Author: Ranveer Kumar

Key Takeaways A new study from the United Kingdom has found that adults living with children appear to be at a slightly increased risk of getting COVID-19 compared to adults who do not live with kids. The increase was only seen with the second wave of the pandemic in England and not with the first wave. Additionally, the risk was higher depending on the age of the children, with a slightly higher risk for adults living with children aged 12 to 18. The researchers also noted that adults younger than age 65 who lived with children under the age of…

BOSTON – (March 25, 2021) – A mechanism has been identified that explains how physical exercise in pregnancy confers metabolic health benefits in offspring. According to researchers, the key lies with a protein called SOD3, vitamin D and adequate exercise, with the outcomes possibly forming the first steps to designing rational diet and exercise programs to use during pregnancy and particularly when mothers may also be overweight or obese. The study, which was led by authors from the Joslin Diabetes Center at the Harvard Medical School and colleagues from Japan, the US, Canada and Denmark, has been published online by Cell Metabolism. We’ve…

Divers practicing blackwater photography are helping marine scientists gain new insights into fish larvae. “There’s a whole lot of nothing,” he said. “There’s no bottom, no walls, just this space that goes to infinity. And one thing you realize is there are a lot of sea monsters there, but they’re tiny.” Of course, there are big monsters, too, like sharks. But the creatures Mr. Milisen is referring to are part of a daily movement of larval fish and invertebrates, which rise from the depths to the surface each evening as part of one of the largest migrations of organisms on…

Motivated by our growing problem with plastics, which are environmentally damaging both to produce and after they’re disposed of, scientists are tinkering away with more eco-friendly forms of the material. Researchers at Yale University have put forward a candidate that ticks a number of important boxes, developing a new bioplastic with high strength but an ability to degrade entirely in the space of three months. The pursuit of more environmentally friendly bioplastics has seen scientists turn to all sorts of biomass as their starting point. These possibilities include egg shells, plants and even tequila waste, and all invariably raise the prospect of a material…

PULLMAN, Wash. – Washington State University researchers have discovered a protein that could be key to blocking the most common bacterial cause of human food poisoning in the United States. Chances are, if you’ve eaten undercooked poultry or cross contaminated food by washing raw chicken, you may be familiar with the food-borne pathogen. “Many people that get sick think, ‘oh, that’s probably Salmonella,’ but it is even more likely it’s Campylobacter,” said Nick Negretti (’20 Ph.D.), a lead member of the research team in Michael Konkel’s Laboratory in WSU’s School of Molecular Biosciences. According to a study on the research recently published in Nature…

Drug companies raised the price of insulin about 10% each time a new type of insulin cleared the third and the final stages toward Food and Drug Administration approval, according to new research that sheds light on a health system that benefits companies more than patients. In a study published March 8 in Health Economics, researchers found that from 2007 through 2015, pharmaceutical companies raised the price of existing insulin drugs about $2.35 per milliliter in the quarter after a potential competitor cleared stage-three FDA trials. Companies then raised the price per milliliter $2 28 in the quarter after…

Australia at high risk of pesticide pollution. Pollutants from agrochemicals and pesticides can disrupt the ecosystem and risk harming human health, despite greatly contributing to food security in the last half-decade. Now, researchers from the University of Sydney had conducted a comprehensive risk assessment of global pesticide pollution. The team, led by Fiona Tang, found that 64% of global agricultural land (around 24.5 million km2) is at risk of pollution from pesticides, and 31% is at high risk – some of which is in Australia. About a third of the regions within the high-risk areas had high biodiversity – that is,…

Rice University lab’s optimized flash process could reduce carbon emissions HOUSTON – (March 29, 2021) – This could be where the rubber truly hits the road. Rice University scientists have optimized a process to convert waste from rubber tires into graphene that can, in turn, be used to strengthen concrete. The environmental benefits of adding graphene to concrete are clear, chemist James Tour said. “Concrete is the most-produced material in the world, and simply making it produces as much as 9% of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions,” Tour said. “If we can use less concrete in our roads, buildings and…

For the last nine years, this country has suffered from a growing overdose crisis caused by illicit fentanyl — aka “the opioid crisis” — which is responsible for killing more than 80,000 Americans in 2020 alone. The crisis started from good intentions by public health authorities. Over the years, as poor outcomes resulted, the complexity of the situation became more widely understood. And yet, as recently as last month, a unit of the Centers for Disease Control refused to consider changing the guidelines that have hurt people as much as, or more than, they help. In 2009, the Obama FDA forced Purdue Pharma to reformulate…

In a new study, people who reported feeling no stress experienced better moods and were less likely to have chronic health conditions than people who did face stressors. However, the people who did not experience stress scored lower on cognition tests. They were also less likely to experience positive events and to give or receive emotional support than people who experienced stress. If accurate, these findings could complicate the seemingly one-sided relationship between stress and health by suggesting that stress may play a positive role in some elements of health and well-being. More than 75% of adults living in the United States…