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VCU Massey Cancer Center researchers have identified two genes that are responsible for governing the replication of the Epstein-Barr virus, an infection that drives the growth of several types of cancer. The discovery could lead to the development of novel therapies for virus-associated diseases including stomach cancer and lymphomas.

Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) is one of the most common viral infections in humans - around 95% of adults carry the virus. EBV infections contribute to nearly 200,000 new cases of cancer and more than 140,000 deaths worldwide per year, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

EBV-associated cancers include nasopharyngeal (a cancer at the back of the nose and throat), subtypes of stomach cancer, Burkitt's lymphoma and Hodgkin's lymphoma.

The life cycle of EBV is divided into latent and lytic phases, where in the latent phase the virus is dormant and in the lytic phase the virus is actively replicating in cells.

Renfeng Li, Ph.D., member of the Cancer Molecular Genetics research program at Massey, conducted a study, published in Cell Reports, which determined that the gene PIAS1 is a crucial factor in preventing EBV replication. This is because EBV specifically targets cellular machinery in infected cells to eliminate PIAS1 in order to copy itself efficiently.

Typically, EBV exists in the latent phase in tumor cells, however various stimuli can reactivate the virus and catalyze its growth and replication.

Once EBV has been activated, it hijacks enzymes responsible for the programmed destruction of cells, referred to as caspases, and then essentially acts like a pair of "molecular scissors" to cut out PIAS1, Li said. The removal of this gene allows for the reactivation and continued replication of the virus.

By deliberately blocking this genetic editing, Li found that PIAS1 was able to prevent EBV from replicating within the host.

"This finding represents a striking example of an emerging category of virus-host interactions which should offer insights into understanding and controlling viral pathogenesis," said Li, an assistant professor at the VCU School of Dentistry.

A second study, published in PLOS Pathogens, furthered the understanding of EBV progression by closely examining interferon regulatory factor 8 (IRF8), a protein that controls the development of blood cells.

IRF8 was previously known to serve a major function in a cellular process involved in the reactivation of EBV (B cell differentiation), and this study found that the depletion of IRF8 was directly associated with a decrease in EBV activity.

Li's research demonstrated IRF8 directly regulates the activation of caspase enzymes which destroy KAP1, another gene that prohibits the development of the virus much like PIAS1.

By suppressing IRF8, Li was able to stabilize the presence of KAP1 to help deactivate EBV in virus-infected cancer cells.

"Due to the unique presence of EBV in cancer cells, our research on EBV life cycle regulation by both PIAS1 and IRF8 can help facilitate the development of novel strategies to wipe out cancers associated with this virus," Li said.

Li, his research team members Kun Zhang and Dong-Wen Lv and two postdoctoral fellows at VCU have contributed to these two studies.

After a biopsy or surgery, doctors often get a molecular snapshot of a patient's tumor. This snapshot is important - knowing the genetics that cause a cancer can help match a patient with a genetically-targeted treatment. But recent work increasingly shows that tumors are not static - the populations of cells that make up a tumor evolve over time in response to treatment, often in ways that lead to treatment immunity. Instead of being defined by a snapshot, tumors are more like a movie. This means that a tumor that recurs after treatment may be much different than the tumor originally seen in a biopsy.

Which is why, as reported in the journal Clinical Cancer Research, it was very special to collect three tumor samples over the course of three surgeries from a patient with salivary gland cancer.

"People talk about molecular evolution of cancer and we were able to show it in this patient. With these three samples, we could see across time how the tumor developed resistance to treatment," says Daniel Bowles, MD, clinical and translational investigator at the University of Colorado Cancer Center and Head of Cancer Research at the Denver Veterans Administration Medical Center.

The major change had to do with the proportion of the tumor made up of cancer stem cells, often seen as the most capable of driving growth of the disease: A sample taken during the patient's first surgery contained 0.2 percent cancer stem cells; a sample taken during the patient's third surgery contained 4.5 percent cancer stem cells. Additionally, the later tumor had overall 50 percent more cancer-driving mutations, and lower activity of genes meant to suppress cancer.

"By the third surgery, the tumor was invasive and aggressive," says Stephen Keysar, PhD, research assistant professor and basic investigator in the lab of senior author Antonio Jimeno, MD, PhD. Not only did the cellular makeup of the tumor change, increasing in the percentage of cancer stem cells, but, "all things being equal, if you compare a stem cell from the first surgery to stem cells from the third, the cells themselves became more aggressive," says Keysar.

Bowles compares cancer treatment to attacking a weed: "Maybe what's happening is the therapies are exfoliating the plant but not affecting the root," he says. In this conceptualization, cancer therapies may kill the bulk of the cells that make up a tumor, but unless they affect the cancer stem cells - the "root" - the tumor may return.

"When you treat a tumor and it's gone for a couple years and then comes back, it's likely that a population of cancer stem cells survived treatment. These stem cells can then restart the cancer much later," Keysar says.

Obtaining enough tumor tissue to analyze required growing patient samples on mice. This effort, supported by National Institutes of Health and philanthropic funds, led to the development of eight unique patient cell lines, some representing the first models of these salivary cancer subtypes.

"Importantly, as these models are based on human tumors, they can be used in the future to explore at the cellular and molecular level how specific genetic alterations regulate cancer development and resistance to therapy," says collaborator Mary Reyland, PhD, professor in the CU School of Medicine Department of Pathology.

"In this relatively simple but groundbreaking research work, we integrated molecular and cancer stem cell biology to show that tumors adapt and 'tool-up' to overcome therapies, leading to relapse in our patients. By pairing two young researchers with complementary expertise, and developing complex animal models, were we able to demonstrate the evolution of salivary cancers and the tumorigenic cells that drive them," Jimeno says.

"Cancers don't ever come back better. At least I've never seen it," Bowles says. "And now we know one important reason why."

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, IL (March 19, 2018) - In January 2017 guidelines were released urging parents to begin early introduction of peanut-containing foods to reduce the risk of peanut allergy. A new study shows those who are aware of the guidelines are still hesitant to put them into place and not everyone has heard of them.

The study, published in Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, the scientific journal of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI) surveyed 1,000 pregnant women and 1,000 new moms. Respondents were asked about their willingness to try early peanut introduction to prevent peanut allergies and their familiarity with the guidelines.

"Since early peanut introduction is a relatively new idea, we were not surprised to find that more than half (53 percent) of those surveyed said following the guidelines was of no or limited importance," said allergist Matthew Greenhawt, MD, MBA, MSc, chair of the ACAAI Food Allergy Committee and lead author. "We saw that overall, 61 percent of respondents had no or minimal concern about their child developing a food allergy, and only 31 percent of respondents were willing to introduce peanut-containing foods before or around 6 months."

The guidelines, endorsed by ACAAI, identify children at high risk for developing a peanut allergy as those with severe eczema and/or egg allergy. The guidelines recommend introduction of peanut-containing foods as early as 4-6 months for high-risk infants who have already started solid foods, after determining that it is safe to do so. If an infant is determined to be high risk, peanut-containing foods should be introduced in a specialist's office as an oral food challenge after peanut skin testing, or not at all if the child has too large of a skin test, which may suggest the child already has peanut allergy. Parents of infants with moderate or low risk for developing peanut allergy are encouraged to introduce peanut-containing foods at home, without such measures.

"The new guidelines are a breakthrough for preventing peanut allergy," says allergist Edmond Chan, MD, ACAAI member and co-author. "But we're still working on helping parents and pediatricians understand how important the guidelines are for preventing peanut allergies. Food allergies are scary, so it's understandable that parents would hesitate to introduce a food they might see as dangerous. In our survey, only 49 percent of the respondents were willing to allow their child to be skin tested, and just 44 percent were willing to allow an oral food challenge before a year of age to help facilitate early introduction. Parents should consult with their primary care physician to help walk them through the process of early peanut introduction for their infant."

Diagnosing food allergy is not always simple, but the need to make a proper diagnosis is very important. Allergists are specially trained to administer allergy testing and diagnose the results. To find an allergist near you, use the ACAAI allergist locator. To learn more about early peanut introduction, watch "Peanuts and your baby: How to introduce the two".

Canada's major medical journal, CMAJ, will champion the health of vulnerable populations with a special focus on groups that experience adverse health outcomes because of poverty, isolation, discrimination and other factors.

"By choosing vulnerable populations as a CMAJ area of focus, we renew our commitment to using our platform to advocate on behalf of Canadians who are vulnerable to poor health because of structural and personal factors that prevent them from achieving the optimal health that is their human right," write CMAJ medical editors Drs. Kirsten Patrick, Ken Flegel and Matthew Stanbrook in an editorial in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal)

"We hope to shine a light on vulnerability in health care and help to reduce it by empowering and giving voice to those who are vulnerable. We are hereby signalling to researchers working with vulnerable populations across Canada and internationally that we can be a prominent home for their highest-quality work in this area. In addition, we will continue to prioritize CMAJ's tradition of effective advocacy for the vulnerable," they write.

The journal will continue to publish a broad range of content relevant to primary care physicians, specialists and policy-makers.

A linked commentary http://www.cmaj.ca/lookup/doi/10.1503/cmaj.180242 discusses the concept of vulnerability in health care.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- As children hit the "tween" stage between early elementary grades and the teenage years, parents may struggle balancing the need for independence with appropriate supervision, a new national poll suggests.

And modern technology has changed the ground rules. Nearly all parents of tweens ages 9-12 agree that social media makes it easier for kids to get in trouble. But 61 percent also felt that social media helps parents keep track of tweens, according to a new report from the C.S. Mott Children's Hospital National Poll on Children's Health at the University of Michigan.

"The tween stage brings new challenges for parents as they often must balance their child's desire for more freedom and independence with supervision. It's not an easy balancing act," says poll co-director Sarah Clark.

Fifty-five percent of parents would read their tween's texts or social media pages to learn more information if their tween was invited to a boy-girl party at the home of an unfamiliar family, and 39 percent would track their tween's location on their cell phone during the party. Mothers were more likely than fathers to say they would use technology to monitor their tweens.

"Social media has opened another door of questions about what parents should be keeping tabs on," Clark says. "In some families, reading text messages or social media posts might be seen as 'spying.' But other parents discuss rules with their kids that include sharing passwords and setting the expectation that they will monitor social media interactions.

"Establishing family rules around the use of social media, and discussing the reasons for those rules, is an important part of parenting tweens."

But the majority of parents still wanted to learn more information about what their kids were up to the traditional way, with 91 percent saying they would talk with a classmate's parents when dropping their tween at a party if they didn't know the family. Seventy-six percent would call ahead to make sure the classmate's parents would be supervising the party.

About 1 in 4 parents were very concerned about their tweens experimenting with sexual activity, marijuana or other drugs, beer or liquor, and guns or other weapons. Parents reported greater concern about tween boys experimenting with guns, but otherwise had similar levels of concern for their tween boys and girls.

Many polled acknowledged the push and pull between allowing children reasonable space while still monitoring their activities. Two-thirds of parents agreed that tweens need some freedom to make mistakes. Nearly half (46 percent) of parents rated themselves as stricter than the parents of their tween's friends, while 45 percent rated themselves as about the same. Nine percent viewed themselves as less strict than others.

Clark says parents may consider giving tweens the opportunity to stay home alone, have greater ownership over schoolwork, and to socialize with friends without the immediate presence of their parents. These learning opportunities may differ from family to family, and likely will increase as children get older, she says.

"Unlike younger children who need adult supervision throughout the day, most tweens are able to spend periods of time without an adult present-- but still don't have the independence that many teenagers have," Clarks says. "Parents must balance their responsibility to help their tween learn to be responsible and make good decisions, while ensuring their tween's safety."

PHOENIX, Ariz. and OSLO, Norway -- March 19, 2018 -- For decades, ultrasound has been used to image organs such as the heart and kidneys, check blood flow, monitor the development of fetuses, reduce pain and even break up kidney stones.

Now, a Norwegian biotech company called Phoenix Solutions AS is working with the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen), a Phoenix, Arizona-based biomedical research facility, to test the use of these pulsed sound waves to direct and focus cancer drug therapies.

In laboratory tests, TGen will help analyze the effectiveness of a technology called Acoustic Cluster Therapy (ACT), a unique approach to targeting cancer cells by concentrating the delivery of chemotherapies, making them more effective and potentially reducing their toxicity.

Humanscan Co. Ltd., a South Korean manufacture of ultrasound diagnostic imaging, is developing clinically applicable hardware optimized for ACT, which TGen will then validate.

Phoenix Solutions is using funding from Innovation Norway to conduct this research in advance of pancreatic cancer clinical trials planned later this year.

"We are very pleased to receive this grant, which will enable us to develop and validate an optimal ultrasound platform for clinical use of ACT. In their respective fields, Humanscan and TGen both represent the cutting edge of science, and we are confident this will contribute to the clinical success of our program," said Dr. Per Sontum, CEO of Phoenix Solutions.

TGen is a world leader in the development of novel therapeutics for the treatment of pancreatic cancer. The TGen team led the clinical development of one of the current standard-of-care regimens for this disease -- nab-paclitaxel plus gemcitabine. TGen currently is involved in 13 pancreatic cancer clinical programs.

"We are pleased that this research program has become a reality, and look forward to working with ACT. The concept represents a novel approach to targeted drug delivery and looks very promising," said Dr. Haiyong Han, a Professor in TGen's Molecular Medicine Division and head of the Basic Research Unit in TGen's Pancreatic Cancer Program.

Among the advantages of ultrasound technology: it is generally painless; non-invasive; does not require needles, injections or incisions; and patients are not exposed to ionizing radiation, making the procedure safer than diagnostic techniques such as X-rays and CT scans.

Humanscan CEO Sungmin Rhim said, "We are excited to enter into this collaboration with Phoenix (Solutions) and participate in the development of ACT. Ultrasound mediated, targeted drug delivery is an emerging therapy approach with great potential and we are delighted to be in the forefront of this development."

Phoenix Solutions also is considering this technology for use in addressing other types of cancer, including: liver, prostate and triple-negative breast cancer; and other diseases, including those involving inflammation and the central nervous system.

CHICAGO -- New research in mice provides an explanation for how exposure to the widely used chemical bisphenol A (BPA) during pregnancy, even at levels lower than the regulated "safe" human exposure level, can lead to altered brain development and behavior later in life. The research will be presented Monday, March 19 at ENDO 2018, the 100th annual meeting of the Endocrine Society in Chicago, Ill.

BPA is a chemical that is added to many commercial products, including water bottles, paper receipts, can liners and food storage containers. It is known as an endocrine-disrupting chemical--a chemical that interferes with the body's hormones.

"Decades of research in over 1,000 animal and 100 human epidemiological studies have demonstrated a link between BPA exposure and adverse health outcomes," said lead researcher Deborah Kurrasch, Ph.D., Associate Professor at the University of Calgary in Calgary, Canada. "This is especially true for the developing brain, which is particularly sensitive to the estrogen-promoting effects of BPA during gestation. Indeed, several human studies have now correlated early life BPA exposure with behavioral problems later in childhood, suggesting BPA permanently alters brain development that leads to lasting effects on neural functioning."

Governmental agencies around the world, including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Health Canada, and European Food Safety Authority, declare BPA to be safe. "One reason for this disparity is the absence of a smoking gun: if BPA is so toxic to developing brains, then where is the evidence of defective brains?" Kurrasch said. "Our study is the first to use environmentally relevant doses of BPA and show exposure to the chemical during brain development can affect the timing of the birth of nerve cells, or neurons."

The researchers studied three groups of pregnant mice. One group ate food without BPA; a second group at food with high doses of BPA; and a third ate low-dose BPA food. They found an increase in the number of neurons created during early development in mouse pups exposed to high and low doses of BPA during pregnancy, compared with those not exposed to BPA.

"This is important because specific neurons are known to be born at a very distinct time points, and if they are born early--as is the case here--then presumably these early neurons will migrate to the wrong place and form the wrong connections. These findings start to provide a rationale as to how BPA might affect developing brains," Kurrasch said.

Siblings to these pups were given behavioral tests to assess whether the early birth of neurons led to changes that affected brain function later in life. The researchers found mice that were exposed to BPA-high and BPA-low food during gestation exhibited some behaviors that match those observed in human children whose mothers had high levels of BPA during pregnancy. "These findings suggest that gestational exposure to BPA can lead to lasting and permanent changes in the brain," Kurrasch said.

"The public is becoming well educated on the debate surrounding BPA safety, as well as other chemicals," she noted. "Although there is still work to be done to translate these rodent effects to human pregnancy, this research could provide expectant mothers with important information on what to avoid to best protect their babies."

Birds do it and so do doughnut-shaped fusion facilities called "tokamaks." But tokamak chirping-- a rapidly changing frequency wave that can be far above what the human ear can detect -- is hardly welcome to researchers who seek to bring the fusion that powers the sun and stars to Earth. Such chirping signals a loss of heat that can slow fusion reactions, a loss that has long puzzled scientists.

Compounding the puzzle is that some tokamaks chirp more frequently than others. For example, chirps have commonly occurred in the National Spherical Torus Experiment Upgrade (NSTX-U) at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Princeton Plasma Laboratory (PPPL), but have been rare in the DIII-D National Fusion Facility tokamak that General Atomics operates for the DOE in San Diego. Understanding why some tokamaks chirp and some do not is important so that researchers can predict and eventually learn to avoid such chirping in the ITER tokamak, the international fusion reactor that is being built in the south of France to demonstrate the practicality of fusion energy.

In a fusion reactor like ITER, fusion reactions produce "fast ions" - highly energetic atomic nuclei that scientists rely on to maintain the high plasma temperatures needed to keep the plasma hot. Such ions are like a fast wind that, under certain conditions, can excite waves called "Alfvén waves" in the hot plasma -- much like the musical notes produced by blowing in a wind instrument. If the fast ion wind is strong enough the Alfvén waves begin to chirp, which will cause loss of energy, reducing the plasma temperature and fusion power output.

Conditions that lead to chirping

Scientists led by PPPL researchers have now modeled the plasma conditions that give rise to chirping and predict when it will occur. The computer model, successfully tested on the DIII-D tokamak, describes the impact of turbulence -- the random fluctuation of plasma that can lead to heat and particle loss -- on the fast ions. The model shows that the turbulence in the plasma helps to break up or scatter the fast ion wind. If the scattering is strong enough the fast ions no longer have the strength to cause Alfvén wave chirping and the loss of heat from the plasma can be reduced.

Until recently, finding direct evidence for the role of turbulence in affecting the strength of the fast ion wind and its role in chirping has been challenging. Recent DIII-D experiments have now revealed the intimate connection between turbulence levels and the chirping of the plasma.

In these experiments, the fast ion wind produced a single Alfvén note in the plasma, much like a single note in a wind instrument. Then, when the plasma spontaneously transitions into a new improved state of confinement with low turbulence levels, the Alfvén note begins to chirp rapidly.

This onset of chirping is clearly tied to the reduction of turbulence, since lower turbulence can no longer scatter the fast ion wind, allowing it to build up sufficiently to drive the Alfvén waves harder and cause them to begin chirping. "The coherent motion of fast ion bunches when the turbulence decreases gives rise to chirping and the leakage and heat associated with chirping," said Vinícius Duarte, a PPPL associate research physicist and former visiting scientist from the University of São Paulo, Brazil, who is lead author of a paper describing the findings in Physics of Plasmas and featured as a "Scilight" -- a science highlight -- by the American Institute of Physics.

Why some plasmas chirp

The theory developed by Duarte also indicates why some plasmas chirp and some do not. The explanation is that turbulence is much less effective in scattering the fast ion wind in some devices compared with others. The next step will be to use this knowledge to design methods to prevent chirping in present experiments, and to use such methods in the design of future fusion reactors such as ITER.

Airborne soot produced by wildfires and fossil-fuel combustion and transported to the remote McMurdo Dry Valleys of Antarctica contains levels of black carbon too low to contribute significantly to the melting of local glaciers, according to a new study by researchers supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF).

Strong winds in the Dry Valleys, however, can temporarily cause large spikes in the amount of locally produced black carbon, which is distributed through the ecosystem, the researchers found.

In the study, the researchers differentiated between black carbon produced elsewhere in the world and carried by winds to the Dry Valleys and black carbon produced by local combustion sources, such as helicopter flights, combustion toilets and other fossil fuel-intensive activities associated with Dry Valleys field camps.

They conclude that further study of local carbon production and transport would help to understand the limited effects of local black carbon production on the Dry Valleys ecosystem, compared to the effects of windblown sediments, commonly deposited in the ablation regions of the glaciers, that have been shown to influence melt.

Alia Khan from the the University of Colorado Boulder's Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research and the National Snow and Ice Data Center, along with her colleagues at the NSF-funded McMurdo Dry Valleys Long Term Ecological Research (LTER) project, published the paper in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres.

The Dry Valleys are a unique ecosystem within the Antarctic continent. The continent as a whole is a landmass the size of the U.S. and Mexico combined, of which 98 percent is permanently covered with ice and snow. The Dry Valleys, by contrast, are ice-free, mountainous regions, interspersed with glaciers, where little snow accumulates because they are scoured by winds.

Samples taken from a snow pit in the accumulation region of the Commonwealth Glacier suggest the black carbon transported from beyond the continent is not sufficient to reduce the albedo -- the glacier's ability to reflect light -- to a degree that would increase melting. Researchers took the samples during the 2013-2014 Antarctic research season.

"The black carbon deposited from long-range atmospheric transport in the snow accumulation regions of the glaciers is present in very low concentrations in the snow, too low to reduce the surface albedo of the glaciers," Khan said.

The research showed that while concentrations of black carbon aerosols near the surface of the valley floor are low, locally produced black carbon may stay sequestered in the upper layers of soils near field camps until it is disturbed and distributed by high winds, including the so-called Foehn wind event, a warm southerly wind that occurred during the study period.

The results of the work indicate that the near-surface concentrations of black carbon in the air in the local area can increase by a factor of three during episodic wind storms.

"We were surprised by the sharp increase in concentrations at the field camp site during the strong winds, which suggests the locally produced black carbon particles, which are generally too large to travel very far, are re-suspended during these wind events," Khan said.

Everyone has experienced the awkward situation of meeting someone and then forgetting their name shortly after. Among older adults, this happens more often than not.

Baycrest researchers have discovered a new method to resolve this problem by tapping into a natural memory change during aging. Their work, which was recently published in the journal, Psychology and Aging, could be incorporated into a smartphone application as an accessible memory training tool.

"Among the memory difficulties that people report as they age, having trouble remembering people's names can be upsetting and stressful in social situations," says Dr. Renee Biss, a former postdoctoral fellow at Baycrest's Neuropsychology and Cognitive Health program who conducted the study. "To avoid this potential embarrassment, an older adult may withdraw from socializing which can negatively affect their brain health."

Previous Baycrest studies have demonstrated that older adults unknowingly pick up information from their surroundings, which is linked to their brains becoming less efficient at ignoring distraction, but young adults don't have the same tendency

"This strategy harnessed a natural change that occurs as we get older and used it to boost memory for information that is meaningful to older adults," says Dr. Kelly Murphy, senior author on the study, a clinical neuropsychologist at Baycrest and a psychology professor at the University of Toronto.

During the study, a group of 57 younger and older adults (between the ages of 17 to 23 and 60 to 86) were shown the faces and names of 24 different people and were tested on their memory right after. Participants were then presented another series of faces with text on their foreheads, but this time they were told to ignore the written information and push a button when they saw the same face appear twice in a row. Some of the same faces and names from the first task were shown again. Upon completion, everyone was tested on their memory for a second time.

Based on the results, older adults had better accuracy for the faces and names shown twice during both tasks, despite being told to ignore the text. When the name was shown as a distraction the second time, older adults used this to spontaneously rehearse the information learned previously. Younger adults did not see the same improvements, which is consistent with prior research.

"Our findings show that this method could be used as an effective memory strategy to help older adults remember the names of people they meet," says Dr. Lynn Hasher, second senior investigator on the study, a senior scientist at Baycrest's Rotman Research Institute and a psychology professor at the University of Toronto. "Through our work, we could develop more successful interventions for this population because it builds on their natural processing abilities rather than trying to use skills employed by younger adults." Over the years, Dr. Hasher's lab has been involved in numerous discoveries demonstrating that older adults could use distraction to help them learn.

Based on this research, they aim to create a training program that could help older adults learn the faces and names of people they meet and help them feel more comfortable with new social interactions. As a next step, the team is exploring whether older adults who have mild cognitive impairment (a condition that is likely to develop into Alzheimer's) could benefit from this strategy.

This work could have greater potential beyond boosting memory for faces and names. Since older adults have a harder time remembering relationships between unrelated items, with further testing these tools could improve this type of memory, says Dr. Biss.

Healthier fish stocks. Higher catches. Profits from fishing. Is there a way to achieve these holy grails of commercial fisheries without harming endangered species that are caught incidentally?

A new UC Santa Barbara-led study has found that may indeed be possible about half the time. According to the research group's analysis, ending overfishing would also promote population recoveries for many endangered species ensnared accidentally as bycatch -- the unwanted fish and other marine creatures caught during commercial fishing for a different species. The team's findings appear in the journal Science.

"Many large animals, including marine mammals, turtles and birds, are threatened by bycatch," said lead author Matt Burgess, a postdoctoral scholar in the Sustainable Fisheries Group at UCSB's Bren School of Environmental Science & Management. "We tend to think that we can only save these species by either dramatically improving our gear or by constraining our fisheries. But this project demonstrated that wasn't always the case. In about half the cases, overexploiting these mammals, turtles and birds occurs because we're also overexploiting the target species."

The study examined how much fishing pressure needs to be reduced to maximize profits in the 4,713 fisheries that produce most of the world's catch -- and to halt the population declines of 20 marine mammal, sea turtle and sea bird populations threatened as bycatch. The researchers also identified which fisheries might be causing the bycatch for each population.

To account for the many uncertainties in each of these aspects, the scientists simulated 1,000 possible scenarios. In each, they asked what fraction of the 20 threatened bycatch populations would begin to recover if all fisheries adopted efforts that would maximize their profits. For each bycatch population that would not recover under such efforts, the investigators then asked how much profit the fisheries would have to give up to enable recovery of the bycatch population. In 95 percent of the simulated scenarios, the analysis demonstrated that between seven and 13 of the bycatch populations could be saved from decline at a cost of less than 5 percent of the maximum profit.

"Maintaining productive fisheries and protecting threatened bycatch species are two of the primary goals of fisheries policy," Burgess said. "We found that about half the time we can accomplish these goals together with the same management actions."

For some populations like the eastern Pacific leatherback turtle, that bycatch is unsustainable but so, too, is the fishing pressure on many of the target species. "For many species, you actually get a 'win-win,' where building higher stocks of fish in the ocean leads to higher fishery profits and recovery of endangered species," said co-author Christopher Costello, a Bren professor and co-principal investigator of the Sustainable Fisheries Group.

To save the other half of the bycatch populations, fisheries would either have to reduce fishing so much that they would give up a lot of their profits or substantially improve their fishing technologies to better avoid bycatch. "These bycatch populations either need total or near-total elimination of bycatch to survive, like the vaquita porpoise from the Gulf of California," Burgess explained. "Or they are caught in fisheries that already exploit their target species relatively sustainably, as may be the case for the New Zealand sea lion."

"Recognizing the benefits of rebuilding fisheries to endangered populations allows us to also focus attention on other key sources of endangered species mortality, like egg poaching, invasive species, pollution and habitat loss," said co-author Rebecca Lewison of San Diego State University.

All of the data and computer code from the study is publicly available online. "We did this so that our analysis will be fully transparent and reproducible by others," said co-lead author Grant McDermott of the University of Oregon. "This is gradually becoming the norm in science, which is great."

In a study that has implications for humans with inflammatory diseases, researchers from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and colleagues have found that, given over a six-week period, the artificial sweetener sucralose, known by the brand name Splenda, worsens gut inflammation in mice with Crohn's-like disease, but had no substantive effect on those without the condition. Crohn's disease is an inflammatory bowel disease of the digestive tract, which can lead to abdominal pain, severe diarrhea, bloody stools, weight loss, and fatigue. About 10-15 percent of human patients report that sweeteners worsen their disease.

The new findings, recently published in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases, revealed increases in the numbers of Proteobacteria, a large phylum [group] of microbes, in the intestines of mice drinking water supplemented with Splenda. Half of the mice studied, belonging to a genetic line that suffers a form of Crohn's disease were more affected than the remaining half of mice, which belong to a healthy mouse line. Splenda produced intestinal overgrowth of E. coli (a member of the Proteobacteria group) and increased bacterial penetration into the gut wall, but only in Crohn's disease-like mice.

The researchers also found that Splenda ingestion results in increased myeloperoxidase activity in the intestines of mice with the bowel disease, but not in the healthy mice. Myeloperoxidase is an enzyme in leukocytes (white blood cells) that is effective in killing various microorganisms. The inference is that the increased presence of E. coli intensified the myeloperoxidase activity in the bowel as the body sought to fight off the invader. The findings suggest that consumption of Splenda may increase myeloperoxidase production only in individuals with a pro-inflammatory predisposition, such as Crohn's disease or other forms of inflammatory bowel disease patients. As part of this process, inflammation and its attendant consequences could exacerbate the symptoms of Crohn's disease.

"Our findings suggest that patients with Crohn's disease should think carefully about consuming Splenda or similar products containing sucralose and maltodextrin," said the study's lead author, Alex Rodriguez-Palacios, DVM, MSc, DVSc, PhD, assistant professor of medicine at Case Western Reserve School of Medicine. "Several studies have examined the ingredients found in this widely available product, separately. Here, we used Splenda as a means to test the combined effect of the commercial ingredients and used one of the best animal models of ileal Crohn's disease." This study demonstrates that the sweetener induces changes in gut bacteria and gut wall immune cell reactivity, which could result in inflammation or disease flare ups in susceptible people. On the other hand, the study suggests that individuals free of intestinal diseases may not need to be overly concerned."

Splenda, which was introduced in 1998, includes a thought-to-be indigestible artificial sweetener called sucralose and a digestible sweetener called maltodextrin. It is about 600 times as sweet as sugar and has become one of the most popular artificial sweeteners on the market. "This is perhaps the closest we can get to provide experimental evidence that these ingredients together induce biological changes known to cause inflammation which could be harmful over time to susceptible animal subjects," said Rodriguez-Palacios. "Our next step would be to run experiments directly in patients, but that is more difficult to conduct given the large variability that is inherent to human genetics, microbiome and diet."

Proteobacteria- the guilty party

Proteobacteria include a wide variety of pathogens, such as E. coli, Salmonella, and Legionellales (which causes Legionnaires' disease.) A certain amount of these bacteria are normal in the body, and not harmful. Overgrowth, or excessive amounts, contributes to many health problems. Proteobacteria have previously been linked with various intestinal-tract diseases in several species, including humans. Most Proteobacteria have an outer membrane composed of lipopolysaccharides, which when present in the body, generally trigger powerful immune responses, including inflammation. Inflammation is the normal response of the body's immune system to injuries and invading organisms. During the process of combating the invader ["antigen"], symptoms such as pain, warmth, swelling, and redness can occur. If the invader, such as E. coli, is successfully repelled, the symptoms dissipate. But if the invader is not eradicated from the body, chronic inflammation may develop, or persist, as it is the case in inflammatory bowel diseases.

"Our findings were due solely to the administration of a minor component of the diet," said the study's senior author Fabio Cominelli, MD, PhD, professor of medicine, at Case Western Reserve School of Medicine and chief of gastroenterology at UH Cleveland Medical Center. "This suggests that other dietary habits or additives may lead to similar microbiota alterations. For instance, diet emulsifiers used as food additives have also been shown recently to alter the gut microbiota and promote colitis in mice. Other scenarios could put Crohn's disease patients at risk of having exaggerated inflammation as well. This could include unexpected foodborne bacterial infections which would further recruit myeloperoxidase-containing leukocytes to the intestinal tract and the resultant inflammation."

In addition to illustrating the experimental role of a sucralose-maltodextrin based artificial sweetener in promoting intestinal dysbiosis [a microbial imbalance] and myeloperoxidase activity, the studies indicate that it might be possible to measure Proteobacteria and myeloperoxidase as simultaneous fecal biomarkers in patients to monitor their gut (disease/health) adjustment to their diets.

WASHINGTON, D.C., March 15, 2018 -- In a jet engine, the flow of air is slowed down to increase the temperature and pressure for combustion -- burning fuel with the right ratio of fuel and air to conquer drag allows for acceleration.

But in supersonic engines achieving the right flow speed, producing the right ratio of evaporated fuel and causing ignition at the right time is more complex. With evaporating liquid in a combustion chamber, there is more at play than just gravity and drag, especially with supersonic shock waves in the equation.

Vortices -- the dynamic structures created in a turbulent flow --are affected by the shock wave. This changes the way the fuel combusts and multiplies the number of possibilities of how particles can behave. To deepen our understanding of the dynamics of supersonic flow, researchers look to numerical modeling to calculate the huge variety of possible outcomes in this changed system.

In their study, published this week in Physics of Fluids, by AIP Publishing, Zhaoxin Ren, Bing Wang and Longxi Zheng viewed supersonic combustion in a time series through numerical modeling. This allowed them to see how changing variables, such as mass loading fuel, the intensity of the shock wave, and the types of reflecting and transmitted waves created at different points in time will affect ignition.

They were able to quantitatively characterize the influence of an incident oblique shock wave on large-scale shearing vortices and exothermal reactions, mathematically mapping the influence of variables and the resulting types of waves created in a shocked gas. Their analysis establishes a reliable simulation method for supersonic combustion using mathematical modeling tools specifically designed for this purpose.

"Currently, no commercial software can simulate the supersonic combustion problem because it requires high-order numerical schemes to compute supersonic flows with complicated evolved shocks, as well as corrected models to describe the droplet dynamics, both of which we carefully consider in our in-house simulation codes," Wang said, a co-author of the study. "Direct numerical simulation can capture the full scales of flows involved in the shock-vortex interaction."

Using a combination of custom simulation codes and the Eulerian-Lagrangian method commonly applied to particle-laden two-phase flows, the authors were able to run a broad range of simulations and provide a series of test cases that inform scramjet engine design. Their analysis revealed two induced combustion modes, including a local quasi detonation mode that occurs due to the formation of a refracted wave coupled with the chemical reaction.

"The scramjet engine is the most favorable option for high-speed flight at Mach six or more," Wang said. "Understanding the complicated physical mechanism of supersonic combustion and the impact of incident shock waves could help engineers choose the best combination of mixing and combustion through installing movable components in the combustor."

Lithium-metal batteries -- which can hold up to 10 times more charge than the lithium-ion batteries that currently power our phones, laptops and cars -- haven't been commercialized because of a fatal flaw: as these batteries charge and discharge, lithium is deposited unevenly on the electrodes. This buildup cuts the lives of these batteries too short to make them viable, and more importantly, can cause the batteries to short-circuit and catch fire.

Now, researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago have developed a solution to this problem in the form of a graphene-oxide coated 'nanosheet' that, when placed in between the two electrodes of a lithium-metal battery, prevents uneven plating of lithium and allows the battery to safely function for hundreds of charge/discharge cycles. They report their findings in the journal Advanced Functional Materials.

"Our findings demonstrate that two-dimensional materials -- in this case, graphene oxide -- can help regulate lithium deposition in such a way that extends the life of lithium-metal batteries," said Reza Shahbazian-Yassar, associate professor of mechanical and industrial engineering in the UIC College of Engineering and corresponding author of the paper.

Lithium-metal batteries are so useful because of their high-energy density and relatively light weights compared with conventional batteries. However, over the course of many charge-discharge cycles, lithium builds up unevenly on the battery's lithium metal electrode in a branching or 'dendritic' pattern and ultimately causes the battery to go dead. If the dendrites grow through the electrolyte solution and make contact with the other electrode, then the battery may experience a catastrophic event -- in other words, an explosion or fire.

In lithium-ion batteries, a separator is placed in the electrolyte. Usually made of a porous polymer or glass ceramic fibers, the separator allows lithium ions to flow through while keeping the other components blocked to prevent electrical shorts, which can lead to fires.

Reza and colleagues used a modified separator in a lithium-metal battery to modulate the flow of lithium ions to control the rate of lithium deposition and see if they could prevent dendrites from forming. They spray-coated a fiberglass separator with graphene oxide, producing what they called a nanosheet.

Using scanning electron microscopy and other imaging techniques, the researchers showed that when the nanosheet was used in a lithium-metal battery, a uniform film of lithium formed on the lithium electrode's surface, which actually improves battery function and makes the battery much safer, said Tara Foroozan, a graduate student in the UIC College of Engineering and first author on this study.

Molecular simulations, led by a team of researchers from Texas A & M University, suggested that the lithium ions become temporarily bonded to the graphene oxide, and then diffuse through areas of nanoscopic defects in the sheet. This delays the passage of lithium ions enough to prevent the formation of dendritic deposition of lithium on the electrode.

"The nanosheet slows the passage of lithium ions enough to allow for more uniform plating on lithium ions across the surface of the electrode, which helps preserve battery life," said Reza.

Results of phase-field modeling computations led by Farzad Mashayek, professor and head of mechanical and industrial engineering in the UIC College of Engineering and an author on the paper, indicated that graphene oxide can also mechanically suppress the growth of lithium dendrites.

"We show that two-dimensional graphene oxide materials are able to impede the formation of dendrites by changing the rate of lithium-ion diffusion as they pass through the graphene oxide layers," said Shahbazian-Yassar. "This method has very high potential for industrial application and scalability."

Medellin, Colombia -- Beginning with an official opening ceremony to be addressed by the President of Colombia on Saturday, leading experts from around the world will convene here for eight days with policymakers from more than 115 countries to finalize landmark reports from five major expert assessments, focused on biodiversity, nature's contributions to people and issues of land degradation and restoration.

An estimated 750 delegates will participate in the sixth session of the Plenary of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (#IPBES6), chaired by Sir Robert Watson, at the Intercontinental Hotel, Medellín, from 17-26 March.

"Taken together, these five peer-reviewed assessment reports represent the single most important expert contribution to our global understanding of biodiversity and ecosystem services of the past decade," said Watson. The assessments will provide unprecedented insights into the status of global biodiversity and land quality, both of which are essential to quality of life and healthy, productive ecosystems.

Often called 'the IPCC for biodiversity,' IPBES is the global science-policy platform tasked with providing the best-available evidence to inform better decisions about nature.

The reports being launched at #IPBES6 were completed over three years by 550 scientists and experts from more than 100 countries.

Four of the studies present the state of biodiversity and nature's contributions to people in the Americas; Asia and the Pacific; Africa; Europe and Central Asia. The launch of these regional assessments will be webcast live with Spanish interpretation, and can be viewed online at http://bit.ly/2F6Leoy on Friday, 23 March, 2018, from 8 a.m. local time / 9 a.m. EDT / 1 p.m. GMT. To confirm the corresponding time in your region, go to: http://bit.ly/2nT8OL4

The fifth assessment report assesses the global problem of land degradation and available remedies. This launch will also be webcast live with Spanish interpretation, and can be viewed online at http://bit.ly/2F5Ts04 on Monday, March 26, 2018 from 8.30 a.m. local time / 9.30 a.m. EDT / 1.30 p.m. GMT. UK, Europe: please note weekend change to daylight savings time. To confirm the corresponding time worldwide in your region, go to: http://bit.ly/2BkuvuZ.

The five reports will be key inputs to a comprehensive IPBES global assessment report on biodiversity and ecosystem services, due for release in 2019, the first such global evaluation since the authoritative 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment.

In addition to helping decision makers evaluate lessons learned and progress on major global development commitments - such as the Sustainable Development Goals, the Aichi Biodiversity Targets and the Paris Agreement on climate change - the reports will also provide vital information for setting biodiversity targets for the period after 2020.

"Biodiversity and nature's contributions are essential to sustain the economic well-being, food security and quality of life of all people," said Watson. "As one of the most biodiverse countries on Earth, Colombia provides the ideal setting for #IPBES6, and we thank the Government and people of Colombia for extending their warm and generous hospitality for these vital global discussions."

The IPBES Plenary session and the release of the five reports takes place in a week of major global environmental events:

19 March: Launch of the World Water Development Report (UN Water and UNESCO)
20 March: International Day of Happiness (linking to values of nature beyond material goods)
21 March: International Day of Forests
22 March: World Water Day, and the launch of the UN International Decade for Action 'Water for Sustainable Development' (2018-2028)
23 March: Launch of the four IPBES regional assessments of biodiversity and ecosystem services and World Meteorological Day (with strong links to both climate change and biodiversity)
24 March: Earth Hour (20:30 local time worldwide, with WWF and the Convention on Biological Diversity)
26 March: Launch of the IPBES assessment report on land degradation and restoration

Speaking about the confluence of so many important environmental activities, the Executive Secretary of IPBES, Dr. Anne Larigauderie said: "There is a rising awareness of the need for nature and the environment to be at the heart of all development planning - IPBES is proud to be able to offer decisionmakers around the world evidence they need for better policies and more effective action for the sustainable future we want."