 10 infected cases would generate "at least one person that couldn't even be identified.

"Similarly, we would expect around 3% of detected cases to not be able to identify their infecting individual," they write, but point out that these figures shouldn't be thought of as a failure of contact tracing; rather, a reflection of the uncertainties inherent in the approach.

Tightening the definition of a close contact to extend the time period could "dramatically lower" the number of contacts that would need to be traced, but would also increase the chances of infectious cases being missed, they explain.

A contact period of 4 or more hours would be unlikely to control an outbreak effectively, they suggest.

They acknowledge that their research has assumed that all primary infections start the process of contact tracing, which, given that many infected people don't have symptoms or seek medical care, is likely to be optimistic. And not all identified contacts will be traced sufficiently quickly to prevent further spread, they say.

But the current lower R number (reproductive ratio) and fewer contacts means that tracing doesn't have to be as effective to control the infection, they say.

And they conclude: "The current tracing strategy within the UK is likely to identify a sufficient proportion of infected individuals, such that subsequent spread could be prevented, although the ultimate success will depend on rapid detection of cases and isolation of contacts.

"Given the burden of tracing a large number of contacts to find new cases, there is the potential the system could be overwhelmed if imports of infection occur at a rapid rate," they warn.

Yale researchers have identified four drugs that may help minimize the long-term health effects of HIV infection, they report June 23 in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

Antiretroviral therapy has proved to be a life-saving treatment for those infected with HIV. Yet even after treatment, most patients still harbor latent HIV in some immune system cells. The presence of inactive HIV in the genome can trigger chronic immune system activation, cause accelerated aging, and make patients more susceptible to cardiovascular problems and some forms of cancer.

"It's like diabetes. There are good treatments available but people still suffer adverse health consequences," said Yale's Ya-Chi Ho, assistant professor of microbial pathogenesis and medicine (infectious diseases) and senior author of the study. "Antiretroviral therapy alone is not sufficient to inhibit chronic immune system activation, and new drugs should be developed."

Ho's team looked for drugs that might help inhibit reactivation of HIV and reduce damaging immune system responses. The researchers screened 1,430 drugs approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to assess their impact on human cells infected by HIV. They eventually zeroed in on four approved drugs that showed the most promise to both suppress activation of latent HIV and reduce damaging immune system response.

Two of the four drugs -- ruxolitinib, used in hematological disorders, and mycophenolic acid, used to inhibit organ transplant rejections -- were already in clinical trials to treat HIV infections. However, the researchers also found that filgotinib, which modulates immune response and is used to treat autoimmune diseases, and spironolactone, a hormone used to treat heart failure, also inhibited HIV reactivation and HIV-induced immune activation.
Ho said that these HIV-suppressing drugs might be used as a complement to antiretroviral therapy in the treatment of HIV infection to reduce chronic immune activation, which cannot be achieved by antiretroviral therapy alone.

Yale's Yang-Hui Jimmy Yeh is the lead author of the study, which was primarily funded by the National Institutes of Health and a Yale Top Scholar award.

LA JOLLA, CALIF. – June 23, 2020 – Scientists at Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute have created a next-generation drug called Ciapavir (SBI-0953294) that is effective at reactivating dormant human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). The research, published in Cell Reports Medicine, aims to create a functional HIV cure by activating and then eliminating all pockets of dormant HIV--an approach called "shock and kill."

"What scientists have found with other 'shock' approaches is that they can be too hot and overactivate the immune system, or too cold and don't wake up the virus," says Sumit Chanda, Ph.D., director of the Immunity and Pathogenesis Program at Sanford Burnham Prebys and the study's lead corresponding and co-senior author. "Our research identifies a drug that works in the 'Goldilocks' zone--it reawakens the virus without activating the immune system. Our work also provides further evidence that this drug class, called Smac mimetics, is a promising approach to reactivating latent HIV."

Antiretroviral therapy (ART) has increased the life expectancy of people with HIV by decades--with many individuals now living as long as the general population. However, because HIV is able to hide in reservoirs in the body, infected individuals never fully clear the disease, and ART must be taken every day for the rest of an individual's life to keep the virus inactive. Like other chronic treatments, non-adherence rates for ARTs are estimated at 30%. Non-adherence increases the likelihood that HIV will progress to AIDS, the later stage of the infection, and also increases the risk of treatment resistance.

Waking up sleeping HIV

This research builds upon the scientists' previous discovery that Smac mimetics--which have undergone human safety testing and are currently in clinical trials for certain cancers--can reactivate latent virus in cells from people with HIV undergoing ART. In parallel, scientists are exploring ways to kill the reactivated virus--such as developing broadly neutralizing antibodies or modified T-cells (CAR-T cell therapy) that destroy infected cells--which would complete the "shock and kill" strategy.

In this study, the researchers administered Ciapavir to mice with a human immune system and were infected with HIV. The treatment significantly increased levels of HIV in the blood and bone marrow--indicating that the latent virus was activated. Importantly, immune activation was minimal. Overactivation of the immune system can be deadly and has historically been a problem with the "shock and kill" approach.

"Ciapavir is the first Smac mimetic specifically optimized for an HIV cure, so it is significantly more potent for HIV than other molecules in this class," says Nicholas Cosford, Ph.D., deputy director of the NCI-designated Cancer Center at Sanford Burnham Prebys and co-senior author of the study. "As a result, Ciapavir may be effective when used on its own instead of in combination with a second drug, as our previous research showed, and potentially at lower doses."

The Goldilocks approach

Ciapavir is a small molecule that awakens dormant HIV by activating non-canonical NF-κB signaling in CD4+ T cells, the target of HIV. This lesser-used pathway only activates a subset of the immune system--which is the key to the drug's gentle approach.

"Non-canonical NF-κB signaling is part of the immune system's 'plan B' response to pathogens," explains Lars Pache, Ph.D., research assistant professor in the Chanda lab at Sanford Burnham Prebys and first author of the study. "In this case, we are using this alternate pathway to our advantage. We can wake up the virus without overwhelming the immune system."

Ciapavir will next undergo further evaluation in nonhuman primates, as well as additional toxicology studies to ensure that the drug is ready for testing in humans.

“Early shock and kill attempts to cure HIV used repurposed drugs and did not achieve their goal of reactivating latent HIV to useful levels,” says Rowena Johnston, Ph.D., vice president and director of research at amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research. “It’s encouraging to see the HIV cure field move towards purpose-built therapeutics to achieve what has so far been an elusive goal.”

More than 37.9 million people around the world are living with HIV, according to the World Health Organization, including 1.1 million people in the U.S. The virus infects the CD4+ T cells of the immune system. As the infection progresses, the immune system is destroyed, which makes people more vulnerable to other infections and diseases. Without medicine, people with AIDS--or late-stage HIV--typically survive about three years.

The study's DOI is 10.1016/j.xcrm.2020.100037.

Research reported in this press release was supported by the National Institutes of Health (P30AI036214, R01AI124843, R01CA195227, P30CA030199) and the James B. Pendleton Charitable Trust.

The co-senior authors of the study are Cosford, Jerome Zack of UCLA, and Chanda, who is also the corresponding author. Additional study authors include Matthew Marsden of UCLA and Peter Teriete of Sanford Burnham Prebys, who contributed equally to the study; Alex Portillo, Dominik Heimann and Maria Celeridad of Sanford Burnham Prebys; Jocelyn Kim, Mohamed Soliman, Melanie Dimapasoc and Camille Carmona of UCLA; and Adam Spivak and Vicente Planelles of the University of Utah School of Medicine.

Volume 11, Issue 25 of @Oncotarget reported that Administration of landiolol hydrochloride was found to be associated with reduced incidence of atrial fibrillation after esophagectomy for esophageal cancer in our previous randomized controlled trial.

Between March 2014 and January 2016, 100 patients with esophageal cancer were registered in an RCT trial and randomly allocated to receive either administration of landiolol or a placebo.

The authors analyzed data from this RCT to better understand the effect of postoperative AF and severe associated complications on overall survival after esophagectomy for cancer.

In multivariate analysis, high stage alone was an independent prognostic factor for esophageal cancer patients the following esophagectomy.

Dr. Toshiyasu Ojima from The Wakayama Medical University said, "Esophagectomy is considered the optimum treatment against esophageal cancers."

The incidence of major postoperative complications in our previous study increased in patients that developed new-onset AF following subtotal esophagectomy.

The effect of postoperative AF on long-term survival following esophagectomy is therefore controversial.

Severe postoperative complications may make patients with esophageal cancer less likely to survive over the long term.

Patients with esophageal cancer but without severe postoperative complications have been shown to have better long-term survival than patients with complications.

The authors also evaluate the influence of severe postoperative complications on overall survival and whether prophylactic administration of landiolol hydrochloride directly influences prolonged survival in patients with esophageal cancer.

The Ojima Research Team concluded in their Oncotarget Research Paper, "new-onset AF and other severe complications were not associated with poorer long-term survival after esophagectomy. In addition, administration of landiolol hydrochloride after esophagectomy did not contribute to the prolonged OS of patients with esophageal cancer."

"Administration of landiolol hydrochloride after esophagectomy did not contribute to the prolonged OS of patients with esophageal cancer"

Volume 11 Issue 25 of @Oncotarget reported that this study aimed to define the mutation profile of SUM in Caucasians.

Next-generation sequencing-based genomic analysis was used to identify frequently mutated loci in 50 cancer-related genes in 31 SUM primary tumors.

The most abundant mutations in SUM were found in KIT – in 13% of cases and NRAS – also in 13%, while BRAF - only in 3% of cases.

The authors' findings confirmed a high frequency of KIT and NRAS mutations in SUM, as well as a low incidence of BRAF mutations.

They reported novel KRAS, CTNNB1, TP53, ERBB2, and SMAD4 mutations in SUM.

Dr. Aneta Borkowska from The Maria Sklodowska-Curie National Research Institute of Oncology said "Across all human cancers, cutaneous malignant melanoma (MM) genome has one of the highest prevalence of somatic mutations."

"Across all human cancers, cutaneous malignant melanoma (MM) genome has one of the highest prevalence of somatic mutations"

- Dr. Aneta Borkowska, The Maria Sklodowska-Curie National Research Institute of Oncology

At the same time, NRAS mutations are detected in approximately 20% of MM and are more commonly reported in melanomas developing in the skin with chronic sun exposure.

WHO Classification of Skin Tumours recognizes the most common acral melanoma histotype is acral lentiginous melanoma, followed by nodular cutaneous melanoma and superficial spreading melanoma.

Cutaneous MM located on the acral part of extremities - hand and foot melanoma - comprises a rare group within all melanomas in Caucasians.

Whole-genome sequencing study shown that structural changes and mutational signature of acral melanomas were dominated by different than other MMs sites.

SUM seems to be not related to sun exposure, however, in Australian Melanoma Genome Project UVR signatures on acral melanomas occurred most frequently in subungual parts.

The Borkowska Research Team concluded in their Oncotarget Research Paper, "Our study offers new insights into the genetics SUM subtype, for understanding pathogenesis and providing potential biomarkers for future studies. Molecular testing is now widely used in patients with advanced melanoma in the process of therapeutic decisions. Mutations reported in melanoma cells provide starting points for the development of the rational design of novel therapies, including immunotherapy agents. They also may provide to find the molecular pathogenesis and natural history of subtypes of this heterogeneous disease. We confirmed that SUM have different than other cutaneous melanomas genetic profile, which due to its rareness and lack of studies should be subjected to further analyzes in multicenter studies."

Volume 11, Issue 25 of @Oncotarget reported that the present study was aimed at evaluating the hypothesis that p53 governs the expression and activation of the INSR gene in breast cancer cells.

The availability of MCF7 breast cancer-derived cell lines with specific disruption of either the insulin-like growth factor-1 receptor or INSR allowed us to address the impact of the IGF1R and INSR pathways on p53 expression.

Wild-type p53 stimulated INSR promoter activity in control cells while disruption of endogenous IGF1R or INSR led to inhibition of promoter activity by p53.

Mutant p53 strongly stimulated INSR promoter.

Furthermore, p53 directly binds to the INSR promoter in cells with a disrupted IGF1R.

Dr. Haim Werner from Tel Aviv University said, "The insulin/insulin-like growth factors (IGFs) create a hormonal network responsible for the regulation of important physiological events throughout life."

"The insulin/insulin-like growth factors (IGFs) create a hormonal network responsible for the regulation of important physiological events throughout life"

- Dr. Haim Werner, Tel Aviv University

The classical view that emerged following the cloning and characterization of the INSR and IGF1R genes in the mid-1980s postulated that activation of INSR by insulin leads, predominantly, to metabolic activities.

One of the cardinal questions still in need of a biologically plausible rationalization is why the INSR and IGF1R, even though they share the majority of their downstream cytoplasmic targets and signaling pathways, are yet responsible for mediating distinct physiological and pathological activities.

Given the emerging evidence of proliferative and potentially anti-apoptotic actions of INSR, the authors investigated in the present paper the regulation of the INSR gene promoter by wild-type and mutant p53 in breast cancer cells.

Using cells with specific disruption of the INSR or IGF1R, the authors also assessed the effect of each one of these signaling pathways on p53 expression and activity.

The data indicate that: activation of p53 is negatively regulated by IGF1R, as indicated by the augmented phosphorylation of p53 in IGF1R-KD cells; p53 directly binds to the INSR promoter region in cells with a disrupted IGF1R; wild-type p53 represses INSR promoter activity in IGF1R-KD and INSR-KD cells while enhancing promoter activity in control cells; mutant p53 stimulates INSR promoter activity in breast cancer cells.

The Werner Research Team concluded in their Oncotarget Research Paper, "we have presented evidence that the INSR gene constitutes a downstream target for p53 action. Whereas wild-type p53 stimulated INSR promoter activity in control MCF7 cells, disruption of endogenous IGF1R or INSR led to inhibition of promoter activity by wild-type p53. Mutant, oncogenic versions of p53, for the most part, strongly stimulated INSR promoter. In addition, p53 exhibits direct binding to the INSR promoter region in cells with a disrupted IGF1R. Taken together, data presented here identifies complex functional and physical interactions between p53 and the INSR pathway. The clinical implications of this interplay in breast cancer needs to be critically assessed."

BEER-SHEVA, Israel...June 23, 2020 - Could furry social robots help bolster moods and reduce pain when human to human contact isn't an option, for example, during a pandemic?

According to a new study by Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) researchers published in Scientific Reports, a one-time, hour-long session with a plush, seal-like social robot reduced pain and oxytocin levels, and increased happiness. The Japanese social robot, PARO, emits seal-like sounds and moves its head and flippers in response to being spoken to and touched.

Human-to-human contact has been found to bolster mood and reduce pain in previous studies. Dr. Shelly Levy-Tzedek of the BGU Department of Physical Therapy and her team investigated whether a furry social robot could induce similar effects when normal human-to-human contact is not available.

Levy-Tzedek and her team discovered that a single, 60-minute interaction with PARO actually improved mood as well as reduced mild or severe pain. When participants touched PARO, they experienced greater pain reduction than when it was simply present in their room.

Surprisingly, the BGU researchers discovered lower oxytocin levels in those who interacted with PARO than in the control group participants, who did not meet PARO. Typically, oxytocin, sometimes called "the love homone," is elevated among romantic partners or mothers playing with their children, so a lower level of oxytocin wasn't expected. However, more recent studies have shown that outside of close relationships, oxytocin production is a stress indicator and therefore, a reduction could indicate relaxation.

"These findings offer new strategies for pain management and for improving well-being, which are particularly needed at this time, when social distancing is a crucial factor in public health," says Dr. Levy-Tzedek.

The United States is home to more than 21 million military veterans, many of whom have difficulty reintegrating into civilian life. A staggering 20 percent of them suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), one of the most common trauma-induced mental illnesses. Moreover, it is estimated that 20 veterans die of suicide each day, resulting in about 6,000 deaths by suicide each year. With President Trump's announcement last week for a roadmap to increase public awareness and training to curb these deaths in our military veterans, a unique study exploring the human-animal bond could play an important role in helping this initiative.

Human-animal interaction is known to reduce stress. Yet, few studies have examined the health effects of interacting with dogs, specifically in the veteran population. With about 6 to 8 million dogs ending up in shelters in the U.S. each year - half of which won't get adopted - researchers enlisted the help of two no-kill shelters for a study evaluating the effects of walking with a shelter dog on psychological and physiological stress indicators in military veterans.

The randomized study was led by Cheryl Krause-Parello, Ph.D., lead author, a professor and director of Canines Providing Assistance to Wounded Warriors® ( C-P.A.W.W.®), within Florida Atlantic University's Christine E. Lynn College of Nursing, and a faculty fellow of FAU's Institute for Human Health and Disease Intervention (I-HEALTH), who conducted the study while at the University of Colorado, in collaboration with researchers from the University of Maryland's School of Nursing and SUNY Fredonia. The study was funded in part by the ISAZ/Waltham Petcare Science Institute Collaborative Research Award and C-P.A.W.W.®.

Results, published in the journal Anthrozoös, provide evidence that walking with a shelter dog may affect psychological and physiological stress indicators in veterans - with particular potential benefits for veterans with an increase in PTSD symptom severity.

Researchers compared the effects of walking with a shelter dog versus walking with a human on psychological stress indicators, PTSD symptoms, and perceived stress in reintegrating military veterans.

Krause-Parello and collaborators evaluated three physiological stress biomarkers: heart rate variability, salivary cortisol, and the enzyme alpha-amylase over four weeks of walking with a dog and walking with a human. The body's reaction to stress affects these biomarkers. The researchers included the heart rate variability biomarker because of its strong correlations with human physical stress and psychosocial stress.

The clearest indicator for decreases in stress came from the heart rate variability data, which was most apparent for veterans with greater PTSD symptom severity. Heart rate variability was measured before, during and for 30 minutes after walking.

"Based on heart rate variability, our study provides evidence that walking with a shelter dog may benefit veterans with higher symptoms of post-traumatic stress. Severity of symptoms and perceived stress tended to decrease more after walks with a dog than walks with a human," said Krause-Parello.

Responses to walking with a dog and a human from week one to week four were different depending on PTSD symptom severity. Walking with another person did not change stress levels, as measured with cortisol, in those with high PTSD symptom severity. Walking with a dog or another person led to decreases in cortisol among those with low PTSD symptom severity. For individuals with high PTSD symptom severity, walking with a dog did not change stress levels, as indicated by alpha amylase, but walking with a person led to increased stress. For individuals with lower PTSD symptoms, alpha amylase did not change significantly for either type of walk.

"Our findings emphasize the need for more research to determine if this form of human-animal interaction is beneficial to veterans with PTSD and to help us identify the optimal level of interaction that will be most impactful for them," said Krause-Parello.

This unique pairing has the potential to be mutually beneficial for veterans and humankind's "best friend" alike. The researchers emphasize the obvious benefits of human-animal interaction for shelter dogs. They need to be walked and socialized on a consistent basis to develop a positive relationship with humans, maintain a good quality of life, reduce their stress, expand the boundaries of a mundane kennel cage, and improve the likelihood that they will be successfully adopted. The dogs involved in the study resided in the two shelters and were awaiting adoption.

"Considering the large number and availability of shelter dogs in the United States, it really makes sense to consider the potential for these dogs to be involved in a unique intervention that combines the benefits of human-animal interaction with the benefits of altruistic action like volunteerism," said Erika Friedmann, Ph.D., co-author, a professor and associate dean for research at the University of Maryland School of Nursing.

Men and women ages 22 to 69 years old participated in the study. A total of 72 different dogs participated in 124 walks and ranged in size from toy (7.2 pounds) to giant (90 pounds). Each dog walked one to six times. Veterans were asked to draw a name to determine what dog they would be walking with to ensure randomization and to minimize the risk of becoming attached to a shelter dog that might be adopted during the course of the study.

"This innovative research confirms the importance of the human-animal bond. It brings to life an unexpected connection between shelter dogs and veterans, serving to meet a need for both and providing direction for holistic programming that addresses both the health of veterans and that of shelter dogs. It is a win-win," said Patricia Liehr, Ph.D., associate dean of research and scholarship at FAU's Christine E. Lynn College of Nursing.

Study co-authors are former C-P.A.W.W.® research assistants Kelly Blanchard and Megan Payton; and Nancy R. Gee, Ph.D., a professor of psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, and director of the Center for Human-Animal Interaction, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, who conducted the research while at SUNY Fredonia.

"At Mars Petcare we believe we have a responsibility to take scientific exploration further when evidence to date shows us that pets can be part of addressing conditions like PTSD," said Kay O'Donnell, vice president, Waltham Petcare Science Institute. "It's important we undertake rigorous studies to understand how companion animals may provide a benefit and we're proud to be part of this study, which takes us another step forward in understanding the human-animal bond."

In their model simulations, climate researchers always have to make compromises. Even with the largest computers available worldwide, they can only reproduce the real world to a limited extent. Depending on the application, simplifications have to be made in the spatial resolution, but also in the physical processes represented by the model. While model experiments over periods of months to a few years can often still be made with high spatial resolution, integrations over centuries to millennia can only be performed at coarser resolution. In the past, models were developed for a specific purpose. Now, GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel presented a flexible model kit, called FOCI (Flexible Ocean and Climate Infrastructure). It is based on the Earth system model of the Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg and has been modified with the NEMO ocean model, in order to represent small-scale processes in the oceans at higher resolution.

"In FOCI we combine decades of expertise in ocean and climate modelling at GEOMAR. The new system enables the investigation of new questions such as the influence of the stratospheric ozone hole on the circulation in the Southern Ocean or the impact of the Gulf Stream on atmospheric processes", explains Professor Dr. Katja Matthes from the Maritime Meteorology Research Unit at GEOMAR.

"With the new system, we can investigate many different research questions on ar range of time scales", Professor Dr. Arne Biastoch, head of the Ocean Dynamics Research Unit at GEOMAR, points out. "We initially performed a set of standardised basic tests with the FOCI system", the oceanographer continues. "We had to find out whether the model system is capable of reproducing the observed climate and the present ocean circulation. Only if we are confident that the system can successfully simulate the present conditions within limited error bands it can be used to investigate unknown phenomena or for the predictions of future climate conditions". The results, which have been published in the international journal Geoscience Model Development, are very promising. "In particular, our special know-how in operating the ocean model regionally at very high resolution improves the results considerably and reduces, for example, common model errors such as deviations in sea surface temperatures in the Gulf Stream system", says Professor Biastoch. FOCI also enables configurations which were previously impossible at spatial resolutions of up to one kilometre in the ocean.

The basic experiments carried out so far include a control run over 1,500 years with pre-industrial greenhouse gas concentrations and several experiments covering the period from 1850 to the present day, for which observational data are available for verification. "The current results are very encouraging", says Katja Matthes. The system will be further improved and used for various questions to study natural climate fluctuations, but also anthropogenic climate change. "From our point of view, FOCI is the ideal system for GEOMAR to simulate small-scale processes in the ocean, interactions between stratosphere and troposphere as well as biogeochemical processes in the ocean. It also allows us to carry out complex projects such as a large number of model simulations over several decades with a reasonable amount of computing time", Professor Matthes concludes.

Researchers from Earth and Ocean Sciences and the Ryan Institute at NUI Galway have carried out a study on the contribution of widely flushed personal care textile products (wet wipes and sanitary towels) to the ocean plastic crisis.

Dr Liam Morrison led the study, which showed that sediments adjacent to a wastewater treatment plant are consistently strewn with white microplastic fibres that are comparable to those from commercially available consumer sanitary products (wet wipes and sanitary towels). The article has been published in the international journal Water Research and was co-authored by NUI Galway PhD student Ana Mendes and Maynooth University graduate Oisín Ó Briain.

In most studies to date, white fibres are likely underestimated, because of the commonly used filtration procedure to capture microplastic fibres as filters are commonly white, making visual identification of microscopic white fibres against a white background difficult. This is significant given the global growth of non-woven synthetic fibre products and their ubiquity in wastewater.

Speaking today, President of NUI Galway, Professor Ciarán Ó hÓgartaigh said: "Our University has made sustainability a strategic priority, and for the world to address climate change, we have a duty to examine the behaviour of individuals and corporations that can help our planet. This research highlights the need for us to adapt our behaviours and tackle the ubiquity of plastic in so many products."

An urban rural gradient involving three locations from Galway City (close to Mutton Island and adjacent to a wastewater treatment plant) to counties Clare (Bell Harbour) and Mayo (Bellacragher) were investigated in this study. The total number of fibres found near Mutton Island was 6083 microplastics fibres per kilogram of sediment, while the rural sites had much lower levels (Bell Harbour, 1627 and Bellacragher 316). The total number of white fibres was 5536, 788, and 265 per kilogram of sediment for Mutton Island, Bell harbour and Bellacragher respectively. Incredibly, 91% of microplastic fibres at Mutton Island are likely derived from wet wipes and sanitary towels.

Lead researcher of the study, Dr Liam Morrison from Earth and Ocean Sciences and Ryan Institute at NUI Galway, said: "COVID-19 may have brought its own challenges for the oceans including the increased use of disinfectant wipes during the pandemic which potentially may end up as microplastic fibres in the sea. It is widely known that microplastics can act as vectors for contaminants including bacteria and viruses and are potentially harmful for public health and marine life."

The nearby intertidal zone at Mutton Island is prone to the accumulation of high volumes of washed-up sewage-derived debris on a frequent basis. Excessive microplastic loading in sediments in December 2017 was likely induced by heavy precipitation episodes during a south-westerly storm front. Elevated debris loading on this occasion may result from combined sewer overflows, where excessive input of drainage water exceeds wastewater treatment effluent capacity and is released untreated in the overflow. Dr Morrison said: "This was significant in the context of climate change, where we are likely to see increased rainfall events and flooding."

While most microplastics may be removed by the wastewater treatment process, combined sewage overflows associated with periods of heavy rainfall give rise to the release of sewage waste containing wipes and sanitary towels, impacting on public health and the environment. Combined sewer overflows and the subsequent shoreline deposition of sanitary waste have not previously been thoroughly investigated as a source of white microplastic fibres in the marine environment. The study found that wet wipes and sanitary towels are a source of unaccounted white microplastic fibres in the marine environment and not all flushable wipes are biodegradable. In fact 50% of the wipes labelled "flushable" in this study were shown to contain microplastics. The lack of regulation for hygiene and sanitary products results in a failure to identify the plastic composition of these materials. This demonstrates the consequences of misleading labelling of non-woven textile personal care products.

The samples of sanitary-related macro debris (wipes and sanitary towels) collected from the intertidal zone near Mutton Island in Galway City following a heavy rainfall event were mostly comprised of the plastic polyethylene terephthalate (PET), with only a quarter of the samples analysed presenting as a mix of PET and cellulose, and over 80% of the wipes in the shoreline waste were identified as non-flushable due to their polymer composition following the International Water Services Flushability Group and non-woven textile industry guidelines (INDA/EDANA, 2018; IWSFG, 2018).

Given the global distribution and projected growth of the non-woven textile industry (as non-woven textiles form the base material of many sanitary products), this is a concern. European production of non-woven textiles for hygiene and sanitary products exceeded one million tonnes in 2016 alone and these products frequently cause blockages in sewage systems globally, incurring significant technical and financial costs to wastewater utilities.

These products are a consistent feature of global plastic pollution surveys and in comparison, microplastic fibres from clothing are generally coloured or multi-coloured. To date the role of these white microplastic fibres as significant components of wastewater effluent remained poorly understood. The quantities of wet wipes washing up on beaches in the UK has increased 400% in the last decade (Marine Conservation Society, 2019*).

Dr Morrison added: "There is a need for increased public awareness of microplastic pollution in the environment and human behaviour should shift away from the inapt disposal of sanitary products down the toilet and instead divert to alternative land-based waste management."

Why is our Universe made of matter? Why does everything exist as we know it? These questions are linked to one of the most important unsolved problems in particle physics. This problem is that of the nature of the neutrino, which could be its own antiparticle, as argued by the unfortunate Italian genius Ettore Majorana almost a century ago. If this were so, it could explain the mysterious cosmic asymmetry between matter and antimatter.

Indeed, we know that the Universe is made almost exclusively of matter. However, the Big Bang theory predicts that the early Universe contained the same amount of matter and antimatter particles. This prediction is consistent with the "small Big Bangs" that form in proton collisions at CERN's giant LHC accelerator, where a symmetrical production of particles and antiparticles is always observed. So, where did the antimatter of the early Universe go? A possible mechanism points to the existence of heavy neutrinos that were its own antiparticle, and therefore, could decay into both matter and antimatter. If a second phenomenon occurs, called violation of charge and parity (that is, if the neutrino slightly favors in its decay the production of matter over that of antimatter), then it could have injected an excess of the first over the second. After all the matter and antimatter in the Universe were annihilated (with the exception of this small excess), the result would be a cosmos made only of matter, of the leftovers from the Big Bang. We could say that our Universe is the remnant of a shipwreck.

It is possible to demonstrate that the neutrino is its own antiparticle by observing a rare type of nuclear process called neutrinoless double beta decay (bb0nu), in which concurrently two neutrons (n) of the nucleus are transformed into protons (p) while two electrons (e) are emitted out of the atom. This process can happen in some rare isotopes, such as Xenon-136, which has in its nucleus 54 p and 82 n, in addition to 54 e when is neutral. The NEXT experiment (directed by J.J. Gómez-Cadenas, DIPC and D. Nygren, UTA), located in the underground laboratory of Canfranc (LSC), looks for these decays using high pressure gas chambers.

When a Xe-136 atom undergoes spontaneous bb0nu decay, the result of the process is the production of a doubly charged ion of Barium-136 (Ba2+); with 54 e and a nucleus made of 56 p and 80 n; and two electrons (Xe à Ba2+ + 2e).

So far, the NEXT experiment has focused on observing these two electrons, whose signal is very characteristic of the process. However, the bb0nu process that is meant to be observed is extremely rare and the signal that is expected is of the order of one bb0nu decay per ton of gas and year of exposure. This very weak signal can be completely masked by background noise due to the ubiquitous natural radioactivity. However, if in addition to observing the two electrons, the barium ionized atom is also detected, the background noise can be reduced to zero, since natural radioactivity does not produce this ion. The problem is that observing a single ion of Ba2+ in the midst of a large bb0nu detector is technically so challenging that until recently it was considered essentially unfeasible. However, a number of recent works, the latest of which has just been published in the journal Nature, suggest that the feat may be feasible after all.

The work, conceived and led by the researchers F.P. Cossío, Professor at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) and Scientific Director of Ikerbasque, and J.J. Gómez-Cadenas, Professor Ikerbasque at the Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC), includes an interdisciplinary team with scientists from DIPC, the UPV/EHU, Ikerbasque, the Optics Laboratory of the University of Murcia (LOUM), the Materials Physics Center (CFM, a joint center CSIC-UPV/EHU), POLYMAT, and the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA). Gómez-Cadenas has pointed out that "the result of this interdisciplinary collaboration that combines, among other disciplines, particle physics, organic chemistry, surface physics and optics, is a clear example of the commitment that DIPC has recently shown to developing new research lines. The purpose is not only to generate knowledge in other fields, different from the centre's usual ones, but also to look for hybrid grounds and create interdisciplinary projects that, in many cases, like this one, can be the most genuine".

The research is based on the idea, proposed by one of the authors of the article, the prestigious scientist D. Nygren (inventor, among other devices of the Time Projection Chamber technology applied by many particle physics experiment, including NEXT). In 2016, Nygren proposed the feasibility to capture Ba2+ with a molecule capable of forming a supramolecular complex with it and to provide a clear signal when this occurs, thus yielding a suitable molecular indicator. Nygren and his group at UTA then went into designing "on-off" indicators, in which the signal of the molecule is highly enhanced when a supra-molecular complex is formed. The group led by Cossío and Gómez-Cadenas has followed a different path, designing a fluorescent bicolor indicator (FBI) which combines a large intensity enhancement and a dramatic color shift when the molecule captures Ba2+. The synthesis of FBI was done under the direction of DIPC researcher I. Rivilla. If an FBI molecule with no barium is illuminated with ultraviolet light, it emits fluorescence in the range of green light, with a narrow emission spectrum of about 550 nm. However, when this molecule captures Ba2+, its emission spectrum shifts towards blue (420 nm). The combination of both features results in a spectacular enhancement of the signal, thus making it very suitable for a future Ba2+ detector.

It is interesting to note that the experimental multiphoton microscopy systems used in the LOUM by P. Artal's group for the green/blue spectral detection are based on those developed previously for imaging the cornea of the human eye in vivo. This is an example of interlacing the use of a unique technology in the world for biomedical applications on a fundamental problem of particle physics. "The effort to combine basic science and new instrumental implementations is essential to open new research avenues to answer the many questions that we scientists ask ourselves every day," says J.M. Bueno, Professor of Optics at LOUM.

As Cossío has explained, "the most difficult task in the chemical part of the work was to design a new molecule that would meet the strict (almost impossible) requirements imposed by the NEXT experiment. This molecule had to be very bright, capture barium with extreme efficiency (bb0nu is a very rare event and no cation could be wasted) and emit a specific signal that would allow the capture to be detected without background noise. In addition, the chemical synthesis of the new FBI sensor had to be efficient in order to have enough ultra-pure samples for installation within the detector. The most rewarding part was to check that, after many efforts by this multidisciplinary team, actually our specific and ultra-sensitive FBI sensor worked as planned".

Besides the design and characterization of FBI, the paper offers the first demonstration of the formation of a supramolecular complex in dry medium. This landmark result has been achieved preparing a layer of FBI indicators compressed over a silica pellet and evaporating over such a layer a salt of barium perchlorate. Z. Freixa, Ikerbasque Professor at the UPV/EHU says, with a smile: "the preparation of FBI on silica has been a quick-but-not-so-dirty solution for this proof of concept. A bit of home alchemy". The vacuum sublimation experiment was done by the CSIC scientist at CFM C. Rogero and her student P. Herrero-Gómez. Rogero, an expert in physics of surfaces says: "it was one of those Eureka moment, when we realized that we had in my lab just the tools to carry on the experiment. We evaporated the perchlorate and got FBI shinning in blue almost at the first attempt"

The next step of this research project is the construction of an FBI based sensor for the detection of the neutrinoless double beta decay or bb0nu, for which Gomez-Cadenas, F. Monrabal from DIPC and D. Nygren and collaborators at UTA are developing a conceptual proposal.

This work is a significant advance towards building a future "barium-tagging" NEXT experiment to look for noise-free bb0nu events through the identification of the two electrons and the barium atom produced in the reaction. This experiment would have a great potential to find out if the neutrino is its own antiparticle, which could lead to answer fundamental questions about the origin of the Universe.

New research highlights the effect of benthic assemblages on the sulfur metabolism of coral and giant clam species. The research was conducted at CRIOBE and ENTROPIE research units, with the collaboration of the Swire institute of Marine Science of The University of Hong Kong (SWIMS, HKU), Paris-Saclay UVSQ University, The Cawthron Institute (New Zealand) and The University of French Polynesia. The findings were recently published in the journal Scientific Reports.

To better understand how benthic species assemblages could influence their respective fitness, the researchers created artificial benthic assemblages using two coral species (Pocillopora damicornis and Acropora cytherea) and one giant clam species (Tridacna maxima) and measured the dimethylsulfoniopropionate (DMSP) concentration in each species using Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. DMSP, produced in large quantities in coral reefs, is a key compound that plays a central role in the marine sulfur cycle and climate regulation as major precursor of the volatile compound Dimethylsulfide (DMS). While DMSP has been found in terrestrial and marine organisms, only few species are able to produce it, among them marine algae such as dinoflagellates and corals. Numerous ecological studies have focused on DMSP concentrations in corals, which led to the hypothesis that increases in DMSP levels might be a general response to stress.

"We submitted our different assemblages of one, two or three co-occurring species to a thermal stress and measured the DMSP concentration in each species. Interestingly, we demonstrated that the concentration of DMSP in A. cytherea and T. maxima is modulated according to the complexity of species assemblages", explains Dr Isis Guibert.

Coral and giant clams are holobionts living in association with symbiotic algae, Symbiodiniaceae, as well as a large bacterial community. Both, Symbiodiniaceae and bacteria are able to produce DMSP. To determine whether giant clams might also contribute to DMSP production, the team explored transcriptomes of T. maxima for genes encoding enzymes involved in the DMSP biosynthesis. "For the first time, we revealed the existence of homologous genes involved in DMSP production in giant clam genome" said Dr Gaël Lecellier, who supervised the study. "Taken together, our results suggest that DMSP concentration in the holobiont is influenced by their neighboring species, modifying the metabolism of the sulfur pathway". The findings of this study offer new perspectives for future global sulfur cycling research.

Researchers at the University of Seville Marine Biology Laboratory, working in the research team of Dr. José Carlos García Gómez, have demonstrated the usefulness of using the SBPQ (Sessile Bioindicators Permanent Quadrats) methodology to detect potential shifts in coastal areas. This technique acts a warning of incidents of a local nature, such as water pollution from poorly treated urban wastewater discharges; or of a more global nature, which become evident by monitoring climate change through species that are sensitive to temperature increases; or incidents caused by the intrusion of potential invasive species.

The first step in applying the SBPQ methodology is to select areas where sensitive native species are present and live in their adult form attached to the rocks (sessile), such as corals and sponges. These species have are unable to escape or relocate if environmental conditions deteriorate, meaning they can be used as environmental sentinels. To do this, the evolution over time of their presence in specific enclaves is monitored closely so that it is possible to detect changing circumstances if they begin to disappear. This early detection of environmental impacts in the coastal environment enables researchers to locate the source of the impact and, potentially, to correct it swiftly when the first signs of change are observed.

These conclusions flow from data collected over a ten year period (2005-2014), making this study one of the longest in the field of pre-coral and coral reefs. Long-term series are key to establishing trends and solving many unanswered questions around developments in ecosystems and possible changes to them. The study, published in the scientific journal PloS One, sought to confirm the validity and usefulness of the SBPQ methodology by focusing on a ten-year historical series which it was designed to test.

Furthermore, the researchers were able to confirm the hypothesis that in very stable and biostructured, high diversity beds, coral reef communities are very stable and tend not to vary over time unless disturbed by environmental factors that change the system. For ten years no change was recorded in the presence/absence of the monitored indicator species or in their abundances on the monitored fixed surfaces, meaning that, in that period of time no change--at least no change of significance--occurred leading to lethal or maladaptive effects on selected sensitive organisms in native biota.

Further research, also using the SBPQ method, led to the detection in 2015 of the invasive Asian algae Rugulopteryx okamurae (although not yet formally declared as such) in the Strait of Gibraltar. Its presence was detected for the first time in the area associated with pre-coral enclaves of high stability, spatial structure and associated biodiversity, which are very sensitive to environmental changes in the system. In this case, researchers from the University of Seville Marine Biology Laboratory tentatively linked this shift to global warming, since the invasion of the species occurred in 2015, coinciding with the highest peak in surface water temperature on the Andalusian coast in the period between 2000 and 2017. These considerations were reflected in another recent article by the team led by Dr. García Gómez, published in the scientific journal Science of The Total Environment (STOTEN).

The Strait of Gibraltar is an especially interesting area to test the usefulness of the SBPQ methodology as it presents coral habitats in pristine waters, especially in the Estrecho Natural Park, featuring excellent indicator species which are highly sensitive to environmental changes.

Based on the results obtained, the researchers underscored the importance of promoting a network to monitor environmental impacts in the coastal environment, tracking invasive species and monitoring global warming in the western Mediterranean. "But perhaps the most important thing about the SBPQ methodology is that it is a tool for social participation that reaches out to diving clubs and centres who want to get involved, under scientific supervision, in the underwater environment to monitor our coastal ecosystems," says Professor José Carlos García Gómez, director of the University of Seville Marine Biology Laboratory. "It is a tool that aims to fit into the recent world trend of Citizen Science, which has shown engagement with the conservation of underwater nature". It is a promising line of research developed by the University of Seville to transfer research results and social innovation in the field of marine biology.

The study was conducted thanks to financing from various European projects, the Network of Northern Mediterranean Protected Areas (Med-PAN), the RAC/SPA (Activity Centre for Special Protected Areas), the Department of the Environment of the Andalusian Regional Government (now CAGPyDS), the Port Authority of Seville (APS), the CEPSA Foundation and Red Eléctrica de España. The Port Authority of Algeciras (APBA) is currently studying the idea of including the waters around its facilities in the research project for the long term.