All posts
- September 17, 2016
- 01:50 PM
- 10 views
Largest-ever study reveals environmental impact of genetically modified crops
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
According to new research, widespread adoption of genetically modified crops has decreased the use of insecticides, but increased the use of weed-killing herbicides as weeds become more resistant. This is the largest study of genetically modified crops and pesticide use to date. The team of economists studied annual data from more than 5,000 soybean and 5,000 maize farmers in the U.S. from 1998 to 2011, far exceeding previous studies that have been limited to one or two years of data.
... Read more »
Perry, E., Ciliberto, F., Hennessy, D., & Moschini, G. (2016) Genetically engineered crops and pesticide use in U.S. maize and soybeans. Science Advances, 2(8). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1600850
- September 17, 2016
- 08:27 AM
- 14 views
Comorbidities surrounding paediatric chronic fatigue syndrome / myalgic encephalomyelitis (CFS / ME)
by Paul Whiteley in Questioning Answers
"This large nationwide registry linkage study confirms that the clinical picture in CFS/ME [chronic fatigue syndrome / myalgic encephalomyelitis] is complex."That sentence, taken from the paper by Inger Bakken and colleagues [1] (open-access available here), is perhaps the under-statement of the year as authors sought to "describe comorbidities diagnosed in primary care in children diagnosed with CFS/ME in specialist health care" and "describe the timing of the diagnoses from prim........ Read more »
Bakken IJ, Tveito K, Aaberg KM, Ghaderi S, Gunnes N, Trogstad L, Magnus P, Stoltenberg C, & Håberg SE. (2016) Comorbidities treated in primary care in children with chronic fatigue syndrome / myalgic encephalomyelitis: A nationwide registry linkage study from Norway. BMC family practice, 17(1), 128. PMID: 27590471
- September 16, 2016
- 09:45 PM
- 27 views
Contiguity Effective for Deductive Inference
by Joshua Fisher in Text Savvy
Even if the benefits of retrieval practice were limited to improvements in recall (as prior research has demonstrated), such improvements do not stand in the way of improvements to higher-order reasoning, such as inference-making. (And shaping the path for students, such as improving informational contiguity can have a positive effect too.)... Read more »
Eglington, L., & Kang, S. (2016) Retrieval Practice Benefits Deductive Inference. Educational Psychology Review. DOI: 10.1007/s10648-016-9386-y
- September 16, 2016
- 03:57 PM
- 26 views
The blur doesn't cut it: AI can identify people in blurred images
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
A trio of researchers has found off-the-shelf AI software can be used to identify people in blurred or pixilated images. The researchers have uploaded a paper describing the experiments they carried out with AI software identification of people or other items in blurred out images, what they found and reveal just how accurate they found it could be.
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Richard McPherson, Reza Shokri, & Vitaly Shmatikov. (2016) Defeating Image Obfuscation with Deep Learning. arXiv. arXiv: 1609.00408v2
- September 16, 2016
- 10:16 AM
- 32 views
The Brain in Super Agers
by William Yates, M.D. in Brain Posts
My Twitter post on a recently published study of brain structure in a group of high performing older adults received quite a bit of attention (see below).Felicia Sun and colleagues at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School selected an interesting research design.A group of elderly subjects between the ages of 60 and 80 years were identified as showing "superaging". This was defined as scoring like young adults on two neuropsychological tests: The Long Delay Free Recall measure........ Read more »
Sun FW, Stepanovic MR, Andreano J, Barrett LF, Touroutoglou A, & Dickerson BC. (2016) Youthful Brains in Older Adults: Preserved Neuroanatomy in the Default Mode and Salience Networks Contributes to Youthful Memory in Superaging. The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience, 36(37), 9659-9668. PMID: 27629716
- September 16, 2016
- 07:00 AM
- 31 views
Friday Fellow: Samambaiaçu
by Piter Boll in Earthling Nature
by Piter Kehoma Boll It’s more than time to bring a fern as a Friday Fellow, and I decided to start with one of my favorites, the Neotropical tree fern Dicksonia sellowiana, known in Brazil as Samambaiaçu or Xaxim. The samambaiaçu … Continue reading →... Read more »
Schmitt, J., Schneider, P., & Windisch, P. (2009) Crescimento do cáudice e fenologia de Dicksonia sellowiana Hook. (Dicksoniaceae) no sul do Brasil. Acta Botanica Brasilica, 23(1), 283-291. DOI: 10.1590/S0102-33062009000100030
- September 16, 2016
- 05:01 AM
- 34 views
Air travel and diving possibly increase risk of pneumothorax in BHD patients
by Joana Guedes in BHD Research Blog
Birt–Hogg–Dubé syndrome is caused by germline mutations in the FLCN gene and characterized by skin fibrofolliculomas, lung cysts, spontaneous pneumothorax (SP) and renal cancer. Because sudden changes in air pressure can increase the chances of developing a collapsed lung, a concern many BHD patients have is whether it is safe to air travel and scuba dive, or whether this increases the chances of a pneumothorax. In a new study, Johannesma et al. (2016) evaluate the incidence ........ Read more »
Johannesma, P., van de Beek, I., van der Wel, J., Paul, M., Houweling, A., Jonker, M., van Waesberghe, J., Reinhard, R., Starink, T., van Moorselaar, R.... (2016) Risk of spontaneous pneumothorax due to air travel and diving in patients with Birt–Hogg–Dubé syndrome. SpringerPlus, 5(1). DOI: 10.1186/s40064-016-3009-4
- September 16, 2016
- 04:24 AM
- 36 views
Anxiety disorders and mortality risk: implications for autism?
by Paul Whiteley in Questioning Answers
"Anxiety disorders significantly increased mortality risk. Comorbidity of anxiety disorders and depression played an important part in the increased mortality."So said the findings reported by Sandra Meier and colleagues [1] looking to assess any relationship between the presence of an anxiety disorder and mortality risk. Based on data from one of those oh-so-useful Scandinavian population registries (Denmark this time), researchers reported that: "The risk of death by natural and unnatural........ Read more »
Meier SM, Mattheisen M, Mors O, Mortensen PB, Laursen TM, & Penninx BW. (2016) Increased mortality among people with anxiety disorders: total population study. The British journal of psychiatry : the journal of mental science. PMID: 27388572
- September 15, 2016
- 05:15 PM
- 49 views
Badass bacteria are thriving in your washing machine
by Piter Boll in Earthling Nature
by Piter Kehoma Boll You probably have heard of bacteria (and archaeans) that live in extreme environments on Earth, such as hot springs or lakes with high salinity, where most lifeforms would die horribly in a few seconds. We usually … Continue reading →... Read more »
Savage, A., Hills, J., Driscoll, K., Fergus, D., Grunden, A., & Dunn, R. (2016) Microbial diversity of extreme habitats in human homes. PeerJ. DOI: 10.7717/peerj.2376
- September 15, 2016
- 02:22 PM
- 42 views
MRI scanner sees emotions flickering across an idle mind
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
As you relax and let your mind drift aimlessly, you might remember a pleasant vacation, an angry confrontation in traffic or maybe the loss of a loved one. And now a team of researchers say they can see those various emotional states flickering across the human brain.
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Kragel, P., & LaBar, K. (2015) Multivariate neural biomarkers of emotional states are categorically distinct. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 10(11), 1437-1448. DOI: 10.1093/scan/nsv032
- September 15, 2016
- 09:10 AM
- 81 views
Paralympic athletes and the rise of the cyborgs
by gdw in FictionalFieldwork
Para and super? The Olympics are over. They’ve brought us some good stories, some nice records, and (self-citation alert!) a humble blog post about the ethics of doping. But the Paralympics, their less mediatized cousin, are in full swing. Paralympians from all over the world gather to wow us with their athletic prowess in the Paralympic […]... Read more »
Swartz, L., & Watermeyer, B. (2008) Cyborg anxiety: Oscar Pistorius and the boundaries of what it means to be human. Disability , 23(2), 187-190. DOI: 10.1080/09687590701841232
Howe, P. (2011) Cyborg and Supercrip: The Paralympics Technology and the (Dis)empowerment of Disabled Athletes. Sociology, 45(5), 868-882. DOI: 10.1177/0038038511413421
Smith, L. (2014) The Blade Runner: The Discourses Surrounding Oscar Pistorius in the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics. Communication , 3(4), 390-410. DOI: 10.1177/2167479513519979
Reardon S. (2016) Welcome to the Cyborg Olympics. Nature, 536(7614), 20-2. PMID: 27488784
- September 15, 2016
- 04:41 AM
- 46 views
How to Hold Scientific Journals Accountable?
by Neuroskeptic in Neuroskeptic_Discover
Writing in PLoS Biology, neurobiologist Thomas C. Südhof discusses Truth in Science Publishing: A Personal Perspective. Südhof is a Professor in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Physiology at Stanford. A veteran scientist, he's been publishing since 1982.
So what's the state of science publishing as Südhof sees it?
He first notes that "scientists, public servants, and patient advocates alike increasingly question the validity of published scientific results, endangering the publi... Read more »
Südhof TC. (2016) Truth in Science Publishing: A Personal Perspective. PLoS biology, 14(8). PMID: 27564858
- September 15, 2016
- 04:25 AM
- 51 views
Eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA)-predominant fatty acid supplements and the treatment of depression
by Paul Whiteley in Questioning Answers
"Further RCTs [randomised-controlled trials] should be conducted on study populations with diagnosed or clinically significant depression of adequate duration using EPA [eicosapentaenoic acid] -predominant omega-3 HUFA [highly unsaturated fatty acids] formulations."So went the conclusions of the review article published by Brian Hallahan and colleagues [1] who searched the peer-reviewed science literature for clinical trials "evaluating efficacy of omega-3 high........ Read more »
Hallahan B, Ryan T, Hibbeln JR, Murray IT, Glynn S, Ramsden CE, SanGiovanni JP, & Davis JM. (2016) Efficacy of omega-3 highly unsaturated fatty acids in the treatment of depression. The British journal of psychiatry : the journal of mental science. PMID: 27103682
- September 14, 2016
- 11:24 PM
- 60 views
Language and migration
by Ingrid Piller in Language on the Move
Humans are a migratory species. Although in modern society the dominant imagery we have created about ourselves is that it...... Read more »
Piller, I. (2016) Language and migration. Language and migration, 1-20. info:/
- September 14, 2016
- 03:48 PM
- 68 views
Food waste could store solar and wind energy, or there's the obvious...
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Saving up excess solar and wind energy for times when the sun is down or the air is still requires a storage device. Batteries get the most attention as a promising solution although pumped hydroelectric storage is currently used most often. Now researchers are advancing another potential approach using sugar alcohols—an abundant waste product of the food industry—mixed with carbon nanotubes.
... Read more »
Zhang, H., Rindt, C., Smeulders, D., & Nedea, S. (2016) Nanoscale Heat Transfer in Carbon Nanotubes - Sugar Alcohol Composite as Heat Storage Materials. The Journal of Physical Chemistry C. DOI: 10.1021/acs.jpcc.6b05466
- September 14, 2016
- 10:30 AM
- 54 views
Are rabbits lagging behind in basic pet care practices?
by CAPB in Companion Animal Psychology Blog
A recent study highlights pet rabbit management practices. Although some owners take extra steps to protect their rabbit, many do not.Guest post by James Oxley (Independent Researcher, UK; Twitter) and Clare Ellis (Moulton College, UK; Twitter; Web).Rabbits sometimes get labelled as an easy pet to keep, and some owners may not consider that common pet care practices used for dogs and cats may also be beneficial for rabbits. In fact, a recent study by Oxley et al. has highlighted h........ Read more »
Oxley, J., Previti, A., Alibrandi, A., Briefer, E., & Passantino, A. (2015) A Preliminary internet survey of pet rabbit owners’ characteristics. World Rabbit Science, 23(4), 289. DOI: 10.4995/wrs.2015.3771
- September 14, 2016
- 08:00 AM
- 54 views
5-Formlycytosine (5fC): A new base?
by Eliza Bacon in EpiBeat
DNA methylation and hydroxymethylation are well-established key players in gene regulation. Although many would agree that 5hmC also plays a critical role, there is still some debate over whether it serves a functional role, or is merely an artifact of DNA de-methylation. Even still, other intermediates of de-methylation are actively being investigated. In a recent paper by Iuilaro et al. 2016, a group of scientists argue that 5-formlycytosine (5fC), an intermediate of DNA de-methylation, is a s........ Read more »
Iurlaro M, McInroy GR, Burgess HE, Dean W, Raiber EA, Bachman M, Beraldi D, Balasubramanian S, & Reik W. (2016) In vivo genome-wide profiling reveals a tissue-specific role for 5-formylcytosine. Genome biology, 17(1), 141. PMID: 27356509
- September 14, 2016
- 04:30 AM
- 74 views
Stabilization Exercises or Manual Therapy for Low Back Pain
by Nicole Cattano in Sports Medicine Research (SMR): In the Lab & In the Field
Stabilization exercises are better than general exercises for people with chronic non-specific low back pain and possibly as effective as manual therapy.... Read more »
Neto, M., Lopes, J., Conceição, C., Araujo, A., Brasileiro, A., Sousa, C., Carvalho, V., & Arcanjo, F. (2016) Stabilization exercise compared to general exercises or manual therapy for the management of low back pain: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Physical Therapy in Sport. DOI: 10.1016/j.ptsp.2016.08.004
- September 14, 2016
- 04:26 AM
- 65 views
Unexpected improvement in core autism symptoms following a probiotic?
by Paul Whiteley in Questioning Answers
The paper by Enzo Grossi and colleagues [1] (open-access) is definitely worthy of a post today and the suggestion that the "appropriate use of probiotics" might be something to consider for at least some diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum.Accepting that I'm slightly curious as to what would be considered 'inappropriate use of probiotics', the Grossi paper describes the clinical journey of a boy aged 12 diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) accompanied by learning (intellectual)........ Read more »
Grossi, E., Melli, S., Dunca, D., & Terruzzi, V. (2016) Unexpected improvement in core autism spectrum disorder symptoms after long-term treatment with probiotics. SAGE Open Medical Case Reports. DOI: 10.1177/2050313X16666231
- September 13, 2016
- 03:48 PM
- 82 views
Entitlement -- a damning recipe for happiness
by Dr. Jekyll in Lunatic Laboratories
Entitlement--a personality trait driven by exaggerated feelings of deservingness and superiority--may lead to chronic disappointment, unmet expectations and a habitual, self-reinforcing cycle of behavior with dire psychological and social costs, according to new research. In a new theoretical model, researchers have mapped how entitled personality traits may lead to a perpetual loop of distress.
... Read more »
Grubbs, J., & Exline, J. (2016) Trait Entitlement: A Cognitive-Personality Source of Vulnerability to Psychological Distress. Psychological Bulletin. DOI: 10.1037/bul0000063
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