Radiofrequency electromagnetic fields may have adverse effects on the development of memory performance of specific brain regions exposed during mobile phone use, suggests a recent study involving nearly 700 adolescents in Switzerland.

Roughly four out of five Americans support the Endangered Species Act, and only one in 10 oppose it, found a survey of 1,287 Americans. Support has remained stable for the past two decades.

Roughly four out of five Americans support the Endangered Species Act, and only one in 10 oppose it, found a survey of 1,287 Americans. Support has remained stable for the past two decades.

Scientists have developed a new method to enable miniature drug-filled nanocarriers to dock on to immune cells, which in turn attack tumors.

Scientists have developed a new method to enable miniature drug-filled nanocarriers to dock on to immune cells, which in turn attack tumors.

A preliminary study shows an intervention program that includes a personalized app could make a difference: Researchers found the rate of attempted suicides by teenagers who received the intervention was halved compared to those who received the standard care during their hospitalization.

Degradation rates of oil were slower in the dark and cold waters of the depths of the Gulf of Mexico than at surface conditions, according to an international team of geoscientists trying to understand where the oil went during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

თბილისში გაიმართა სამხრეთ კავკასიის მე-15 მედიაკონფერენცია.

თბილისში გაიმართა სამხრეთ კავკასიის მე-15 მედიაკონფერენცია.

თბილისში გაიმართა სამხრეთ კავკასიის მე-15 მედიაკონფერენცია.

A hotel at Iceland's Blue Lagoon, the megatall tower from summer blockbuster Skyscraper and the RIBA Stirling Prize 2018 shortlist feature in the latest edition of our newsletter Dezeen Weekly. Subscribe to Dezeen Weekly ›

It’s rampant, but it’s hardly a new phenomenon -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com

Poor air quality in national parks may put a damper on visitation, according to a new study.

As reported in Science Advances, the researchers studied ozone levels in 33 of the largest national parks in the US. The researchers found that from 1990 to 2014 average ozone concentrations in national parks were statistically indistinguishable from those of the 20 largest US metropolitan areas—conditions that previously sparked federal legislation. To protect parks, the Clean Air Act (CAA) Amendments of 1977 and 1990 designated national parks as Federal Class I Areas.

“The US has spent billions of dollars over the last three decades to improve air quality,” says David Keiser, assistant professor of economics at Iowa State University. “Given the popularity of national parks, as well as the fact that people go to parks to be outside, we believed it was worth better understanding air quality trends in these areas and whether people, through their actions, respond to changes in air quality in parks.”

…air quality in many national parks remains unhealthy for sensitive groups on average for two-and-one-half to three weeks per year.

The study found that ozone levels improved in metropolitan areas starting in 1990; however, national parks improvements have only been apparent since the early 2000s, corresponding to the passage of the Regional Haze Rule, a 1999 EPA regulation that strengthened air quality protections for national parks and wilderness areas.

The authors first compiled data from extensive ozone monitoring efforts led by the National Park Service and the EPA. Data show that since 1990, national parks have seen only modest reductions in days with ozone concentrations exceeding 70 parts per billion, levels deemed unhealthy by the EPA.

The researchers then matched the pollution data to monthly park visitation statistics at 33 of the most heavily visited national parks and found that visitation responds most to ozone during months with poor air quality. Unsurprisingly, this response is largest in summer and fall, the seasons when park visitation is highest.

They also explored two potential causes for this result: air quality warnings (AQI) issued by parks and poor visibility. They found that the visitation response is more strongly associated with potential health warnings and less correlated with visibility.

Does air pollution lead to more unethical behavior?

A recent survey found that nearly 90 percent of respondents had visited a national park area in their lifetime, with one-third of respondents anticipating visiting a park in the coming year. Despite improvements over the last two decades, air quality in many national parks remains unhealthy for sensitive groups on average for two-and-one-half to three weeks per year.

Indeed, despite the decrease in visitation that the authors found during months with poor air quality, an estimated 35 percent of all visitor days occurred when ozone exceeded the 55 ppb “moderate” AQI threshold, and nearly 9 percent of visitor days when ozone levels exceeded 70 ppb. Exposure to these elevated ozone levels has important health implications—visitors have an increased chance of adverse health outcomes, including hospitalization, respiratory symptoms, and mortality for sensitive individuals.

The number of park visits suggests potentially large human health benefits to further air quality improvements at national parks and elsewhere.

Coauthors of the study are from Iowa State and Cornell University.

Source: Iowa State University

The post Air pollution in national parks may keep visitors away appeared first on Futurity.

2017 წლის პირველ დეკემბერს, ხორავას ქუჩაზე მომხდარი მკვლელობის ძირითადი საქმიდან გამოყოფილი საქმის ფარგლებში, ცენტრალური კრიმინალური პოლიციის დეპარტამენტის თანამშრომლებმა დააკავეს არასრულწლოვანი პირი, რომელაც ცრუ ჩვენების მიცემა ბრალდება. შინაგან საქმეთა სამინისტრო იტყობინება, რომ როგორც გამოძიებით დადგინდა, დ.ღ.-მ, რომელიც უშუალოდ შეესწრო განსაკუთრებით მძიმე დანაშაულის ჩადენის ფაქტს, განზრახ არასწორი ინფორმაცია მიაწოდა სასამართლოს და მისცა ცრუ ჩვენება. მოსამართლის განჩინების საფუძველზე...

Wegen technischer Probleme bei der Flugüberwachung ist am Donnerstag der Luftraum über Belgien gesperrt worden. Hunderte Flüge fielen aus oder sind verspätet. Für die Sicherheit der Passagiere bestehe keine Gefahr.

Feuer zu nutzen ist eine Sache - es zu erzeugen eine andere: Letzteres galt bei Neandertalern bisher als unsicher, weil man ihre "Feuerzeuge" nie fand. Doch offenbar brauchten sie auch keine.

Gibt es einen falschen Feminismus? Meg Wolitzer erzählt in "Das weibliche Prinzip" von zwei Frauen-Generationen, die auf unterschiedliche Weise um Selbstbestimmung kämpfen.

Taylor Perron, associate professor of geology and chair of the Program in Geology, Geochemistry and Geobiology, has been appointed associate department head for MIT’s Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS), effective July 1. He succeeds Tim Grove, the Robert R. Shrock Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences and the chair of the Joint Committee for Marine Geology and Geophysics. Working with the EAPS academic program administrator and department head, Perron will oversee the department’s educational program. This encompasses ensuring the development and quality of the curriculum and the fieldwork program, teaching, the general exam process, admissions and tasks related to the EAPS educational mission. Building upon Grove’s accomplishments, Perron will focus on expanding the department’s engagement with and exposure to MIT undergraduate students, utilizing modern technology for education and outreach, and bettering the overall learning experience of students across the department. “We are living in an era of exploration and discovery — from Earth's history and the tree of life to the outer reaches of the solar system and beyond — and our society depends in so many ways on the fields we study in EAPS, from climate and natural disasters to energy and policy,” Perron said. “I want to help as many MIT undergraduates as possible to experience that excitement, consider that relevance, and understand the associated career options. I also want to continue our efforts to enhance our world-leading graduate program.” Fine-grained analysis Perron’s research touches upon the complementary and intersecting themes studied in EAPS: earth, planets, climate, and life. He examines how landscapes form and evolve on Earth and other planets. Using theory, modeling, observations and experiments, Perron and his group are charting new paths in river research. Currently, he’s working with researchers in the MIT Department of Mechanical Engineering to explore on the microscale how turbulent flows move sand and gravel. Dipping into the field of evolutionary biology, Perron’s group is uncovering how changes in river paths that occurred over millions of years might be responsible for the exceptional diversity of fish in regions like the southeastern U.S. He’s also delving into archaeology with colleagues in MIT’s Department of Materials Science and Engineering to learn how rivers and plate tectonics shaped prehistoric human agriculture. Lastly, his group is continuing to study how rivers of methane sculpted the icy surface of Saturn's moon Titan. In addition to his research and service in EAPS, Perron has taken initiative to improve the welfare of the MIT community and familiarize himself with Institute-wide views on student life and education. He advises first-year students, including working with MIT’s Experimental Study Group (ESG), and has served on the MIT Faculty Committee on Student Life and the MIT Faculty Subcommittee on the Communication Requirement. Passing the baton Perron assumes the reins from Tim Grove, who has made major contributions to elevate and strengthen the quality of the EAPS education program. "Tim brought remarkable experience to the position, including education service at the Institute level, national leadership as president of the American Geophysical Union and as a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and of course through his own extensive teaching contributions in the classroom and in the field,” said Perron, who has learned a great deal from his predecessor. As member and chair of MIT’s Committee on the Undergraduate Program, Grove stayed connected to the educational mission of the Institute. One particularly notable achievement was building an MIT-wide consensus that every MIT first-year student should have a faculty advisor. Within EAPS, he led a major effort to collect data and feedback from past graduates and reorganized the undergraduate curriculum, overseeing the streamlining of requirements for EAPS majors and minors. Additionally, Grove created a more uniform general exam structure and spearheaded several initiatives to enhance academic opportunities for graduate and undergraduate students. He also devoted a great deal of time to the ongoing improvement of the departmental facilities, a crucial effort he will continue even after the transition. “Tim [Grove] was well liked by all students and will be a tough act to follow,” said EAPS department head and Schlumberger Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences Rob van der Hilst, conveying his appreciation for Grove’s efforts and looking forward to building upon them in the future. “I am deeply grateful for Tim’s dedication, contributions, and accomplishments, and I very much look forward to working with Taylor to maintain a world-class educational program that not only continues to attract the best students but also shares what EAPS has to offer with the world beyond our own classrooms.”

Brüssel nahm zu Theresa Mays Brexit-„Weißbuch“ Stellung: Es soll „keine Schlupflöcher an den Außengrenzen“ geben. Mays neuer Minister für den EU-Austritt Dominic Raab hat zudem erstmals an den Gesprächen mit der EU teilgenommen.

Chemicals used to cure beef jerky, salami, hot dogs, and other processed meat snacks may contribute to mania, an abnormal mood state characterized by hyperactivity, euphoria, and insomnia, according to a new study.

The study, which appears in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, while not designed to determine cause-and-effect, did find that people hospitalized for an episode of mania were three times more likely ever to have eaten nitrate-cured meats than were people without a history of a serious psychiatric disorder. Experiments in rats by the same researchers showed mania-like hyperactivity after just a few weeks on diets with added nitrates.

Mania, a state of elevated mood, arousal, and energy that lasts weeks to months, is generally seen in people with bipolar disorder.

While a number of genetic and other risk factors have been linked to manic episodes that characterize bipolar disorder and other psychiatric conditions, those factors have been unable to explain the cause of these illnesses. Researchers are increasingly looking for environmental factors, such as diet, that may play a role.

The new study adds to evidence that certain diets and potentially the amounts and types of bacteria in the gut may contribute to mania, the researchers say.

“Future work on this association could lead to dietary interventions to help reduce the risk of manic episodes in those who have bipolar disorder or who are otherwise vulnerable to mania,” says Robert Yolken, professor of neurovirology in pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins University.

Meat and mania

Mania, a state of elevated mood, arousal, and energy that lasts weeks to months, is generally seen in people with bipolar disorder, but can also occur in schizoaffective disorder. Manic states can lead to dangerous risk-taking behavior and can include delusional thinking. Most of those affected experience multiple hospitalizations.

“We looked at a number of different dietary exposures and cured meat really stood out.”

Bipolar disorder affects an estimated one to three percent of the US population and costs an estimated $25 billion a year in direct health care costs, according to a study in the Journal of Affective Disorders.

Yolken, trained as an infectious disease expert, was originally interested in whether exposure to infections such as viruses transmitted through food might be linked to psychiatric conditions. He and colleagues collected demographic, health, and dietary data on 1,101 individuals with and without psychiatric disorders.

Unexpectedly, among people who had been hospitalized for mania, the team found a history of eating cured meat before hospitalization 3.5 times higher than in the group of people without psychiatric illness. Cured meats were not associated with a diagnosis of schizoaffective disorder, bipolar disorder in people not hospitalized for mania, or in major depressive disorder. No other foods had a significant association with any of the disorders.

“We looked at a number of different dietary exposures and cured meat really stood out,” Yolken says.

Nitrates have long been used as preservatives in cured meat products and have been previously linked to some cancers and neurodegenerative diseases. The dietary survey did not ask about frequency or time frame of cured meat consumption, so the researchers couldn’t draw conclusions about how much cured meat may boost one’s risk of mania, but Yolken hopes future studies will address this.

Altering rat brains

To get at the roots of the association, Yolken collaborated with researchers studying the impact of nitrates on rats.

They divided otherwise healthy rats into two groups: one received normal rat chow, and the other both normal chow and a piece of store-bought, nitrate-prepared beef jerky every other day. Within two weeks, the rats eating jerky showed irregular sleeping patterns and hyperactivity.

Can graphic warnings steer us away from junk food?

Next, the team worked with a Baltimore beef jerky company to create a special nitrate-free dried beef. They repeated the experiment, this time giving some rats the store-bought, nitrate-prepared jerky and others the nitrate-free formulation. The animals that ate the nitrate-free meat behaved similarly to a control group, while the animals that consumed the nitrates once again showed sleep disturbances and hyperactivity similar to that seen in mania.

The results were then replicated with a specially formulated rat chow that had either nitrate added directly to the chow, or no nitrate.

The amount of nitrate consumed on a daily basis by the rats—when scaled up to the size of a human—was equivalent to the amount a person might eat for a daily snack, such as one beef jerky stick or hot dog.

“We tried to make sure the amount of nitrate used in the experiment was in the range of what people might reasonably be eating,” Yolken says.

When the group analyzed the gut bacteria of the rats, they found that animals with nitrate in their diet had different bacteria in their intestines than the others. The animals also had differences in several molecular pathways in the brain that have been previously implicated in bipolar disorder.

Lots of red meat and poultry linked to diabetes risk

While occasional cured meat consumption is unlikely to spur a manic episode in most of the population, Yolken says the findings add to evidence that multiple factors contribute to mania and bipolar disorder.

Funding for the research came from the National Institute of Mental Health and the Stanley Medical Research Institute. Additional researchers contributing to the work came from Johns Hopkins, Sheppard Pratt Health System, Purdue University, and Mobtown Meat Snacks.

Source: Johns Hopkins University

The post Chemicals in beef jerky and hot dogs linked to mania appeared first on Futurity.