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One of the many challenges with battling alcohol addiction and other substance abuse disorders is the risk of relapse, even after progress toward recovery. Even pesky fruit flies have a hankering for alcohol, and because the molecular signals involved in forming flies’ reward and avoidance memories are much the same as those in humans, they’re a good model for study. […]
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A Stanford-developed virtual reality experience, called “Becoming Homeless,” is helping expand research on how this new immersive technology affects people’s level of empathy. According to new Stanford research, people who saw in virtual reality, also known as VR, what it would be like to lose their jobs and homes developed longer-lasting compassion toward the homeless compared to those who explored […]
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A research team has discovered that abnormal vision in childhood can affect the development of higher-level brain areas responsible for things such as attention. The researchers from the University of Waterloo, University of British Columbia, and the University of Auckland uncovered differences in how the brain processes visual information in patients with various types of lazy eye. In doing so, […]
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Pneumonia-causing bacteria can be spread through picking and rubbing the nose, according to new research published in the European Respiratory Journal. Pneumococcus, the bacteria that can cause pneumonia, is known to be spread through inhalation of airborne droplets containing the bacteria, for example in coughs and sneezes. This study is the first to show that transmission can also occur via […]
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Experiencing physical or emotional abuse in childhood can measurably reduce the wages of young adults, according to a study conducted in South Africa by an international research team, including Dr. Xiangming Fang of the School of Public Health at Georgia State University. On average, the researchers found that child maltreatment was associated with a 12 percent loss of wages for […]
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Scientists around the world have been trying to replace damaged heart tissue using lab-made heart-muscle cells (cardiomyocytes), either injecting them into the heart or applying patches laced with the cells. But results to date have been underwhelming. “If you make cardiomyocytes in a dish from pluripotent stem cells, they will engraft in the heart and form muscle,” says William Pu, MD, […]
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The child protection investigation system in the UK is not fit for purpose. Despite high profile child abuse cases in Rochdale, Rotherham and Telford, lessons are not being learned and the failings of those investigations are being repeated. The Interim Report of the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse found that two thirds of adults do not feel comfortable discussing […]
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How do we know if we’re looking at three apples or four? Researchers at the Universities of Bonn and Tübingen are now one step closer to answering this question. They were able to demonstrate that some brain cells fire mainly for quantities of three, others for quantities of four and others for other quantities. A similar effect can be observed […]
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Pundits are projecting this year’s midterm elections to be nasty, polarizing and “epic.” They’re also expected to stress a lot of Americans out in every part of their lives. And that includes at the office. I recently conducted a study on a broad range of workplace issues, including how the stress of our increasingly divisive politics is affecting worker health, […]
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You’ve worked abroad. You’ve lived abroad. But have you had a close friendship or romantic relationship with a person from a culture drastically different from your own? If not, you might be missing out on a powerful way to boost your own creativity, recent research shows. A study by MIT Sloan assistant professor of work and organization studies Jackson Lu […]
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