Lifeboat Foundation

New research from UBC Okanagan could make monitoring gut health easier and less painful by tapping into a common—yet often overlooked—source of information: the mucus in our digestive system that eventually becomes part of fecal matter.

Researcher Dr. Kirk Bergstrom and post-graduate student Noah Fancy of UBCO’s Biology department have discovered a non-invasive technique to study MUC2, a critical gut protein, from what we leave behind in the bathroom.

Theie findings are published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry.

Researchers based at the Drexel University College of Engineering have devised a new method for performing structural safety inspections using autonomous robots aided by machine learning technology.

The article they published recently in the Elsevier journal Automation in Construction presented the potential for a new multi-scale monitoring system informed by deep-learning algorithms that work to find cracks and other damage to buildings before using LiDAR to produce three-dimensional images for inspectors to aid in their documentation.

The development could potentially work to benefit the enormous task of maintaining the health of structures that are increasingly being reused or restored in cities large and small across the country. Despite the relative age of America’s built environment, roughly two-thirds of today’s existing buildings will be in use in the year 2050, according to Gensler’s predictions.

A case of the bubonic plague has hit Oregon, and the likely cause was a cat.

Health officials in Deschutes County announced last week that a resident, who has not been identified, had been diagnosed with the plague, in the state’s first human case in eight years. The individual was likely infected by their cat, the department says.

“All close contacts of the resident and their pet have been contacted and provided medication to prevent illness,” said Dr. Richard Fawcett, the Deschutes County Health Services Officer.

The number of people with obesity has nearly tripled since 1975, resulting in a worldwide epidemic. While lifestyle factors like diet and exercise play a role in the development and progression of obesity, scientists have come to understand that obesity is also associated with intrinsic metabolic abnormalities.

Now, researchers from University of California San Diego School of Medicine have shed new light on how obesity affects our mitochondria, the all-important energy-producing structures of our cells.

In a study published in Nature Metabolism, the researchers found that when mice were fed a high-fat diet, mitochondria within their fat cells broke apart into smaller mitochondria with reduced capacity for burning fat. Further, they discovered that this process is controlled by a single gene. By deleting this gene from the mice, they were able to protect them from excess weight gain, even when they ate the same high-fat diet as other mice.

Engaging in music throughout your life is associated with better brain health in older age, according to a new study published by experts at the University of Exeter.

Scientists working on PROTECT, an online study open to people aged 40 and over, reviewed data from more than a thousand adults over the age of 40 to see the effect of playing a musical instrument—or singing in a choir—on brain health. Over 25,000 people have signed up for the PROTECT study, which has been running for 10 years.

The team reviewed participants’ musical experience and lifetime exposure to music, alongside results of cognitive testing, to determine whether musicality helps to keep the brain sharp in later life.

The gut microbiota influences sports performance and resilience after physical exercise. Also, practicing moderate exercise on a regular basis results in a healthier bacterial composition and, therefore, better physical and mental health.

From Alzheimer’s discoveries to animal organ transplants, new breakthroughs are improving and extending lives.

Could cannabis use lead to anxiety disorders? This is what a recent study published in EClinicalMedicine hopes to address as a team of researchers led by the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute examine the connection between cannabis use and anxiety disorders by patients who have had emergency department visits. While this study was limited to Canada, it holds the potential to help researchers, legislators, and the public better understand the long-term risks of cannabis on mental health disorders throughout the world.

For the study, the researchers analyzed health records from 2008 to 2019 for 12,099,144 individuals between 10 and 105 years of age across Ontario, Canada who had no prior history of being diagnosed with an anxiety disorder from any hospital visit and compared this to the general population. In the end, the researchers found that 27.5 percent of individuals who visited a hospital for cannabis use were diagnosed with an anxiety disorder within three years of their hospital visit, whereas only 5.6 percent of the general population experienced the same. Additionally, they found that individuals who visited a hospital for cannabis use also visited a hospital for an anxiety disorder within three years of the initial hospital visit, whereas only 1.2 percent of the general population experienced the same.

“Our results suggest that individuals requiring emergency department treatment for cannabis use were both at substantially increased risk of developing a new anxiety disorder and experiencing worsening symptoms for already existing anxiety disorders,” said Dr. Daniel Myran, who is a Faculty of Medicine in the Department of Family Medicine at the University of Ottawa and lead author of the study.

C. auris, a type of yeast that can cause severe illness, is a “global health threat”, according to experts.

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