Culture

An unlikely penchant for pee is putting a common sugar ant on the map, as new research from the University of South Australia shows their taste for urine could play a role in reducing greenhouse gases.

Led by wildlife ecologist Associate Professor Topa Petit, the Kangaroo Island-based research found that sugar ants prefer urine over sugar - the food source after which they're named - nocturnally foraging on it to extract nitrogen molecules, some of which could end up in the greenhouse gas, nitrous oxide.

The Australian-first study compared the behaviours of sugar ants (Camponotus terebrans) as they were exposed to different concentrations of urine (human and kangaroo ~ 2.5 per cent urea), sugar water (20 per cent and 40 per cent), and urea in water (at 2.5 per cent; 3.5 per cent; 7 per cent and 10 per cent), finding that sugar ants were most attracted to higher concentrations of urea, mining them for long periods within a dry sand substrate.

While other ants are known to be attracted to urine, this is the first time that ants have been observed mining dry urine from sand, and for a long period of time.

Assoc Prof Petit says the curious discovery could play a role in nitrogen cycling.

"When I first noticed the ants swarming to scavenge urine, it was purely by accident. But under research conditions we found that the ants determinedly mined urea patches night after night with greater numbers of ants drawn to higher urea concentrations," Assoc Prof Petit says.

"Camponotus terebrans are undoubtedly looking for urea in urine because, similar to certain other ant species, a bacterium in their digestive tract allows them to process urea to get nitrogen for protein.

"This remarkable ability to extract urea from dry sand not only shows how sugar ants can survive in arid conditions, but also, how they might reduce the release of ammonia from urine, which leads to the production of nitrous oxide, a highly active greenhouse gas."

Nitrous oxide (NO2) is a greenhouse gas 300 times more potent than carbon dioxide. And while less abundant than carbon dioxide emissions, its presence in the atmosphere has increased substantially over the past decade, accelerated mostly by the widespread use of fertilisers.

Assoc Prof Petit says that while there is still a lot to learn about the foraging behaviours of sugar ants, the study shows a symbiotic relationship between ants and vertebrates such as kangaroos in dry environments, and evidence of the nitrogen cycle at work.

"The ability of sugar ants to thrive in dry, sandy environments and use sources of nitrogen that may not be available to other species is impressive. It may give them a competitive advantage by allowing them to feed more offspring and therefore increase their numbers," Assoc Prof Petit says.

"Researchers working on ants as bio-indicators on grazed and ungrazed lands should take ants' ability to process urea into account, because large amounts of urine will probably affect the assortment of ant species in the area. It would also be interesting to investigate how much ants may modify the urine ammonia volatilises from paddocks.

"This is not the last we will hear about these sugar ants - they could open up a whole new field of research."

How to teach citizens to become active members of the society? Peter Ehrström, Head of Research in Regional Science, and Marina Lindell, Project Researcher at the Social Science Research Institute of Åbo Akademi University in Vaasa, Finland, approached the question by inviting a group of students on a course that utilized a method called Deliberative Walks. The experiment produced very positive results.

Deliberative Walks, developed by Ehrström and Harri Raisio, University Lecturer at the University of Vaasa, is a model of participatory democracy that combines citizens' juries and development walks.

The method is intended to be applied in matters concerning, for example, urban planning. It can help to find out the views of various groups of people on how a particular area should be developed.

"Some of the models of participatory democracy are too theoretical. In case a method aims primarily at collecting expert views, there is a risk that people with lower levels of education, for instance, feel that they are at a disadvantage. That would be unfortunate, as the specific purpose of participatory democracy is to listen to all opinions, not just those of the elite", explains Ehrström.

The participants of the course included both international and local students of various subjects, women as well as men. They were assigned to deliberate on the planning of an area around the Åbo Akademi University campus in Vaasa and create new development ideas for the area.

"The idea is to bring together people from various backgrounds and with different skills and to get them to discuss, deliberate, compromise and make decisions. As a result of all this, they should be able, as a group, to present and justify the conclusion they have reached together. It is especially valuable to offer international and local students a chance to meet, work together and establish relationships across subject, language and cultural borders. The ability to be open and receptive to new impressions, ideas and opportunities for cooperation is particularly important in today's world", says Ehrström.

The course also had an educational aspect: In order to strengthen the participants' learning processes, it combined different teaching methods, both place-based and theoretical ones.

The course started with a series of lectures on, for example, participatory democracy, urban planning, architecture and art. After that, the participants took a two-hour development walk in and around the Academill building as well as in the museum area of the inner harbour of Vaasa. During the walk, the participants had the opportunity to see and experience the area and meet people who work there to learn about their points of view.

To wrap up the course, the participants spent a whole day discussing ideas on how to develop the area. Many proposals were made but in the end the deliberation process led to a concrete outcome with five practical proposals that all participants agreed upon. These proposals were presented to local decision-makers and representatives of the media.

According to feedback from questionnaires and interviews, the course increased the participants' engagement in the society as well as their understanding of participatory democracy as a part of political decision-making.

"We should keep in mind that we need more than just active citizens. Many of our students will become decision-makers in the future, and it is important for them to understand that tools like this are available for decision-makers to engage citizens", says Ehrström.

The course experience also enhanced the participants' sense of inclusion and boosted their self-confidence to express and discuss their own opinions.

"By adding elements like place-based learning and outdoor pedagogy and by including varied discussion formats, we make discussions more inclusive and more appealing to people who normally might not take part in them at all. Decision-makers and citizens move closer towards each other and learning becomes more equal", says Marina Lindell.

"Above all, the method aims at making all participants feel that their opinions are valuable. Some contribute by bringing in theoretical expertise while others provide local knowledge, and all of them should feel that their contribution is important", Ehrström points out.

Ehrström arranged a course like this in Hamburg, Germany, in 2019. As both experiments have been very successful, similar courses will be offered within the subject Regional Science at Åbo Akademi University in Vaasa during the academic years 2020-2022.

"Universities can play a central and important role in societal development when it comes to teaching citizens to become active members of the society. Universities could also take a more active role in facilitating discussion on political issues of long-term importance. By creating methods and models to be applied in the development of the society and citizen participation, we can strengthen the civic society on various levels. To be able to develop as democratic citizens, we need to learn to debate and discuss", says Lindell.

The boundary between life and non-life is a remarkably narrow one. A central hallmark of life is the cellular membrane - a protective barrier of only a few nanometers thickness (one nanometre is a millionth of a millimetre) that is composed of proteins and two fluid layers of water-insoluble lipids. The function and integrity of this lipid bilayer is essential for the survival of the cell. If the cell membrane (or plasma membrane as it is also known) is compromised, the cell will die.

'But this boundary is more than just a semi-permeable, passive barrier' explains Robert Ernst, Professor of Molecular Biology at Saarland University, whose research focuses on improving our understanding of these ultra-thin, flexible barriers around our cells. 'Cell membranes are astonishing materials with bizarre properties that are difficult to imagine. They are extremely soft, yet they can cope with pressures that are hundreds of times greater than atmospheric pressure. At the same time, they have liquid-like properties and the ability to self-repair. This unique material protects the our cells from physical and chemical stress, facilitates communication between cells, mediates uptake of nutrients, and it wards off invading pathogens,' says Ernst.

For a system that has to perform such a variety of functions, it is critical to have fine-tuned properties to warrant full functionality. 'The cell membrane is a self-regulated system that is able to optimize its composition to each environmental condition.' To illustrate this adaptability, Robert Ernst chooses the image of a reindeer with its hooves in the Arctic permafrost, while its head has a stable temperature of 37 degrees Celsius. 'The cell membranes close to the hoove are composed of an entirely different set of lipids than the membranes in the brain.' says Ernst.

For about the last fifty years, scientists have assumed that the fluid character of the membrane is crucial for this adaptivity. By sensing membrane fluidity, a cell would 'know' what to do to survive in the cold. When the membrane becomes more viscous or even freezes as the temperature falls, the cell reacts by producing a different set of lipids that does not freeze as easily. A perfectly logical and credible explanation, which found its way as the theory of 'homeoviscous adaptation' into the textbooks of biochemistry.

'Unfortunately, this is not what's happening,' says Robert Ernst.

Through a collaborative scientific study involving lead author Stephanie Ballweg, Robert Ernst's research team at the Saarland University and colleagues from Great Britain, Germany and the USA, the researchers have been able to refute the central assumption underlying the hypothesis of 'homeoviscous adaptation'. 'We have isolated the membrane sensor Mga2 from baker's yeast and investigated how it responds to membrane fluidity,' explains Ernst. 'According to the prevailing hypothesis, this sensor would trigger a response whenever the membrane viscosity increases. But that is not what we observe.' It turns out that the fluidity is irrelevant, but that the packing density of lipid atoms in a special region of the membrane determines whether or not the sensor is activated. 'This makes it possible for the sensor to distinguish between saturated and unsaturated fatty acids in the membrane lipids,' says Ernst, describing the findings that have swept away a fifty-year-old theory.

And why didn't someone come up with this idea earlier? 'Up until recently, the disciplines interested in membranes have worked somewhat in isolation with relatively little exchange,' says Ernst. 'In order to conduct this research project, it was crucial to bring together experts in physics, materials science, biochemistry, and genetics.' Only by the synergy released by this interdisciplinary team it was possible to test the validity of the prevailing model. Based on these findings, bioscientists around the world can revisit the important question how membrane regulate the function of membrane proteins and how the lipid composition affects the communication between cells from a new perspective.

Philadelphia, February 6, 2020 - Over the next decade, older adults will grow to become 20 percent of the US population. A new paper in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior, published by Elsevier, found Healthy Teaching Kitchen programs are great vehicles for nutrition education specifically among older veterans.

Veterans Affairs' Healthy Teaching Kitchen is an interactive nutrition education program offered by the Veterans Health Administration's Nutrition and Food Services Department that addresses several aging-related issues like social connection, nutrition, and self-care.

"Each class, we learn, cook, and eat," one veteran said, adding they enjoyed "having the cooking steps explained as they were done and being able to eat it."

"It showed me that I can plan and make my meal with healthy choices [without getting] real expensive," said another.

Nutrition needs to be supported by a high quality diet that meets requirements for both micronutrients (e.g., vitamins C, A, D, calcium, iron) and macronutrients (e.g., protein, whole grains, carbs). This is especially important for older adults because poor nutrition increases the risk of aging-related issues like osteoporosis, muscle weakness, and falls.

The authors suggest nutrition education for older adults is improved by taking a holistic approach. By applying the 5M Care Philosophy framework that provides a categorical structure for older adults' complex health needs - Mind, Multi-complexity, Medications, Mobility, and what Matters Most - the issues affecting older adults can be easily addressed.

"Healthy Teaching Kitchens not only focus on participants' knowledge, but also on supporting practical skills such as kitchen setup, meal experience, grocery shopping, label reading, meal planning, and budgeting," explained author Marissa Black, MD, MPH, Division of Gerontology and Geriatric Medicine, Geriatric Research Education and Clinical Center, Puget Sound Veterans Affairs Medical Center, and University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA.

Programming through group classes can address social isolation or be tailored to individuals with mental health issues and/or cognitive impairment to address the "Mind" category. Given many older adults take more than five medications simultaneously or specific medications that affect nutrition, teaching how diet, disease, and medications interact and affect participants' daily choices is key for the "Medications" category. Authors found using this simple framework for future nutrition and cooking educational programming may benefit the geriatric population.

The program got largely positive reviews from its attendees.

"I feel very blessed and fortunate to have experienced this," one said in the review process. "As I see it, the teachers - while not being aware of it - were actually doing ministry. I don't mean religious; ministry to me is when people act out and share their skills and time with others. They are acting in love, and that is what life is all about."

The Healthy Teaching Kitchen program at the VA is part of the Teaching Kitchen Collaborative, a collaboration through the Harvard School of Public Health and the Culinary Institute of America with the goal of learning best practices and expanding research of Teaching Kitchen programs. The collaborative plans to do future research in this area.

Scientists from the University of La Serena, Newcastle University, UK, and the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile surveyed ranchers to find out what they thought were the drivers of conflict between people and guanacos (a wild camelid species closely related to the Llama).

Ranchers blamed the increased aridity for reducing the availability of pasture, which meant there was more competition for grazing between livestock and guanacos.

As the area became drier, guanacos were thought to come down from the mountains in search for better grazing, coming into conflict with the herds of cattle.

To reduce this problem, some ranchers wanted to cull the guanacos to protect their livestock.

Traditional ranchers in central Chile use summer pastures in the Andes Mountain, where livestock graze in areas shared with wildlife.

It is here that, in the last few years, conflicts have intensified between people grazing their livestock and the State Services that protect wildlife due to differences in how these groups want wildlife to be managed.

Farmers accuse guanaco (Lama guanicoe), a native and IUCN-listed Vulnerable herbivore, of competing for pastures with livestock, which farmers believe has intensified in recent years due to the increase of guanaco population in the summers grazing pastures of the Province of Petorca, in the Region of Valparaíso.

Solange Vargas, the lead author based at the University of La Serena, says:

"The problem was more complex than it initially seemed.

At first glance, it appeared that farmers were accusing only guanaco as a cause of pasture competition. But there was a key element that ultimately caused competition for pastures: climate change."

Farmers claimed that the cause of all changes in the mountain range was ultimately caused by climate change, including what would eventually be reflected in a problem by competition for pastures.

Dr Niki Rust, from Newcastle University, and one of the study's authors, adds:

"As climate change begins to alter our environments, we are already seeing increased competition for resources between people and wildlife.

"The bush fires in Australia, widely claimed to have increased in severity this year due to climate change, have resulted in humans and wild animals competing for scarce water.

"These human-wildlife conflicts will likely worsen as global temperatures rise, which is why it is so important that we act now to limit greenhouse gas emissions - to benefit people and wildlife."

Pablo Castro-Carrasco from the University of La Serena and one of the study's authors says that "understanding farmers' beliefs are key, because beliefs guide behaviour.

"Subjective theories are important to understand in conservation context because they can inhibit or prevent people's behaviour from changing.

"In this study, we have seen that the lay knowledge of farmers is very important to help us search for solutions to allow for coexistence between guanacos with human activities."

The conservation conflict between guanaco and livestock is also a reflection of other deeper demands.

Vargas explains that "where farmers claim to have been abandoned by the State and its public policies, they feel relegated to second place over vulnerable wild species, which they convey to the State through complaints about the species.

"We hope this study help people consider that when analyzing these types of complex social-ecological problems, considering the ecological knowledge of local communities is paramount."

Rust concludes that "because human behaviour is more often driven by perceptions of reality rather than reality itself, we should spend more time trying to understand how people think the world works and basing conservation interventions on these perceptions, rather than focusing exclusively on education as a way to change behaviour."

Moral or religious beliefs may lead some people to believe they are addicted to pornography even when their porn use is low or average, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association.

"Self-reported addiction to pornography is probably deeply intertwined with religious and moral beliefs for some people," said lead researcher Joshua B. Grubbs, PhD, an assistant professor of psychology at Bowling Green State University. "When people morally disapprove of pornography but still use it anyway, they are more likely to report that pornography is interfering with their lives."

In two studies with more than 3,500 participants, the researchers found that moral or religious beliefs may be a central contributing factor to distress over porn use. Such a view may complicate an accurate diagnosis of compulsive sexual behavior disorder (CSBD), which includes porn addiction and detrimental sexual behaviors such as patronizing prostitutes. The research was published online in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology.

In one experiment, 2,200 online participants who were selected to be representative of the U.S. population, along with 467 undergraduate students from Bowling Green State University, were surveyed about their porn use and their religious and moral beliefs. People who viewed pornography and believed pornography is morally wrong were more likely to report that they were addicted to porn than those who didn't find porn use to be morally objectionable. Participants who reported they were religious or who regularly attended religious services were more likely to believe they were addicted to porn, even if their porn use was the same as less religious participants who didn't believe their porn use was a problem.

In another online experiment, 850 U.S. adults who used porn were surveyed about their porn use and religious beliefs and then were invited to complete follow-up surveys every four months for a year. The findings were similar, with more religious participants reporting an addiction to pornography. These feelings tracked together over time: Increases in feelings of moral disapproval of pornography corresponded to increases in feelings of addiction to pornography.

"We are not suggesting that people need to change their moral or religious beliefs, but it's not helpful for someone with a low or normal amount of porn use to be convinced that they have an addiction because they feel bad about it," Grubbs said. "However, if someone wants to reduce their porn use because it causes distress, then therapists should work with them in a non-judgmental way that doesn't induce shame."

CSBD has been controversial due to conflicting research on whether it is a distinct mental illness. CSBD is not included in the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, published by the American Psychiatric Association in 2013. In 2018, the World Health Organization included CSBD in the 11th edition of the International Classification of Diseases, a commonly used worldwide standard reference for health conditions and mental illnesses. In the International Classification of Diseases, CSBD is categorized as an impulse control disorder, which includes "a persistent pattern of failure to control intense, repetitive sexual impulses or urges resulting in repetitive sexual behavior."

Grubbs said he supports a diagnosis for CSBD as a distinct mental illness, but mental health professionals must ensure their own biases don't lead to inaccurate diagnoses. Previous research has shown that therapists are less likely to diagnose LGBTQ people with CSBD, while religious therapists are more likely to view porn use as addictive and evidence of a mental illness.

Some people seeking treatment for CSBD may not meet the diagnostic criteria even if they are distressed about their porn use, Grubbs said. Clinicians will need to find objective measures, not just the subjective feelings of clients, to diagnose CSBD, such as failed attempts to stop using porn or impairment in job or family duties caused by porn use.

"This diagnosis enables access to care for people who need treatment," Grubbs said. "Just like cultural sensitivity is needed for any diagnosis, CSBD will require that clinicians and therapists be aware of and sensitive to the unique aspects of themselves and their clients that might influence how symptoms should be addressed."

Patients who are being treated with blood-thinning drugs for irregular heart beat should always be investigated for bowel cancer if they experience gastrointestinal bleeding, say the authors of a study published in the European Heart Journal [1] today (Friday).

If doctors see bleeding in patients with atrial fibrillation, they may assume that it is due to oral anticoagulant drugs and alter the treatment rather than check for bowel cancer; but the study of nearly 125,500 Danish patients with atrial fibrillation shows that those who experienced bleeding were between 11 and 24 times more likely to be diagnosed with bowel cancer, compared to patients who did not have gastrointestinal bleeding. [2]

Dr Peter Vibe Rasmussen, from Herlev-Gentofte University Hospital, University of Copenhagen, Denmark, who led the research, said: "We found that between four and eight per cent of atrial fibrillation patients who experienced bleeding from their lower gastrointestinal tract were diagnosed with bowel cancer. Less than one per cent of patients were diagnosed with bowel cancer if they did not have bleeding.

"These high absolute risks of bowel cancer associated with bleeding provide a strong argument that if blood is detected in the stools of patients being treated with oral anticoagulants, this is something doctors should worry about. Our findings underline the important point that patients with gastrointestinal bleeding should always be offered meticulous clinical examination, irrespective of whether or not they are taking anticoagulants. It should not be dismissed as a mere consequence of anticoagulant treatment.

"Our study is also a reminder that educating and informing our patients is of utmost importance. When patients start taking anticoagulants, we should tell them that if they see blood in their stools they should always consult their doctor. Timely examination could potentially provide early detection of bowel cancer."

Patients with atrial fibrillation are often prescribed oral blood-thinning drugs, such as warfarin, dabigatran, rivaroxaban and apixaban, to prevent the formation of clots that can lead to stroke. However, bleeding from the gastrointestinal tract can be a side effect and is estimated to occur in about one to two per cent of these patients each year.

Dr Vibe Rasmussen said: "Cancer in the lower part of the digestive system develops over extended periods of time often without showing any symptoms. These tumours are called occult cancers. As a consequence, the cancer is most often not diagnosed until the patient experiences symptoms. Treatment with blood thinning medication, as often recommended in patients with heart disease, increases the risk of bleeding from the gastrointestinal tract. In this study we wanted to test the hypothesis that bleeding induced by oral anticoagulants could be due to the unmasking of an undiagnosed occult cancer."

The researchers identified all patients aged between 18 and 100 years with a diagnosis of atrial fibrillation between 1 January 1996 and 31 December 2014 from the Danish national registers. Patients who took any oral anticoagulant were included in the study and were followed until the end of 2015. After excluding some patients for reasons such as not living in Denmark, already having a bowel cancer diagnosis, or having recently had hip or knee surgery, there was a total of 125,418 patients eligible for inclusion in the study.

During a maximum of three years of treatment, the researchers identified 2576 patients with bleeding from the lower gastrointestinal tract. Of these, 140 were diagnosed with bowel cancer within the first year after the bleeding was detected.

The risk of bowel cancer being diagnosed in the first year after bleeding depended on the patients' age. Patients aged 65 or younger with bleeding were 24 times more likely to have bowel cancer detected than those of the same age without bleeding, while older patients (aged 71 to 75 years) with bleeding were 11 times more likely to have bowel cancer than those without bleeding.

Dr Vibe Rasmussen said: "We found the highest absolute risk of bowel cancer after bleeding among patients aged 76-80 years; eight per cent of patients in this age group were diagnosed with bowel cancer within the first year after bleeding."

The researchers point out that with an aging population in many countries, the prevalence of atrial fibrillation is increasing, more people are treated with blood-thinning drugs and so gastrointestinal bleeding is likely to occur more frequently.

There is no suggestion that oral anticoagulants cause bowel cancer.

The main strength of the study is its large size and the fact that it included everyone in Denmark diagnosed with atrial fibrillation. Limitations of the study include: it is an observational study; there were no data available about risk factors such as alcohol consumption, dietary habits and obesity; adherence to oral anticoagulant therapy was assumed on the basis that patients were collecting their prescriptions; and selection bias may have occurred due to the fact that patients with more severe bleeding, combined with other, potentially cancer-related symptoms, are more likely to be referred for further investigation than patients with light bleeding and without any other symptoms.

Social media users are more likely to eat fruit and veg - or snack on junk food - if they think their friends do the same, a new study has found.

The research, by Aston University's School of Life and Health Sciences, found that study participants ate an extra fifth of a portion of fruit and vegetables themselves for every portion they thought their social media peers ate. So, if they believed their friends got their 'five a day' of fruit and veg, they were likely to eat an extra portion themselves.

But conversely, the Facebook users were found to consume an extra portion of unhealthy snack foods and sugary drinks for every three portions they believed their online social circles did. The finding suggests we eat around a third more junk food if we think our friends also indulge.

The Aston University researchers said the findings provide the first evidence to suggest our online social circles could be implicitly influencing our eating habits, with important implications for using 'nudge' techniques on social media to encourage healthy eating.

In the study, published in the scientific journal Appetite, the researchers asked 369 university students to estimate the amount of fruit, vegetables, 'energy-dense snacks' and sugary drinks their Facebook peers consumed on a daily basis.

This information was cross-referenced with the participants' own actual eating habits and showed that those who felt their social circles 'approved' of eating junk food consumed significantly more themselves. Meanwhile, those who thought their friends ate a healthy diet ate more portions of fruit and veg. Their perceptions could have come from seeing friends' posts about the food and drink they consumed, or simply a general impression of their overall health.

There was no significant link between the participants' eating habits and their Body Mass Index (BMI), a standard measure of healthy weight, however. The researchers said the next stage of their work would track a participant group over time to see whether the influence of social media on eating habits had a longer-term impact on weight.

The most recent figures from the NHS's Health Survey for England showed that in 2018 only 28 percent of adults were eating the recommended five portions of fruit and vegetables per day. In Wales, this was 24 percent, in Scotland 22 percent and in Northern Ireland around 20 percent. Children and young people across the UK had even lower levels of fruit and veg consumption.

Aston University health psychology PhD student Lily Hawkins, who led the study alongside supervisor Dr Jason Thomas, said:

"This study suggests we may be influenced by our social peers more than we realise when choosing certain foods. We seem to be subconsciously accounting for how others behave when making our own food choices.

"So if we believe our friends are eating plenty of fruit and veg we're more likely to eat fruit and veg ourselves. On the other hand, if we feel they're happy to consume lots of snacks and sugary drinks, it can give us a 'licence to overeat' foods that are bad for our health.

"The implication is that we can use social media as a tool to 'nudge' each other's eating behaviour within friendship groups, and potentially use this knowledge as a tool for public health interventions."

Professor Claire Farrow, Director of Aston University's Applied Health Research Group whose work has contributed to the national Child Feeding Guide resource, added:

"With children and young people spending a huge amount of time interacting with peers and influencers via social media, the important new findings from this study could help shape how we deliver interventions that help them adopt healthy eating habits from a young age - and stick with them for life."

Aisling Pigott, a registered dietitian and spokesperson for the British Dietetic Association (BDA), said:

"Research such as this demonstrates how we are influenced by online perceptions about how others eat. The promotion of positive health messages across social media, which are focused on promoting healthy choices and non-restrictive relationships with food and body, could nudge people into making positive decisions around the food they eat.

"We do have to be mindful of the importance of 'nudging' positive behaviours and not 'shaming' food choices on social media as a health intervention. We know that generating guilt around food is not particularly helpful when it comes to lifestyle change and maintenance."

A new study from the University of Oxford and the University of Warwick reveals a breakthrough for sportsmen and women in the treatment of Achilles tendon rupture.

Researchers found that early walking in a brace provides similar outcomes to plaster casting with no increase in the risk of complications, paving the way for a big change in the way that patients are treated.

The results from the UKSTAR trial are reported today (Thursday 6 February) in The Lancet.

The study was funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) and was a multi-centre collaboration between universities and hospitals across the UK.

"This research is particularly important for sportsmen and women of all levels and abilities," said Matthew Costa, Professor of Orthopaedic Trauma Surgery at NDORMS, University of Oxford. "Achilles tendon rupture keeps people away from sport for many months. For some, it stops them ever returning to their favourite recreational activities, and for professional athletes it can be a career-ending injury. Immediate mobilisation in a brace is a safe alternative to plaster casting after an Achilles rupture and patients report better early outcomes, probably because the brace allows them to walk earlier than the cast."

Rupture of the Achilles tendon is a serious and increasingly common injury with over 11,000 people from both the sporting and non-sporting populations experiencing the injury each year in the UK.

Some patients are treated with surgery, but non-operative treatment is increasingly preferred, with patients either being treated in a plaster cast to immobilise the foot and ankle or by the use of functional bracing that allows weight-bearing. However, before the UKSTAR study there was little evidence towards which was more effective.

Although traditional plaster cast treatment protected the tendon as it healed, there were problems with casts including the immediate impact on mobility, additional risks associated with prolonged immobilisation, and possible long-term issues arising from gait abnormalities and muscle weakness.

With the bracing method, there were questions around the safety profile, specifically whether the risk of re-rupture was higher, leading to the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons being unable to recommend for or against functional bracing in their 2009 guidelines.

However, the study found that the risk of re-rupture of the tendon in bracing was lower that reported in existing literature. Matthew Costa said: "Traditionally, patients with a rupture of the Achilles tendon are immobilised for several weeks in a plaster cast which restricts their mobility. However, our new research shows that immediate weight-bearing in a walking boot allows the tendon to heal just as quickly and with no increase in the risk of further rupture. Plus, the walking boot treatment is cheaper for the NHS."

Associate Professor Rebecca Kearney is an academic physiotherapy lead at Warwick Clinical Trials Unit, who has worked collaboratively with Professor Costa in this research area across Warwick and Oxford universities. She said: "This research is answering a question that has been debated for over a decade; early research began at the University of Warwick in 2009 exploring the impact of plaster casts and walking boots on walking patterns and getting back to activities, which led to the development of this trial. We now know that patients who immediate weight bear in a walking boot have better early outcomes, but this is only the beginning of the recovery. We need to do further research exploring how we best rehabilitate patients after the walking boot is discarded. This trial highlighted large variation in rehabilitation provision across the UK for this injury."

The UKSTAR trial randomised 540 participants from 39 UK hospitals making it the largest study of its kind to compare the two treatments. Adult patients were randomly assigned to plaster cast or functional brace. The objective was to compare function and pain, quality of life, complications including re-rupture, and resource use in patients having non-operative treatment. The study found no difference between the patient-reported Achilles Tendon Rupture Score (ATRS) at 9 months, or in the rate of re-rupture of the tendon.

Children with higher concentrations of a certain chemical in their blood are more likely to get cavities, according to a new study by West Virginia University School of Dentistry researchers.

Manufactured chemical g roups called perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances are universal as a result of extensive manufacturing and use. Although manufacturers no longer use PFAS to make nonstick cookware, carpet, cardboard and other products, they persist in the environment. Scientists have linked them to a range of health problems--from heart disease to high cholesterol--but now R. Constance Wiener and Christopher Waters are exploring how they affect dental health.

They investigated whether higher concentrations of PFAS were associated with greater tooth decay in children. One of them--perfluorodecanoic acid--was linked to dental cavities. Their findings appear in the Journal of Public Health Dentistry.

"Due to the strong chemical bonds of PFAS, it is difficult for them to breakdown, which makes them more likely to be persistent within the environment, especially in drinking water systems," said Waters, who directs the School of Dentistry's research labs. "A majority of people may not be aware that they are using water and other products that contain PFAS."

The 629 children who participated in the study were 3 to 11 years old and were part of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Samples of the children's blood were analyzed for PFAS in 2013 and 2014. Their tooth decay and other factors--such as their race, their BMI and how often they brushed their teeth--were assessed.

Of the seven PFAS that Wiener and Waters analyzed, perfluorodecanoic acid was the one that correlated with higher levels of tooth decay.

"Perfluorodecanoic acid, in particular, has a long molecular structure and strong chemical bonds; therefore, it remains in the environment longer. As a result, it is more likely to have negative health consequences such as dental caries," said Dr. Wiener, an associate professor in the Department of Dental Practice and Rural Health.

But how does that influence happen? Wiener and Waters have a hypothesis. According to other research, perfluorodecanoic acid may disrupt the healthy development of enamel, which is what makes teeth hard. That disruption can leave teeth susceptible to decay.

However, when it comes to cavities, scientists haven't parsed perfluorodecanoic acid's mechanism of action yet. The topic warrants further investigation.

"While the findings of this study are important, there are some study limitations, and more work is needed to fully understand how this molecule impacts normal tooth formation," said Fotinos Panagakos, the School of Dentistry's vice dean for administration and research.

"The good news is that, in our study, about half of the children did not have any measurable amount of PFAS. Perhaps this is due to certain PFAS no longer being made in the US," Wiener said.

Another piece of good news is that the study reaffirmed the importance of dental hygiene and checkups. Children who brushed once a day or less frequently had significantly higher tooth decay than those who brushed at least twice daily.

Likewise, children who had not been to the dentist within the previous year were twice as likely to have higher rates of tooth decay than kids who hadn't.

So, even though parents cannot control what is in their children's drinking water, they can still protect their children's teeth by fostering thorough, regular brushing and scheduling dental exams.

The School of Dentistry will hold Give Kids a Smile Day on Friday, Feb. 7, at the Pediatric Dentistry Clinic. Dental students will treat more than 100 children for free that day. Each visit includes an exam, a cleaning, a fluoride treatment and--if appropriate--X-rays.

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - In a recent study, University of Arkansas physics researchers found evidence of an inverse transition in ferroelectric ultrathin films, which could lead to advances in development of data storage, microelectronics and sensors.

"We found that a disordered labyrinthine phase transforms into the more ordered parallel-stripe structure upon raising the temperature," said Yousra Nahas, first author of the study titled "Inverse Transition of Labyrinthine Domain Patterns in Ferroelectric Thin Films," published in the journal Nature. Former and present U of A physics researchers Sergei Prokhorenko, Bin Xu, Sergey Prosandeev, and Distinguished Professor Laurent Bellaiche, along with colleagues in France, also contributed to the study.

Proposed a century ago, these types of transitions seem to contradict the fundamental law that disorder increases with temperature. They have been found in other systems such as superconductors, proteins, liquid crystals and metallic alloys. But they had not been found in ferroelectric materials, which are of interest to scientists because they possess spontaneous electrical polarization that can be reversed by the application of an electric field.

The University of Arkansas researchers were able to model the transitions using the Arkansas High Performance Computing Center, which is funded in part by the Arkansas Economic Development Commission. Researchers in France demonstrated the model's predictions through laboratory experiments.

"These findings may be put at use to leap beyond current technologies by enabling fundamentally new design principles and topologically enhanced functionalities within ferroelectric films," said Nahas.

Italian American organized crime may conjure images of classic gangster flicks, but as James B. Jacobs explores in the Crime and Justice article "The Rise and Fall of Organized Crime in the United States," its history is unexpectedly nuanced and mutable. The Cosa Nostra families--popularly known as the Mafia--operated, at the height of their power, in at least twenty-four American cities, with five in New York City alone. Although no national body governed the families, they operated similarly to one another and were major urban power brokers.

Before the 1970s, organized crime was largely ignored by J. Edgar Hoover's FBI, even though Cosa Nostra families had begun to traffic drugs and infiltrate unions as early as the 1910s, and Prohibition in particular (1919-1933) gave them the opportunity to control black markets. As times changed, they expanded their powers to run seedy coin-operated pornography films, finance the first large Las Vegas casino, and fix sports contests. It wasn't until the 1960s that Cosa Nostra began to face serious legal consequences. Congress enacted the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act in 1968 and followed up in 1970 with the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO). When Hoover died in 1972, the FBI redefined its top priorities, and took on the Cosa Nostra families. By this time, Italian American organized crime was reaching its peak, thanks to labor and business racketeering, black markets like gambling and pornography, and drug trafficking. But in the 1980s and '90s, and into the current century, the federal government relentlessly pressured and prosecuted organized crime outfits, with dozens upon dozens of members and even bosses recanting the Cosa Nostra code of silence known as omertá. With the federal government able to protect informants under 1970's Witness Security Program, streams of members and associates agreed to cooperate with prosecutors.

Jacobs details many aspects of organized crime and explains how political and social changes helped define paths to power--and how further political and social changes have eroded them. For instance, the power that labor unions held in the U.S. in the 1970s was substantial enough that by replacing union officers with Cosa Nostra family members and associates, an organized crime family could control which businesses could operate in certain sectors, designating who would win contracts. As corruption began to be rooted out of these unions, the Cosa Nostra families' powers shrank. Around the same time, most U.S. cities had working-class Italian American neighborhoods, including recent immigrants who were ripe for recruitment by the ruling crime families. With neighborhood boundaries shrinking, and Italian Americans assimilating into mainstream society, the recruitment pool shrank. More legislation, especially in New York City in the late '90s, allowed law enforcement to purge Cosa Nostra groups from the legitimate economy by, for instance, refusing to award government contracts to any group affiliated with organized crime.

Despite pressure from the legal and judicial systems and a rapidly changing world, Cosa Nostra families survive and operate, albeit as shadow of their former selves. But Jacobs cautions that Cosa Nostra has proved resilient for more than a century--and even if organized crime is down, it's not out.

HOUSTON -- A study led by The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center furthered understanding about mitochondria, the cell components known as the "powerhouse of the cell." Knowing more about the genome is crucial given that mitochondria play important roles in tumorigenesis.

Findings were published in the Feb. 5 online issue of Nature Genetics and resulted through collaboration with the International Cancer Genome Consortium--The Cancer Genome Atlas Pan--Cancer Analysis of Whole Genomes (PCAWG) project, an effort involving more than 1,300 scientists and clinicians from 37 countries. Since its inception, the PCAWG has analyzed more than 2,600 genomes across 38 tumor types.

"This study lays a foundation for translating mitochondrial biology into clinical applications," said Han Liang, Ph.D., professor of Bioinformatics & Computational Biology. "Our analysis presents the most definitive mutational landscape of mitochondrial genomes and identifies several hyper-mutated cases. Such truncated mutations are remarkably enriched in kidney, colorectal and thyroid cancers, suggesting oncogenic impact with the activation of signaling pathways."

Mitochondria are crucial cellular organelles, with a single human cell containing several hundred mitochondria. The cell components play essential roles in generating most of the cell's energy through a process known as oxidative phosphorylation. The mitochondrial genome encodes 13 proteins that form respiratory chain complexes with other proteins.

"The involvement of mitochondria in carcinogenesis has long been suspected because altered energy metabolism is a common feature of cancer," said Liang. "Furthermore, mitochondria play important roles in other tasks, such as biosynthesis, signaling, cellular differentiation, cell growth and death."

The team found that the mitochondrial genome is an essential component in understanding the complex molecular patterns observed in cancer genomes and helping to pinpoint potential cancer driver events.

"Our results underscore the clinical importance of mitochondria. This study has untangled and characterized the full spectrum of molecular alterations of mitochondria in human cancers," said Liang. "We have highlighted the function of mitochondrial genes in oxidative phosphorylation, DNA repair and cell cycle, showing their connections with clinically actionable genes."

Singapore, 6 February 2020 - Cancer is the leading cause of death in Singapore and the second leading cause of death around the world, implicated in about one in six deaths globally. An international consortium of scientists has now identified 81 mutational 'signatures' that could help reveal the origins and development of various types of cancer, and inform new strategies to prevent, diagnose and treat the disease.

Published in the journal Nature, the study by researchers from Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore, the Wellcome Sanger Institute in the UK, the University of California San Diego School of Medicine in the USA, and their collaborators around the world is part of a decade-long Pan-Cancer Project aimed at comprehensively analysing whole cancer genomes.

"Different kinds of DNA copying problems and mutation-causing agents, like tobacco, UV light, and chemotherapeutic drugs, lead to mutations with recognisable fingerprints, which we call mutational signatures," explained Professor Steven Rozen, a senior author of the study from the Cancer and Stem Cell Biology Programme at Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore.

These signatures can provide a snapshot of a cell's life history and insight into factors that have mutated the cell's genetic material. Understanding the role these mutations play in cancer development can help advance research into prevention, diagnosis and treatment.

The research was part of the Pan-Cancer Project, a massive international effort to establish the most comprehensive map of primary cancer genomes to date, involving more than 1,300 scientists and clinicians from 37 countries. For this particular study, the researchers used machine learning to computationally mine mutation data from almost 24,000 human cancer samples. The large data set allowed them to identify 81 different mutational signatures.

Some of the signatures represented fingerprints of known mutation-causing agents. For example, signature SBS4 involves a specific combination of 'single base substitutions', in which mutations cause the replacement of a nucleic acid base, the building block of DNA, with another. Lung cancer samples have a strong SBS4 signature, indicating that this particular one is associated with tobacco smoking.

"This study presents a fundamental resource that will tie in with experimental studies to open new doors for understanding the causes of cancer," said Prof Rozen, who is also Director of Duke-NUS' Centre for Computational Biology. "This will illuminate new opportunities for cancer prevention, or help screen exposed individuals more intensively. The results will also help us understand in more detail how exposure to mutation-causing agents leads to cancer."

Prof Mike Stratton, a senior author of the study and Director of the Wellcome Sanger Institute in the UK, said, "Using our detailed catalogue of the range of mutational signatures in cancer DNA, researchers worldwide will now be able to investigate which chemicals or processes are linked to these signatures. This will increase our understanding of how cancer develops, and discover new causes of cancer, helping to inform public health strategies to prevent cancer."

Prof Patrick Casey, Senior Vice Dean for Research at Duke-NUS, commented, "In Singapore, cancer is the leading cause of death, and it has significant societal and economic impact on patients and their families, as well as the healthcare system. We are truly encouraged by this important achievement by Prof Rozen and his collaborators, and look forward to the advances in cancer treatment and patient care their findings unlock."

Prof Rozen and his team next plan to study the mutational signature caused by aristolochic acid, a naturally occurring chemical found in the plant family known as birthworts, which are used in herbal medicine in Asia and worldwide. This mutational signature is found in urinary tract and liver cancers throughout East Asia. Further studies on this mutational signature could lead to tests that could help determine who has been exposed to aristolochic acid and help clarify if cancers caused by it require a unique treatment approach.

Prof Rozen shared that scientists will also need to study a more geographically diverse data set of cancer genomes, as the current data set was mainly from Europe and North America. "We simply have no idea if there are substantial exposures to unknown mutation-causing agents in other parts of the world," he stated.

The research findings were published as part of a special edition of Nature and affiliated publications featuring 23 papers from the Pan-Cancer Project, which is coordinated by the International Cancer Genome Consortium and The Cancer Genome Atlas.