First-of-its-kind study finds gene variant linked to the symptom in menopausal women
Most women experience hot flashes and night sweats either before or during menopause, but a significant minority don’t have these symptoms. Could our genes be a factor in determining which women get hot flashes? (more…)
The UA’s Dr. Fernando Martinez wants to know why children on Amish farms are healthier, and his research could have far-reaching implications.
Dr. Fernando Martinez’s first childhood memory was one of awaking in the middle of the night to find his mother suffering an asthma attack. His father, a physician, quelled the flare-up with a nebulizer. (more…)
Initial findings from one of the largest cognitive science experiments ever conducted have shown that mobile games can be used to reliably address psychology questions, paving the way to a better understanding of how cognitive function differs across populations.
With its first comprehensive set of results published today, the Great Brain Experiment, a free mobile app run by neuroscientists at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging at UCL, uses ‘gamified’ neuroscience experiments to address scientific questions on a scale that would not be possible using traditional approaches. The app investigates memory, impulsivity, risk-taking and happiness. By playing the games, anyone can anonymously compare their abilities to the wider population and contribute to real scientific research. More than 60,000 people have taken part so far. (more…)
A Yale-led research team has developed a new approach to species conservation that prioritizes genetic and geographic rarity and applies it to all 9,993 known bird species.
“To date, conservation has emphasized the number of species, treating all species as equal,” said Walter Jetz, the Yale evolutionary biologist who is lead author of a paper published April 10 in Current Biology. “But not all species are equal in their genetic or geographic rarity. We provide a framework for how such species information could be used for prioritizing conservation.” (more…)
Many animals, including humans, harbor ingrained biases to act when they can obtain rewards and to remain inactive to avoid punishment. Sometimes, however those biases can steer us wrong. A new study finds that theta brainwave activity in the prefrontal cortex predicts how well people can overcome these biases when a better choice are available.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Vertebrates are predisposed to act to gain rewards and to lie low to avoid punishment. Try to teach chickens to back away from food in order to obtain it, and you’ll fail, as researchers did in 1986. But humans are better thinkers than chickens. In the May 8 edition of the Journal of Neuroscience, researchers show that the level of theta brainwave activity in the prefrontal cortex predicts whether people will be able to overcome these ingrained biases when doing so is required to achieve a goal. (more…)
Scientists build new ‘tree of life’ for placentals, visualize common ancestor
Scientists have reconstructed the common ancestor of placental mammals–an extremely diverse group including animals ranging from rodents to whales to humans–using the world’s largest dataset of both genetic and physical traits. (more…)
About the video: watch an animation showing the changes in the structure of a T7 virus as it infects an E. coli bacterium.
AUSTIN, Texas — The detailed changes in the structure of a virus as it infects an E. coli bacterium have been observed for the first time, report researchers from The University of Texas at Austin and The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UT Health) Medical School this week in Science Express. (more…)
Scientists have discovered a rare genetic mutation that increases the risk of Alzheimer’s disease.
The international team, led by researchers at the UCL Institute of Neurology, studied data from more than 25,000 people and found a link between a rare variant of the TREM2 gene – which is known to play a role in the immune system – and a higher risk of Alzheimer’s.
The paper, which is published in the New England Journal of Medicine, has major implications for our understanding of the causes of Alzheimer’s and the authors believe it is potentially the most influential gene discovery for the disease in the last two decades. (more…)
