Category Health/Medical

A large new study suggests that higher levels of a common amino acid called tyrosine may be linked to a shorter lifespan in men.

The research, published recently in the journal Aging, examined whether blood levels of two amino acids, phenylalanine and tyrosine, were connected to how long people live.

Amino acids are building blocks of protein. They are found in protein-rich foods such as milk, eggs and meat, and are also sold as dietary supplements.

Researchers from the University of Hong Kong and the University of Georgia analyzed health and genetic data from more than 270,000 people in the U.K. Biobank, a large long-term health study in the U.K.

At first, both amino acids appeared to be tied to a higher risk of death...

Scientists may have new answers to why pop-ups or notifications grab our attention. Turns out our attention is on a cycle, shifting seven to 10 times per second. This rhythmic occurrence may be crucial for survival, as it prevents us from becoming overly focused on one thing in our environment. It could help us to see a car backing up in a parking lot while we search for where we parked, or to duck to avoid a low-hanging tree branch on a walk while watching a kid ride a bike.

However, these windows that shift our attention could also make us more susceptible to distractions, especially in modern times...

Recent technological advances have opened new possibilities for the development of advanced medical devices, including tiny robots that can safely move inside the human body. Some of these systems could help to simplify complex medical procedures, including delicate surgeries and the targeted delivery of drugs to specific sites.

THE MINIMAX lab at University of Texas (UT) Austin specializes in the development of tiny robots for medical, environmental, and other applications. In a recent preprint paper on arXiv, researchers from this lab introduced a new 3Dprintable and magnetically steerable capsule robot that could potentially help to diagnose and treat some gastrointestinal (GI) conditions.

“My motivation for GI health monitoring is deeply personal,” Fangzhou Xia, director of ...

One way cancer specialists detect the disease is by examining cells and bodily fluids under a microscope, a time-consuming and labor-intensive process called cytology. It involves visually inspecting tens of thousands to one million cells per slide for subtle 3D morphological changes that might signal the onset of cancer. But AI offers an approach that is potentially faster and more accurate.

In a new study published in the journal Nature, researchers demonstrate an AI-powered 3D scanning system that can automatically sort through samples and identify abnormal cells with performance approaching that of human experts.

Building digital models
The team developed a system called Whole-Slide Edge Tomo...