Category Health/Medical

agitating host-microbiota interactions to cause low-grade gut inflammation can promote colon carcinogenesis

Emulsifiers, added to most processed foods to aid texture and extend shelf life, can alter intestinal bacteria in a manner that promotes intestinal inflammation and colorectal cancer, according to a new study. The findings, published in the journal Cancer Research, show regular consumption of dietary emulsifiers in mice exacerbated tumor development. Colorectal cancer, the fourth leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide, was responsible for about 700,000 deaths in 2012. There is increasing awareness that intestinal microbiota play a role in driving colorectal cancer.

The microbiota is also a key factor in driving Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, the two most common for...

Vigorous exercise amplified increase in hormone levels

Twelve weeks of aerobic exercise significantly boosted testosterone levels in overweight and obese men, with the greatest increases seen among vigorous exercisers, according to research presented at the Integrative Biology of Exercise 7 meeting in Phoenix. Researchers from Tsukuba University and Ryutsu Keizai University in Japan previously found that a combination of diet and exercise was effective in increasing the testosterone in this population. For this study, however, they looked specifically at the effect of regular aerobic exercise on testosterone levels.

“Testosterone is a male sex hormone, and low circulating testosterone levels lead to various health disorders in men...

In the conventional electron micrograph at left, it is difficult to distinguish form and function of two hippocampal astrocytes in a mouse brain. The multicolor micrograph at right marks the two astrocytes using different color lanthanides and more clearly shows where they contact and nurture the same synapse (dark railroad lines). Credit: Image courtesy of Stephen Adams, NCMIR, UC San Diego

Electron microscopy (EM), which uses particle beams of accelerated electrons to interrogate specimens, has long been a leading technology for revealing the shape and structure of the tiniest objects, from the cells which make up the bodies organs and microbes to individual building blocks or molecules which comprise cells, in often dramatic 3D detail...

a neural circuit taxonomy for depression and anxiety

A team led by neurologists at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) has pinpointed the regions of the brain that may play a role maintaining consciousness. “For the first time, we have found a connection between the brainstem region involved in arousal and regions involved in awareness, 2 prerequisites for consciousness,” said Michael D. Fox, MD, PhD, Director of the Laboratory for Brain Network Imaging and Modulation and the Associate Director of the Berenson-Allen Center for Noninvasive Brain Stimulation at BIDMC.

Arousal is likely regulated by the brainstem, responsible for the sleep/wake cycle and cardiac/ respiratory rates. Awareness has long been thought to reside in the cortex...