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Researchers answer decades-old question about protein found in Alzheimer’s brain plaques

Credit: CC0 Public Domain Alzheimer’s-affected brains are riddled with amyloid plaques, protein aggregates consisting mainly of amyloid-β. However, amyloid-β is a fragment produced from a precursor protein whose normal function has remained enigmatic for decades. A team of scientists at VIB and KU Leuven led by professors Joris de Wit and Bart De Strooper has ..
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Researchers map previously unknown disease in children

Credit: CC0 Public Domain Two children from Europe and one from Canada, aged four, six and 10, suffer from a previously unknown disease that causes epileptic seizures, loss of magnesium and reduced intelligence. There is currently no way to treat or alleviate their symptoms. But researchers in an international consortium have now discovered the cause ..
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New app gives throat cancer patients their voice back

Vlastimil Gular’s life took an unwelcome turn a year ago: minor surgery on his vocal cords revealed throat cancer, which led to the loss of his larynx and with it, his voice Vlastimil Gular’s life took an unwelcome turn a year ago: minor surgery on his vocal cords revealed throat cancer, which led to the ..
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Fatal drug ODs soaring among middle-aged women: CDC

(HealthDay)—The rate at which middle-aged American women die from overdoses involving opioids and other drugs nearly quadrupled between 1999 and 2017, new government data shows. In 1999, about seven out of every 100,000 deaths among U.S. women aged 30 to 64 was caused by a drug overdose, but by 2017 that rate had risen to ..
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Phat on potential, lipidomics is gaining weight

Another example of LIPID MAPS database content. Credit: Edward Dennis, UC San Diego The post-holiday New Year might not seem like an ideal time to celebrate fat. But when it comes to lipids, there is no better time. For the past 15 years, scientists have been working to specify and classify these fatty acids in ..
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Seeing shapeshifting receptors at work could yield new drugs

Just as squeezing the top of a balloon changes its overall shape, the interaction of hormones and drugs in the bloodstream changes the shape of cell surface receptors. A pair of new papers map those shapes in detail, giving researchers hope of developing more specific, more effective medications. Credit: Lefkowitz Lab, Duke University Blood pressure ..
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Millennials’ odds for depression rise with social media use

(HealthDay)—Millennials struggling with depression aren’t being helped by their use of Facebook, Instagram or Snapchat, a new study reports. College students who meet the criteria for major depressive disorder tend to use social media more often and are more heavily addicted to social media, researchers found. They’re also more likely to use social media in ..
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Perceptions of chronic fatigue syndrome in the emergency department

Findings from a novel online questionnaire of people with chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) who rated their perceptions of care in a hospital’s emergency department suggest the majority of these patients do not receive proper care, say researchers from Georgetown University Medical Center. The study, published in the journal Open Access Emergency Medicine, is the first ..
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