This is an edited excerpt from “I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life,” which will be published on August 9th by Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. The Foods for Health Institute, at the University of California, Davis, has the appearance of a Tuscan villa, its terra-cotta-walled buildings overlooking [...]
A study has warned that air pollution can increase the risk of asthma in adults, even at low levels. Researchers found that Australians aged 45-50 who lived less than 200 metres from a major road had a 50 percent higher risk of asthma, wheeze and lower lung function over a five-year period than those who [...]
Abstract Potent trienone and dienone steroid hormones undergo a coupled photohydration (in light)-thermal dehydration (in dark) cycle that ultimately increases their environmental persistence. Here, we studied the photolysis of dienogest, a dienone progestin prescribed as a next-generation oral contraceptive, and used high resolution mass spectrometry and both 1D and 2D nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy to [...]
Through a few clever molecular hacks, researchers at Columbia University Medical Center have converted a natural bacterial immune system into a microscopic data recorder, laying the groundwork for a new class of technologies that use bacterial cells for everything from disease diagnosis to environmental monitoring. The researchers modified an ordinary laboratory strain of the ubiquitous [...]
Abstract Background Artemisinin resistance, linked to polymorphisms in the Kelch gene on chromosome 13 of Plasmodium falciparum (k13), has outpaced containment efforts in South East Asia. For national malaria control programmes in the region, it is important to establish a surveillance system which includes monitoring for k13polymorphisms associated with the clinical phenotype. Methods Between February and December 2013, [...]
The immune cells trained to fight off the body’s invaders can become defective. It’s what allows cancer to develop. So most cancer immunotherapy research has targeted these so-called effector T cells. MORE FROM THE LAB: Subscribe to our weekly newsletter But a new study steps back and considers: What if the problem isn’t with the [...]
In low- and middle-income nations, 98% of cities with populations exceeding 100,000 people do not meet the World Health Organization's air quality guidelines. Among high-income countries, the number falls to 56%. The big picture: Together, the top ten most polluted cities have over 20 million residents. The 11th most polluted city in the world is Delhi, India, [...]
Manitoba health officials have reported 1,268 confirmed cases of mumps since Sep. 2016 and more than 1,000 cases in 2017 alone. This is a huge difference from the five or less cases reported in a year. Mumps/THD While the number of cases reported monthly remains abnormally high, there are signs of some decline in cases in [...]
Four out of 10 children in the US are exposed to secondhand smoke, according to the American Heart Association. A new Tel Aviv University study suggests that parents who smoke mistakenly rely on their own physical senses to gauge the presence of tobacco smoke in the air. "This reliance on their own physical sensory perceptions [...]
Abstract Asthma during pregnancy is associated with retardation of fetal growth in a sex-specific manner. Lactobacilli microbes influence infant growth. This study aimed to determine whether lactobacilli and other microbes are reduced in the gut of infants born to an asthmatic mother, and whether this differs by the sex of the infant. Mother-infant pairs (N=1021) [...]
