Attempting suicide by ingesting pesticides is a major public health problem in rural Asia. In Sri Lanka, pesticide self-poisoning is the most common method used in suicide attempts in many rural areas. Globally, it accounts for as many as one in every five of the world’s suicides. Many people have recommended ‘safer storage and use’ as the answer to the problem. A group of Sri Lankan and international researchers took on the challenge to test, on a large scale, whether improving pesticide storag...
Apr 17, 2020•12 min
When learning about fluid dynamics, physics and engineering students can benefit greatly from hands-on experiments that allow them to visualise the equations they learn in lectures. For supersonic flows, however, the equipment required is incredibly expensive, making some experiments inaccessible to many universities. Dr Oleg Goushcha at Manhattan College has revived an old methodology to demonstrate supersonic flows in the classroom using far more affordable equipment. He has shown that the fea...
Apr 09, 2020•9 min
Despite recent efforts to promote diversity in STEM education and professional environments, some ethnic groups remain highly underrepresented in STEM fields, including the Hispanic/LatinX community. To tackle this underrepresentation, researchers at the University of San Diego have created a multi-dimensional program funded by the National Science Foundation called STEMWoW , which is designed to promote and sustain interest in STEM disciplines among middle school students from underserved commu...
Apr 03, 2020•14 min
In certain areas of the US, local berry growers face difficulties in meeting the growing customer demand for high-quality berries, while also managing pests in sustainable ways. Aware of these challenges, researchers from different universities, including Michigan State, Penn State and Cornell Universities have been collaborating on a project called TunnelBerries . Their aim is to conduct research related to berry growing and provide berry crop producers with useful information, paving the way t...
Apr 03, 2020•14 min
Dr Jun Hua , Associate Professor at the F. M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging at the Kennedy Krieger Institute and Johns Hopkins University, USA, leads a team focused on developing novel magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technologies for imaging the structure and function of the brain. Recently, they have been pioneering the development of new MRI techniques that can be used to improve pre-surgical planning for neurological patients and optimise patient outcomes....
Mar 20, 2020•14 min
Our brain forms long-term memories and stores information through synaptic plasticity, the ability of the connections between neurons to be strengthened or weakened over time. However, the exact methods through which synaptic plasticity is achieved by the brain remain largely unknown in the scientific community. Professor Don Kulasiri at Lincoln University, New Zealand, is using a mathematical modelling approach to shed light into this process. His findings are providing molecular insights into ...
Mar 13, 2020•14 min
As people are now spending a substantial amount of time online, traditional businesses and other vendors try to attract new customers by gaining traction on social media platforms, capturing the attention of users in a variety of ways. This is often achieved by disseminating compelling information, which is not always true or reliable. In a recent study, Dr Camille Ryan and her colleagues at Bayer Crop Science have taken a closer look at the monetisation of disinformation, focusing on the specif...
Mar 13, 2020•9 min
Type 2 diabetes (T2D) is among the most impactful and costly biomedical challenges confronting society. Current treatment regimens for T2D rely upon daily drug dosing and frequent glucose monitoring to normalise blood glucose levels. However, these medications can only delay disease progression and frequently have undesired side effects including hypoglycaemia and weight gain. Growing evidence supports a key role for the brain in glucose homeostasis and diabetes pathogenesis. Dr Jarrad Scarlett ...
Mar 06, 2020•12 min
Broadening Experiences in Scientific Training – or ‘BEST’ – is a program that aims to help biomedical students to explore and pursue expanded career options beyond traditional academic positions. While the program has been in place for a few years, the views of participating faculty members on the value of BEST’s career development initiatives had never been collected. To fill this gap, Dr Stephanie Watts at Michigan State University and her collaborators asked faculty members at seven instituti...
Mar 06, 2020•8 min
Despite dramatic advances in neuroscience and biology in the 20th and 21st centuries, our understanding of the brain remains very limited. Dr Yan M Yufik , Head at Virtual Structures Research Inc, USA, is a physicist and cognitive scientist who has spent over 20 years combining experimental findings and theoretical concepts in domains as diverse as neuroscience and thermodynamics to form a theory of the brain. His focus has been on elucidating the mechanisms underlying human understanding and ap...
Feb 28, 2020•16 min
Foreign animal disease outbreaks in livestock systems have far-reaching economic, trade and food security implications. Biosecurity strategies can enhance the resilience of livestock production; however, understanding the behaviors of people involved in agriculture is critical – and more challenging. In a new approach, an innovative US-wide project is integrating social science, human decision making, economic and animal health perspectives to target disease prevention.
Feb 14, 2020•32 min
Dr Christine Pfund is a researcher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA. With a strong network of colleagues and collaborators, her work focuses on developing, implementing, documenting, and studying interventions to optimise research mentoring relationships across science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine. Read on to discover how the success of these initiatives has resulted in the development of a national network of mentors in the USA.
Feb 14, 2020•13 min
Our kidneys are primarily responsible for filtering waste out of the body and into urine. However, with aging, kidney dysfunction begins to develop. Although no symptoms appear for years, this dysfunction can eventually progress to severe kidney failure. If caught early, the adverse outcomes of kidney dysfunction can be prevented. But unfortunately, the detection and management of kidney disease remain far from optimal. Professor Eiichiro Kanda of the Kawasaki Medical School has established a ne...
Feb 06, 2020•9 min
Identifying students who are at risk of withdrawing from higher education is of key importance, as it allows educators to devise and implement intervention strategies that could support students in completing their studies. With this in mind, Dr Naif Radi Aljohani and his colleagues at King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia have recently devised a technique that could help to predict early dropout from university courses, by analysing data related to student engagement on online learning plat...
Jan 30, 2020•8 min
Lifestyle factors and behavioural changes, such as diet modifications, are gaining interest as methods to modify or even prevent the global progression of chronic diseases, such as heart conditions and type 2 diabetes. Dr Konstantinos Makris (con-stan-teen-os Mah-kris), at the Cyprus International Institute for Environmental and Public Health within the Cyprus University of Technology, and his colleagues conducted a clinical trial to investigate the benefits of eating an organic diet in school c...
Jan 24, 2020•9 min
Floods devastate communities across the globe. A single flood disaster can cause the loss of thousands of lives, and the displacement of millions of people. The devastating effect is exacerbated by the difficulty in monitoring floods and evaluating the information to make the best responsive decisions. To help communities and emergency response teams better predict and prepare for flooding events, Dr Guy J-P Schumann and his team at Remote Sensing Solutions in collaboration with the Dartmouth Fl...
Jan 16, 2020•12 min
Facilities for recycling metal parts at the locations they are required would be a major milestone in the global struggle towards sustainable industry. Yet for all its advantages, the innovations required to realise such a goal are a daunting prospect. Now, Andrew LaTour and his colleagues at MolyWorks Materials are bringing the idea one step closer to reality, through the development of their ‘Mobile Foundry’. The company’s work could soon provide a new basis for developing a completely closed-...
Jan 10, 2020•12 min
Amyloids are aggregates of polymerised proteins. The polymerised proteins do not fold as they should and adopt shapes that enable multiple copies to stick together. In humans, these clusters of proteins form fibrils and the presence of these amyloid protein clusters are associated with disease pathologies. In a recent study, Dr Sidharth Mahapatra and colleagues at Stanford University assessed their hypothesis, that, contrary to much of the work in this area, in some cases, amyloids may be benefi...
Dec 19, 2019•9 min
The use of radiation therapy to treat cancer has improved the long-term outcome of thousands of patients but is associated with serious side effects. Photodynamic therapy (PDT), a targeted light-based technique, has been approved as an effective treatment for some forms of cancer with fewer side effects than radiotherapy. However, the effectiveness of this technique depends on fine-tuning its application to the patient. Simphotek, a US-based company founded by world leaders in biophysics and com...
Dec 13, 2019•15 min
Because of growing international trade, increasing numbers of invasive pest insects are being transported throughout the world. If they become established, invasive insects can have enormous impacts on agriculture, human health and natural ecosystems. However, it can be difficult to control them without causing further damage to the surrounding environment. Dr Robert K. Vander Meer of the USDA Agricultural Research Service studies the chemistry of pest ants, as it pertains to their behaviour and...
Dec 13, 2019•15 min
Global Navigation Satellite Systems such as GPS are the backbone of many global communications, but they are not immune to failure. Progeny Systems Corporation is dedicated to mitigating such disasters if and when satellite-based communications fail, by developing Earth-based systems that work in comparable ways to synchronised satellite networks. As an alternative to GPS, the company’s technology could provide communicating parties with a crucial yet inexpensive safeguard against future failure...
Dec 06, 2019•12 min
Dogs are renowned for their status as man’s best friend. Based first at the University of Colorado and now at the University of Minnesota in the Twin Cities, Dr Jaime Modiano and his team have spent the last 25 years trying to understand how cancer develops at a basic level, aiming to use this knowledge to improve the health and wellbeing of both humans and their companion animals.
Dec 06, 2019•11 min
In recent years, dramatic advances have been made in brain science and molecular genetics. However, there is currently a shortage of psychiatrists with the scientific training necessary to take this knowledge and apply it in the clinic. Psychiatrist and neuroscience researcher, Dr Susan Voglmaier of the University of California, San Francisco, runs a research training program that supports the next generation of research scientists in the field of psychiatry. Dr Voglmaier believes that by traini...
Nov 29, 2019•13 min
Both diabetic adults and premature babies are at risk for a similar type of eye disease that involves the growth of abnormal, blood vessels in the retina, the photosensitive layer of the eye. When this eye disease occurs in diabetics, it is called diabetic retinopathy and when it occurs in premature infants, it is called retinopathy of prematurity. The pathologic vessels, seen in both of these diseases, can pull on the retina and cause it to detach, leading to blindness. Dr Tammy Movsas (Executi...
Nov 29, 2019•13 min
When an artery becomes blocked or damaged, a mechanical scaffold called a stent is often implanted into the vessel to improve blood flow. However, metallic stents can cause re-narrowing at the sites where they are implanted. This process is known as restenosis, which can lead to lethal complications. Dr York Hsiang , Professor of Surgery at the University of British Columbia, and his team use microengineering techniques to develop novel stents that can better detect restenosis, and treat it earl...
Nov 22, 2019•11 min
Robots that assist us with both everyday and highly specialised tasks are no new concept, but so far, their actual development has appeared to be far from becoming a reality. Yet through the research of Dr Paul Robertson , Chief Scientist at Dynamic Object Language Labs (DOLL) in Massachusetts, such sophisticated technology is now looking increasingly feasible. By considering how robots can be programmed to recognise tasks and comprehend human emotions, his research could be bringing engineers a...
Nov 22, 2019•12 min
Schizophrenia is a serious psychiatric disorder that affects around 1% of the global population, producing debilitating symptoms that significantly impact upon the quality of life of sufferers. Even with treatment, prognosis is often poor with a high risk of relapse. Dr Samuel Clark of Terran Biosciences Inc and colleagues at Stony Brook University, New York, are investigating the potential of blocking one type of opioid receptor in the brain – the kappa receptor – to reduce the symptoms of the ...
Nov 14, 2019•13 min
There are numerous health benefits related to eating fibre-containing foods, including lowering the levels of serum glucose and lipids, thus reducing the risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Furthermore, by creating an increased feeling of fullness, eating fibre-rich foods reduces caloric intake and obesity. Professor Douglas Goff from the University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada, researches the supplementation of food with fibre and the specific mechanisms of beneficial action, with a focus ...
Nov 14, 2019•16 min
Mental health conditions such as anxiety disorders significantly impact on the quality of life of sufferers, their physical health and psycho-social functioning. Given the high prevalence and extent of impairment inflicted on affected individuals, the economic cost to public health is substantial. Professor Christine Larson at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA, seeks to identify new and more effective targets for intervention by better understanding the relationship between brain functi...
Nov 08, 2019•12 min
According to the World Health Organisation, between 5 and 10 million people die globally of kidney disease each year. There has been an important shift towards recognising chronic kidney disease (CKD) as a major public health problem that requires early management. Protein energy wasting is a maladaptive metabolic state resulting in severe malnutrition and one of the major causes of CKD-related deaths. Professor Eiichiro Kanda at Kawasaki Medical School and his colleagues have established a risk...
Nov 08, 2019•9 min
