In a new study in Neuron, scientists identified specific key steps in the chain of events that causes stress-related drug relapse. They identified the exact region of the brain where the events take place in rat models and showed that by blocking a step, they could prevent stress-related relapse. (more…)
Clean Syringes Often Unavailable in St. Petersburg, YSPH Research Finds
Russia’s HIV epidemic is among the fastest growing in the world and injection drug users who often share needles and other supplies are hardest hit. This occurs even though pharmacies are a legal source for clean syringes and can sell them without restriction.
A recent study led by the Yale School of Public Health and St. Petersburg State University mapped the city’s 965 pharmacies and compared their locations and density to HIV prevalence at the district level. (more…)
This year’s unusually long and rocky flu season would be nothing compared to the pandemic that could occur if bird flu became highly contagious among humans, which is why UCLA researchers and their colleagues are creating new ways to predict where an outbreak could emerge.
“Using surveillance of influenza cases in humans and birds, we’ve come up with a technique to predict sites where these viruses could mix and generate a future pandemic,” said lead author Trevon Fuller, a UCLA postdoctoral research fellow at the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability’s Center for Tropical Research. (more…)
New research shows that drinking beetroot juice can significantly improve performance in team sports involving bouts of high intensity exercise.
Trials by the University of Exeter Sport and Health Sciences department have found a direct link between the high nitrate content of beetroot and the chemical processes needed to get muscles working at their most efficient during intermittent bursts of activity.
During the tests, sportsmen were either given beetroot juice with a full complement of nitrates, or juice which had had the nitrate removed. Those who had taken the nitrate-rich juice were found to have a distinct advantage when exercising over those who had been given the control juice to drink. (more…)
Selling a kidney or part of one’s liver to pay off loans is becoming increasingly common in Bangladesh, where desperate villagers are being exploited by human organ traffickers, a Michigan State University researcher has found. (more…)
YSPH Postdoc Examines how Armed Conflict Increases the Incidence of Intimate Partner Violence
The armed conflict in Burma is not one that receives much attention in the western media. But it has forced thousands of people to flee their homes and seek relative safety just over the border in Thailand.
But once there, refugee women face another peril entirely that continues to threaten their well-being: intimate partner violence.
In a research paper that was recently published in the International Journal of Gynecology and Obstetrics, Yale School of Public Health postdoctoral research associate Kathryn Falb found that refugee women living in three Thai border camps experience widespread physical violence, not by Burmese soldiers, but by the men who fled with them in the first place. (more…)
UCLA findings suggests possible new treatment for depression, other disorders
What makes us happy? Family? Money? Love? How about a peptide?
The neurochemical changes underlying human emotions and social behavior are largely unknown. Now though, for the first time in humans, scientists at UCLA have measured the release of a specific peptide, a neurotransmitter called hypocretin, that greatly increased when subjects were happy but decreased when they were sad. (more…)
ANN ARBOR — Researchers at the University of Michigan have found a new potential benefit of a molecule in green tea: preventing the misfolding of specific proteins in the brain.
The aggregation of these proteins, called metal-associated amyloids, is associated with Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative conditions. (more…)
