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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on June 3, 2014 at 8:31am

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on June 3, 2014 at 8:28am

Drug Developers Take a Second Look at Herbal Medicines
Desperate to develop new drugs for malaria and other ailments, researchers are running clinical trials with traditional herbal medicines—and generating promising leads

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on June 3, 2014 at 8:28am

Vision Involves a Bit of Hearing, Too
Researchers could tell what sounds blindfolded volunters were hearing by analyzing activity in their visual cortexes.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/vision-involves-h...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on June 3, 2014 at 8:25am

Risk factors for febrile seizures include developmental delay, discharge from a neonatal unit after 28 days, day care attendance, viral infections, a family history of febrile seizures, certain vaccinations, and possibly iron and zinc deficiencies. Febrile seizures may occur before or soon after the onset of fever, with the likelihood of seizure increasing with the child's temperature and not with the rate of temperature rise.

Vaccinations associated with increased risk include 2010 Southern Hemisphere seasonal influenza trivalent inactivated vaccine (Fluvax Junior and Fluvax); diphtheria and tetanus toxoids and whole-cell pertussis (DTP); and measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR). A Cochrane review and a review of 530,000 children receiving the MMR vaccine showed that the risk of febrile seizures increased only during the first two weeks after vaccination, was small (an additional one or two febrile seizures per 1,000 vaccinations), and was likely related to fever from the vaccine.
http://www.aafp.org/afp/2012/0115/p149.html

A genetic predisposition for febrile seizures has been postulated, although no susceptibility gene has been identified. Genetic abnormalities have been reported in persons with febrile epilepsy syndromes, such as severe myoclonic epilepsy in infancy and generalized epilepsy with febrile seizures plus (GEFS+).14 Most causes of febrile seizures are multifactorial, with two or more genetic and contributing environmental factors.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on June 3, 2014 at 8:18am

Delaying Vaccines Increases Risks—with No Added Benefits
Some parents delay vaccines out of a misinformed belief that it’s safer, but that decision actually increases the risk of a seizure after vaccination and leaves children at risk for disease longer
Concerns about vaccine safety have led up to 40 percent of parents in the U.S. to delay or refuse some vaccines for their children in hopes of avoiding rare reactions. Barriers to health care access can also cause immunization delays. But delaying some vaccines, in addition to leaving children unprotected from disease longer, can actually increase the risk of fever-related seizures, according to a new study.
The new study, published in the May 19 Pediatrics, found that administering the MMR shot or the less frequently used MMRV one (which includes the varicella, or chickenpox, vaccine) later, between 16 and 23 months, doubles the child’s risk of developing a fever-caused, or febrile, seizure as a reaction to the vaccine. The risk of a febrile seizure following the MMR is approximately one case in 3,000 doses for children aged 12 to 15 months but one case in 1,500 doses for children aged 16 to 23 months “This study adds to the evidence that the best way to prevent disease and minimize side effects from vaccines is to vaccinate on the recommended schedule.
It's not clear why the MMR and MMRV vaccines increase febrile seizure risk in the older children, but it may be simply that they receive the vaccines when they are already more susceptible to the seizures. Hambidge says evidence shows the immune system may still be maturing during the second year of life, and febrile seizures caused by viruses naturally peak around 16 to 18 months. Vaccines administered during this interval may increase the risk of fever, and therefore febrile seizures, because the vaccines rev up the immune system to mount a better immune response. These seizures do not cause any long-term health effects. Even though they’re scary for parents, these seizures are temporary events. They don’t recur and don’t cause epilepsy.
No evidence to date reveals any benefits to delaying vaccines. A study in 2010 showed that children who received delayed vaccinations performed no better at ages seven to 10 on behavioral and cognitive assessments than children who received their vaccines on time.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/delaying-vaccines-increas...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on June 3, 2014 at 7:53am

Evolution Sparks Silence of the Crickets
Males on two Hawaiian islands simultaneously went mute in just a few years to avoid a parasite
Populations of a male cricket on different Hawaiian islands have lost their ability to chirp as a result of separate, but simultaneous, evolutionary adaptations to their wings. The changes, which allow the insects to avoid attracting a parasitic fly, occurred independently over just 20 generations and are visible to the human eye, a study reveals.

The findings could help to shed light on the earliest stages of convergent evolution — when separate groups or populations independently evolve similar adaptations in response to natural selection.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/evolution-sparks-silence-...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on June 2, 2014 at 6:08am

Scientists discover how to make children eat vegetables

Study shows how parents can encourage their toddlers to eat more vegetables to inculcate healthy eating habits early on.
A new study by the University of Leeds Institute of Psychological Sciences shows that parents can, in fact, help their children be more willing to eat healthy foods by exposing them to it routinely at a younger age. The study offers insight into habits and tricks that will help get children eating even the ‘yuckiest’ of vegetables by choice.

The study, published in the journal Public Library of Science ONE (PLOS ONE), was conducted with participant babies and toddlers from the UK, France and Denmark. Participants were fed between one and 10 servings of a minimum of 100 g of one of three versions of artichoke puree: basic; sweetened with added sugar; or added energy with vegetable oil. Artichoke was chosen as it was unanimously the least-offered vegetable by the participants’ parents.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on June 1, 2014 at 5:24am

Scientists find compound to fight virus behind SARS, MERS
An international team of scientists say they have identified a compound that can fight coronaviruses, responsible for the SARS and MERS outbreaks, which currently have no cure.
Coronaviruses affect the upper and lower respiratory tracts in humans. They are the reason for up to a third of common colds.

A more severe strain of the virus, thought to have come from bats, triggered the global SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) epidemic in 2002, which killed nearly 800 people.

The Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) is a new strain discovered in Saudi Arabia in 2012 and thought to have originated in camels. More deadly but less contagious, it has so far killed 193 people out of 636 confirmed cases.

Now, a team of scientists led by Edward Trybala from the University of Gothenburg in Sweden and Volker Thiel from the University of Bern, have discovered a compound called K22, which appears to block the ability of the virus to spread in humans.
In an article for specialist journal "PLOS Pathogens", the scientists explained that the virus reproduces in the cells that line the human respiratory system.

The virus takes over the membranes that separate different parts of human cells, reshaping them into a sort of protective armor in order to start its production cycle, and so creating "viral factories," Trybala told AFP.

K22 acts at an early stage in this process, preventing the virus from taking control of the cell membranes and so opening up "new treatment possibilities," he said.

"The results confirm that the use of the membrane of the host cell is a crucial step in the life-cycle of the virus," the researchers wrote. Their work shows that "the process is highly sensitive and can be influenced by anti-viral medications".

They said the recent SARS epidemic and MERS outbreak mean there should be urgent investment in testing K22 outside the laboratory and developing medicines.

While K22 still has a way to go before it can be tested on humans, that identification of this new strategy of combating coronaviruses will aid to develop an effective and safe antiviral drug.
- Agence France-Presse

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 31, 2014 at 6:19am

Smart WCup teams tap science to beat Brazil's heat
Trying to reproduce the environmental conditions that we will likely find, above all in Manaus, but also in Recife and Natal," team physician Enrico Castellacci said. "Players work on a specific program and then we evaluate their resistance to the fatigue, by monitoring their heartbeat and weight before and after the exercises."

Players cooled off by plunging their hands into icy water. Tipton said that technique was first developed to cool navy firefighters and works better than soaking the whole body in ice baths or fancy gizmos like air-conditioned vests and jackets packed with dry ice.
Doctors can analyze players' sweat to gauge how acclimatized they are and to tailor salt dosages in their rehydration drinks.
"Players need to learn to be comfortable being uncomfortable''.
Some players use special sun-reflecting hair gel.
http://www.wkrn.com/story/25646049/smart-wcup-teams-tap-science-to-...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 31, 2014 at 6:14am

Human Evolution Traded Brawn For Brains
Have you ever wondered why it is that monkeys, chimpanzees, apes and other primates are frighteningly strong compared to us humans? If your answer was yes, you are not alone. And now a new study goes in depth in explaining why and how this phenomenon has occurred evolutionarily.

If we take the primate as the most logical known last point in human evolution, then describing primate strength and cognitive abilities as superhuman and subhuman, respectively, would be incorrect. In fact, human strength and cognition would better be described as subprimate and superprimate, again, respectively.

Humans were able to walk out of the forests and slowly civilize over millenia, eventually mastering and manipulating our environments. As we have progressed, we have done such things as create the car and the airplane, land men on the moon, and surf this virtual landscape we call the worldwide web. All of that brain power required more and more energy. With a finite amount of energy able to be ingested, some human features had to suffer. Muscle strength, it turns out, was an excellent candidate for energy to be siphoned from.

This finding was discovered as the result of a study conducted by scientists from Shanghai’s CAS-MPG Partner Institute for Computational Biology and other research teams based at the Max Planck Institutes in Germany. In their study, the teams investigated the evolution of metabolites – small molecules like sugar, vitamins, amino acids and neurotransmitters that represent key elements of our physiological functions. Their investigation showed how metabolite concentrations actually evolved in humans at a staggeringly fast pace compared to our primate cousins. This was especially true in two tissue areas: the brain and muscle.

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Exceptional Evolutionary Divergence of Human Muscle and Brain Metabolomes Parallels Human Cognitive and Physical Uniqueness
Metabolite concentrations reflect the physiological states of tissues and cells. However, the role of metabolic changes in species evolution is currently unknown. Here, we present a study of metabolome evolution conducted in three brain regions and two non-neural tissues from humans, chimpanzees, macaque monkeys, and mice based on over 10,000 hydrophilic compounds. While chimpanzee, macaque, and mouse metabolomes diverge following the genetic distances among species, we detect remarkable acceleration of metabolome evolution in human prefrontal cortex and skeletal muscle affecting neural and energy metabolism pathways. These metabolic changes could not be attributed to environmental conditions and were confirmed against the expression of their corresponding enzymes. We further conducted muscle strength tests in humans, chimpanzees, and macaques. The results suggest that, while humans are characterized by superior cognition, their muscular performance might be markedly inferior to that of chimpanzees and macaque monkeys.
http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pbio.10...

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