Tag: basic research
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Nation & World
Scientists from Harvard, China to unite against coronavirus
With nearly 78,000 cases and more than 2,300 deaths from the novel coronavirus, Harvard University scientists will join forces with colleagues from China to improve diagnostics, develop vaccines to prevent new infections, and antiviral therapies to treat existing ones.
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Nation & World
Drop in cancer deaths lifts U.S. life expectancy
A decline in cancer mortality was a prominent feature of recent good news about U.S. life expectancy. The Gazette spoke with the director of the Chan School’s Zhu Family Center for Global Cancer Prevention to understand why.
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Nation & World
Beyond Pavlov
Artificial intelligence researchers and neurobiologists share data on how options are sorted in decision-making.
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Nation & World
In soda tax fight, echoes of tobacco battles
Taxes on sugary drinks are potentially effective tools to fight the obesity epidemic and advocates are drawing lessons from the long battle against tobacco as they plot what they know will be a tough road ahead.
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Nation & World
The ‘right’ diet
Professor Emily Balskus and her team have identified an entirely new class of enzymes that degrade chemicals essential for neurological health, but also help digest foods like nuts, berries, and tea, releasing nutrients that may impact human health.
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Nation & World
Coronavirus likely now ‘gathering steam’
Harvard’s Marc Lipsitch said evidence indicates that the international cordon keeping coronavirus cases bottled up in China is a leaky one, and it’s likely that the relative handful of global cases reported so far are undercounted. If true, that will lead to widespread illness internationally, including in the U.S.
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Nation & World
Getting the brain’s attention
New technology helps dissect how the brain ignores or acts on information
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Nation & World
How I hacked the government (it was easier than you may think)
Though no expert coder, Max Weiss ’20, a government concentrator uses bots to show an agency its website vulnerability.
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Nation & World
Antioxidant reverses most BPA-induced fertility damage in worms
Treatment with a naturally occurring antioxidant, CoQ10, restores many aspects of fertility in C. elegans worms following exposure to BPA. The findings offer a possible path toward undoing BPA-induced reproductive harms in people.
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Nation & World
Collaboration generates most complete cancer genome map
An international team of 1,300 scientists has generated the most complete cancer genome map to date, bringing researchers closer to identifying all major cancer-causing genetic mutations.
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Nation & World
Evaluating the hidden risks of herbicides
Research into the gut microbes of wasps shows that exposure to atrazine, a widely used herbicide, leads to changes in the gut microbiome that are passed to future generations. Findings indicate that the microbiomes of insects, including pollinators, and of humans should be considered when evaluating the biorisk of pesticides.
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Nation & World
Filling in the blanks of evolution
Harvard Researchers show what drives functional diversity in the spines of mammal.
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Nation & World
Hidden hearing loss revealed
Harvard researchers have found two biomarkers that may help explain why a person with normal hearing struggles to follow conversations in noisy environments.
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Nation & World
What we know — and don’t know — about the coronavirus outbreak
As the number of coronavirus cases rapidly grows, the Gazette spoke with Professor of Epidemiology Marc Lipsitch, an expert in the spread of infectious disease and director of the Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics.
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Nation & World
Life’s Frankenstein monster beginnings
The evolution of the first building blocks on Earth may have been messier than previously thought, likening it to the mishmash creation of Frankenstein’s monster.
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Nation & World
Disinfecting your hands with ‘magic’
Harvard researchers have devised what they hope is a better way to disinfect hands, using tiny aerosolized nanodroplets of water and nontoxic disinfectants that not only leave hands sterile, but use so little water the hands stay dry.
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Nation & World
Feel like kids, spouse, work giving you gray hair? They may be
Harvard scientists have found evidence to support long-standing anecdotes that stress turns hair gray.
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Nation & World
A solid vaccine for liquid tumors
A new study presents an alternative treatment for acute myeloid leukemia (AML) that has the potential to eliminate AML cells completely.
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Nation & World
DNA damage linked to plastic additive
New findings shed light as to how DEHP, a common chemical in plastic, may impact human reproductive health.
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Nation & World
Unlearning racial bias
Miao Qian, a postdoctoral research fellow with the Inequality in America Initiative, studies the development of implicit racial biases in children to understand better how and when unconscious prejudices and stereotypes form in the brain.
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Nation & World
Helping to uncover the mechanism controlling brain states
A team of researchers led by two Harvard alumni uncover a switch that controls brain states.
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Nation & World
An algorithm to help predict Alzheimer’s
Researchers have developed a software-based method of scanning electronic health records to estimate the risk that a healthy person will receive a dementia diagnosis in the future.
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Nation & World
The power of positive phrasing
Analysis of more than 6 million clinical and life-science papers shows articles with male lead authors are up to 21 percent more likely than those with female lead authors to use language that frames their research positively, which could contribute to persistent gender gaps in pay and career advancement in life sciences and medicine.
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Nation & World
Merry and bright?
Natalie Dattilo discusses how the holiday season can trigger the blues — and how to help avoid them.
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Nation & World
Living hydrogel can help heal intestinal wounds
A genetically programmed living hydrogel material that facilitates intestinal wound healing is being considered for development as a probiotic therapy for patients with inflammatory bowel disease.
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Nation & World
Who’s that girl?
New research suggests a country’s degree of gender equality can shape men’s ability to recognize famous female faces.