Scientists fear rise in deaths from untreated depression
Challenging recent claims linking antidepressant use to suicidal behavior, a new UCLA study shows that American suicide rates have dropped steadily since the introduction of Prozac and other serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) drugs. Published in the February edition of the journal Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, the authors caution that regulatory actions to limit SSRI prescriptions may actually increase death rates from untrea
The star-nosed mole gives a whole new meaning to the term “fast food.”
A study published this week in the journal Nature reveals that this mysterious mole has moves that can put the best magician to shame: The energetic burrower can detect small prey animals and gulp them down with a speed that is literally too fast for the human eye to follow.
It takes a car driver about 650 milliseconds to hit the brake after seeing the traffic light ahead turn red. The star-nosed mol
If successful, discovery could play an important role in putting a man on Mars
Robert Levis, Ph.D. (center), Director of the Center for Advanced Photonics Research, demonstrates the ultrafast laser beams used to detect the cyclic ozone reaction product. Assisting Levis are (L-R) Alexei Filin, Ph.D.; Ryan Compton; and Matthew Coughlan.
With nearly twice the energy of normal, bent-shaped ozone (O3), cyclic ozone could hold the key component for a future manned-mission
May offer new approach to smallpox treatment
In a finding that represents an entirely new approach to treating viral diseases such as smallpox, scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and collaborating institutions have shown that infections can be stymied by interfering with signals used by viruses to reproduce in human cells.
The results, reported in the February issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation, point to a possible strategy for broadly treating acut
A gene that plays many fundamental roles in cells throughout the body has, for the first time, been implicated in human disease, according to researchers at the Duke Center for Human Genetics. A defect in the ubiquitous gene dynamin 2 underlies one form of the prevalent, familial nerve disorder, known as Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT). The disorder affects approximately 1 in every 2,500 people, making it one of the most common of all hereditary disorders, said the researchers.
Swimming endurance improvement comes from equivalent of four cups of tea a day over 10 weeks
Now that even baseball players may need to seek new, more natural performance aids, will Japanese green tea sets become standard in dugouts and athletic training tables around the world? A new study tested the effect of regularly taking green tea extract (GTE) and found that over 10 weeks, endurance exercise performance was boosted up to 24% with 0.5% GTE supplementation, and 8% with 0.