Parts of the brain involved in monitoring behaviors and emotions show different levels of activity in cocaine users relative to non-drug users, even when both groups perform equally well on a psychological test. These results — from a brain-imaging study conducted at the U.S. Department of Energy`s Brookhaven National Laboratory and published online the week of May 25, 2009, by the Proceedin...

Researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine have found that an approved drug for treating rheumatoid arthritis reduces severe illness and death in mice exposed to the Influenza A virus. Their findings suggest that tempering the response of the body`s immune system to influenza infection may alleviate some of the more severe symptoms and even reduce mortality from this virus. The s...

Packs of hunting dogs, troops of baboons, herds of antelope: when people observe social animals, they are often struck by how intelligent they seem, and recent studies suggest that sociality has played a key role in the evolution of larger brain size among several orders of mammals. But new research from two evolutionary biologists, John Finarelli of the University of Michigan and John Flynn of th...

As President Barack Obama calls for streamlining heath care by fully converting to electronic medical records and as Congress prepares to debate issues of patient privacy, one question has largely gone unasked: What do patients want? A qualitative study led by a research team at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) helps answer that question. Reported in the June 2009 issue of the Journal...

More Americans are developing drug-resistant staph infections, known as MRSA, from common, relatively minor foot problems such as cuts, cracks in the skin, athlete’s foot and ingrown toenails, according to the American College of Foot and Ankle Surgeons (ACFAS). Foot and ankle surgeons are noting an increase in community-associated MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus. MRSA L...

Without knowing how much of an industrial chemical is being produced, it is almost impossible for scientists to determine if it poses any threat to the environment or human health. Civil engineers at Duke University believe they have come up with a novel way of estimating how much of one such material – titanium dioxide – is being generated, laying the groundwork for future studies to ...