Tag Archives: new study

New study offers innovative model to reindeer conservation with global potential

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A groundbreaking study from the University of Calgary presents a novel method for identifying wildlife populations at risk—such as caribou and reindeer—based on their individual movement patterns. This approach could revolutionize future conservation strategies.

Published in Biological Conservation, the study utilizes a long-term dataset from GPS-collared caribou across Western Canada. Researchers identified six distinct behavioral groups, each requiring tailored conservation actions.

Spanning vast regions of the Rocky Mountains, particularly in British Columbia, the study area encompasses protected parklands as well as private and multi-use public lands. This diverse landscape, with its rugged topography and climate of long winters and short summers, has been increasingly impacted by habitat fragmentation due to roads, seismic exploration, railways, and logging.

The research analyzed key movement behaviors—such as migration patterns, range sizes, and elevation shifts—to gain deeper insights into caribou ecology. Lead author Margaret Hughes, a PhD candidate in the Department of Biological Sciences, explains that the study revealed subtle but significant differences from current caribou management practices in Western Canada.

“Our approach focuses on behavior to distinguish differences between individuals and groups, clustering them based on movement patterns,” Hughes says. “By understanding where they go and why, we can better inform conservation efforts.”

Behavioural Analysis

This behavioral analysis offers a more comprehensive framework for defining population boundaries, optimizing conservation resource allocation, and improving biodiversity management. While genetic studies have traditionally guided caribou conservation, Hughes emphasizes the added value of integrating movement behavior into conservation planning.

“It helps managers recognize ecologically meaningful variations within species, ultimately leading to more effective conservation strategies,” she explains.

Caribou, an iconic member of the deer family, face mounting threats from habitat loss, industrial development, and climate change. Professor Marco Musiani, a co-author from the University of Bologna and adjunct professor at UCalgary, underscores the species’ significance.

“Caribou are one of the most affected species in Canada due to oil and gas development, forestry, and climate change. Their sensitivity makes them a key indicator of ecosystem health,” Musiani says.

Beyond caribou, the study’s methodology holds promise for broader conservation efforts. Hughes notes that the findings could inform habitat protection, ecological corridor design, and even species translocation strategies—critical areas receiving increasing conservation investment.

By incorporating behavioral science into conservation, this research offers a powerful tool for safeguarding not only caribou populations but also broader biodiversity in a rapidly changing world beset with human activities which have driven species extinction rates to nearly 1,000 times from the natural background rate.

What IUCN says?

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) reports that over 42,100 assessed species are at risk, including 25% of mammals, 14% of birds, and 40% of amphibians. However, the true numbers could be far higher, as not all species have been evaluated.

A 2019 UN biodiversity report estimated that up to one million species worldwide could face extinction, highlighting the urgent need for conservation. Yet, limited resources often force conservationists to prioritize species based on economic, ecological, or aesthetic value—leaving many vulnerable species without sufficient protection.

Ecosystems supporting endangered species are also disappearing at an alarming rate despite the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in vogue to protect vulnerable species and habitats across the planet. Beyond government efforts, conservation organizations such as the Nature Conservancy, World Wildlife Fund, and Conservation International are playing a crucial role in safeguarding biodiversity.

As global collaboration model remains essential to preserving the planet’s natural ecosystems for future generations, “This approach can be applied to other at-risk species, helping guide habitat restoration and protection on a much larger scale,” Hughes says.

All tattoos are not same, what’s harmful in ink matters

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Although people have decorated their bodies for millennia with tattoo images as a form of self-expression but the inks used remained unregulated, resulting in products whose components are largely a mystery.

Now, researchers have analyzed almost 100 inks and report that even when these products include an ingredient label, the lists often aren’t accurate. The team also detected small particles that could be harmful to cells.

To be presented today at the fall meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS) Fall 2022, the team from Binghamton University (State University of New York), the study probed the particle size and molecular composition of tattoo pigments using a variety of techniques, such as Raman spectroscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and electron microscopy.

“The idea for this project initially came about because I was interested in what happens when laser light is used to remove tattoos,” says John Swierk, the project’s principal investigator. “But then I realized that very little is actually known about the composition of tattoo inks, so we started analyzing popular brands.”

Swierk and undergraduates in his laboratory interviewed tattoo artists to see what they knew about the inks they use on their customers. The artists could quickly identify a brand they preferred, but they didn’t know much about its contents. “Surprisingly, no dye shop makes pigment specific for tattoo ink,” Swierk explains.

“Big companies manufacture pigments for everything, such as paint and textiles. These same pigments are used in tattoo inks,” he said and noted that tattoo artists must be licensed in the locales where they operate for safety reasons, yet no federal or local agency regulates the contents of the inks themselves.

Tattoo inks contain two parts

Tattoo contains a pigment and a carrier solution. The pigment could be a molecular compound such as a blue pigment; a solid compound such as titanium dioxide, which is white; or a combination of the two compound types such as light blue ink, which contains both the molecular blue pigment and titanium dioxide.

The carrier solution transports the pigment to the middle layer of skin and typically helps make the pigment more soluble. It can also control the viscosity of the ink solution and sometimes includes an anti-inflammatory ingredient.

Swierk’s team has confirmed the presence of ingredients that aren’t listed on some labels. For example, in one case ethanol was not listed, but the chemical analysis showed it was present in the ink. The team has also been able to identify what specific pigments are present in some inks.

“Every time we looked at one of the inks, we found something that gave me pause,” Swierk says. “For example, 23 of 56 different inks analyzed to date suggest an azo-containing dye is present.” Although many azo pigments do not cause health concerns when they are chemically intact, bacteria or ultraviolet light can degrade them into another nitrogen-based compound that is a potential carcinogen, according to the Joint Research Centre, which provides independent scientific advice to the European Union.

In addition, the team has analyzed 16 inks using electron microscopy, and about half contained particles smaller than 100 nm. “That’s a concerning size range,” says Swierk. “Particles of this size can get through the cell membrane and potentially cause harm.”

Staring at red light 3 minutes daily may lessen the risk of sight loss, says study

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Staring at a deep red light for three minutes a day can significantly improve declining eyesight, finds a new study, which may bring immense potential to bring about new affordable home-based eye care technique or therapy, helping millions of people globally with naturally declining vision as they age.

The first of its kind in humans study by scientists at the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology was published in the Journals of Gerontology. Once over 40, the retinal sensitivity and colour vision gradually decline and with an ageing population, this is an increasingly important issue. The new method can reverse this decline, by rebooting the retina’s ageing cells with short bursts of longwave light.

In humans around 40 years-old, cells in the eye’s retina begin to age caused, in part, when the cell’s mitochondria, whose role is to produce energy (known as ATP) and boost cell function, also start to decline. In the UK there are currently around 12 million people aged over 65 and in 50 years this is estimated to increase to around 20 million.

Retina Decline Reversible

Mitochondrial density is greatest in the retina’s photoreceptor cells, which require high energy and thus, the retina ages faster than other organs, with a 70% ATP reduction over life, causing a significant decline in photoreceptor function. Researchers built on their previous findings in mice, bumblebees and fruit flies, when their eyes were exposed to 670 nanometre (long wavelength) deep red light.

Red light vision therapy (UCL)

“Mitochondria have specific light absorbance characteristics influencing their performance: longer wavelengths spanning 650 to 1000nm are absorbed and improve mitochondrial performance to increase energy production,” said Professor Glen Jeffery, lead author and scientist at UCL Insitutute of Ophthalmology. The retina’s photoreceptor population is formed of cones, which mediate colour vision and rods, which provide peripheral vision and adapt vision in low or dim light.

For the study, 24 people (12 male, 12 female), aged between 28 and 72, who had no ocular disease, were recruited. All participants’ eyes were tested for the sensitivity of their rods and cones at the start of the study. Rod sensitivity was measured in dark adapted eyes (with pupils dilated) by asking participants to detect dim light signals in the dark, and cone function was tested by subjects identifying coloured letters that had very low contrast and appeared increasingly blurred, a process called colour contrast.

All participants were then given a small LED torch to take home and were asked to look into* its deep red 670nm light beam for three minutes a day for two weeks. They were then re-tested for their rod and cone sensitivity

Study Results

Researchers found the 670nm light had no impact in younger individuals, but in those around 40 years and over, cone colour contrast sensitivity (the ability to detect colours) improved by up to 20% in some people aged around 40 and over. Improvements were more significant in the blue part of the colour spectrum that is more vulnerable in ageing. Rod sensitivity also improved significantly in them though less than colour contrast.

Professor Jeffery said: “Our study shows that it is possible to significantly improve vision that has declined in aged individuals using simple brief exposures to light wavelengths that recharge the energy system that has declined in the retina cells, rather like re-charging a battery. The technology is simple and very safe, using a deep red light of a specific wavelength, that is absorbed by mitochondria in the retina that supply energy for cellular function.

The team is planning to make devices costing about £12 to make, so the technology is highly accessible to the public.

Patient ID, medical records’ matching now helps during vaccination, say experts

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Experts from Regenstrief Institute, Mayo Clinic and the Pew Charitable Trusts have suggested that matching patient records from disparate sources has become crucial to stem the tide of the current coronavirus pandemic and allow for fast action for future outbreaks of highly contagious viruses.

In a peer-reviewed commentary published in npj Digital Medicine, the team of experts said rapid identification of COVID-19 infected and at-risk individuals and the success of future large-scale vaccination efforts in the United States will depend on how effectively an individual’s electronic health data is securely preserved and shared among healthcare providers, including hospitals and pharmacies, and other systems used to track the illness and immunization.

For data sharing to be effective, electronic health records (EHRs) — both those held within a single facility and those in different healthcare organizations — must correctly refer to a specific individual.

Some of the specimen queries are:

Is Billy Jones known at a different doctor’s office as William Jones and are all his health records linked? To which Maria Garcia do lab test results belong?
Which John Smith was referred to during contact tracing?

The commentary note said patient matching rates vary widely, with healthcare facilities failing to link records for the same patient as often as half the time. Authors — Shaun Grannis, vice president for data and analytics at Regenstrief Institute and Regenstrief Professor of Medical Informatics at Indiana University School of Medicine, John D. Halamka, president of Mayo Clinic Platform and Ben Moscovitch, director of the Pew Charitable Trusts’ health information technology initiative — call for stakeholders to urgently address the patient matching conundrum. Otherwise, efforts to curtail the current pandemic and future ones will be ill-advisedly delayed, they cautioned.

“The sharing of more data and use of standards — reflect near-term opportunities that government and health care organizations can implement to respond to the current pandemic and prepare for future ones. In the longer term, there may be other opportunities — such as use of biometrics, unique identifiers, or multi-factor authentication — that could further enhance patient identification and matching, including for routine care,” they said in their note.

However, those options and the associated standards that underlie their success are worthwhile to examine, but cannot be designed, deployed, and implemented in a near-term manner that could help mitigate the effects of this pandemic, said the authors.

Flowers origin traced to 174 million years, 50 Mln years earlier than previously thought

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Analysis of fossil specimens of a flower called Nanjinganthus from the Early Jurassic (more than 174 million years ago) suggests that flowers originated 50 million years earlier than previously thought, a study published in eLife reports.

Before now, angiosperms (flowering plants) were thought to have a history of no more than 130 million years – despite molecular clocks indicating they must have appeared earlier – since no convincing fossil-based evidence existed.

The discovery of Nanjinganthus dendrostyla, however, offers fossil evidence that extends the evolutionary timeline and, due to the flower’s unexpected characteristics, throws widely accepted theories of plant evolution into question.

“Researchers were not certain where and how flowers came into existence because it seems that many flowers just popped up in the Cretaceous from nowhere,” said FU Qiang, a researcher from the Nanjing Institute of Geology and Paleontology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (NIGPAS). “Studying fossil flowers, especially those from earlier geologic periods, is the only reliable way to get an answer to these questions.”

The team studied 264 specimens of 198 individual flowers preserved on 34 rock slabs from the South Xiangshan Formation – an outcrop of rocks in the Nanjing region of China renowned for its fossils from the Early Jurassic epoch.

Due to the abundance of fossil samples used, the researchers could dissect some and then study them with sophisticated microscopy. The high-resolution pictures of the flowers – from different angles and with different magnifications – allowed the team to envision the features of Nanjinganthus dendrostyla.

Siltstone slabs bearing Nanjinganthus. CREDIT
NIGPAS

The key feature of angiosperms is the presence of fully enclosed ovules, which are precursors of seeds before pollination. In the current study, the reconstructed flower was found to have a cup-form receptacle and ovarian roof that together enclose the ovules/seeds. This discovery was crucial, since these features can confirm the flower as of an angiosperm.

Although there have been reports of angiosperms from the Middle-Late Jurassic epochs in northeastern China, the morphological features of Nanjinganthus distinguish it from other specimens and suggest that it is a new angiosperm genus.

Individuals of Nanjinganthus
CREDIT
NIGPAS

The team hopes to determine whether angiosperms are monophyletic – which would mean Nanjinganthus represents a stem group giving rise to all later species – or polyphyletic, meaning Nanjinganthus represents an evolutionary dead end and has little to do with many later species.

“The origin of angiosperms has long been an academic headache for many botanists,” said WANG Xin of NIGPAS. “Our discovery has moved the botany field forward and will allow a better understanding of angiosperms.”

Fatty fish, camelina oil good for HDL, IDL cholesterol: study

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Eating fatty fish increases the size and lipid composition of HDL particles in people with impaired glucose metabolism, said a new study by the University of Eastern Finland.

The changes in size and lipid composition of HDL (good cholestrol) particles make them beneficial for cardiovascular health, said the study published in Molecular Nutrition & Food Research. It also found that camelina sativa oil decreases the number of harmful IDL particles.

The researchers studied the effects of camelina oil and fatty fish intake on the size and composition of cholesterol-carrying lipoproteins. Although the health effects of HDL particles actually are dependent on their size and composition, earlier research has shown that large HDL particles are associated with a reduced risk of cardiovascular diseases, whereas a small HDL particle size may increase the risk.

The IDL lipoprotein, on the other hand, is the precursor of LDL, which is also known as “the bad” cholesterol. Previous studies have shown that long-chain omega-3 fatty acids found in fish have a beneficial effect on lipoprotein size and composition. Camelina oil. It’s also rich in alpha-linolenic acid, which is an essential omega-3 fatty acid whose associations with lipoproteins aren’t well understood yet.

The study involved 79 Finnish men and women aged between 40 and 72, and with impaired glucose metabolism. The participants were randomly divided into 4 groups and studied for 12 weeks — the camelina oil group, the fatty fish group, the lean fish group, and the control group.

People in the lean and fatty fish groups were instructed to eat lean or fatty fish four times a week, and people in the camelina oil group were asked to use 30 mm of camelina sativa oil daily. Participants in the control group were allowed to eat fish once a week, and the use of camelina oil and other oils containing alpha-linolenic acid, such as rapeseed oil, was prohibited.

The researchers found that eating fatty fish increased the size and lipid composition of HDL particles, and that the use of camelina oil decreased the number of harmful IDL particles.

Both of these changes can reduce the risk of cardiovascular diseases. Eating lean fish, however, was not associated with changes in the number, size or composition of lipoprotein particles, they found.

Childhood trauma behind schizophrenia, hallucinations among elders, reveals study

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Brain Image (NIH)

Researchers have shown that childhood sexual, physical and emotional abuse are associated with severe hallucinations in schizophrenia.

The joint study by several research institutes found that hallucinations in schizophrenia were linked with childhood trauma, said Sarah Bendall, the lead author.

The study has analyzed 29 studies on childhood trauma and psychotic symptoms and found that childhood sexual abuse is often associated with delusions, seen among patients with schizophrenia.

“This means there’s something about childhood trauma that leads some people to develop hallucinations,” Bendall said. The symptoms include unrealistic attitude, unemotional attitude, hallucinations, delusions, disorganised thinking, and lack of motivation.

The study was jointly conducted by Orygen, the National Centre of Excellence for Youth Mental Health; the University of Melbourne; Port Phillip Prison and University Hospital of Gran Canaria Dr Negrin, Spain.

Bendall said many patients fail to provide this evidence during the treatment, thus missing the key link. It was found that one in every 100 people will experience a psychotic disorder in their lives, majority of them facing it during 18-25 years.

“When young people come to youth mental health services, we should be assessing for trauma and for emerging psychotic symptoms, and treating them as soon as they emerge,” Dr Bendall said. “It’s a very empowering thing to be able to give people that information.”

The study was published in the journal Schizophrenia Bulletin.

Ketamine may help treat migraine compared to other therapies

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Ketamine, a medication commonly used for pain relief and increasingly used for depression, may help alleviate migraine pain in patients who have not been helped by other treatments, said a new study presented at the ANESTHESIOLOGY 2017 annual meeting.

The study of 61 patients found that almost 75 percent experienced an improvement in their migraine intensity after a three- to seven-day course of inpatient treatment with ketamine. The drug is used to induce general anesthesia but also provides powerful pain control for patients with many painful conditions in lower doses than its anesthetic use.

“Ketamine may hold promise as a treatment for migraine headaches in patients who have failed other treatments,” said study co-author Eric Schwenk, director of orthopedic anesthesia at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia. “Our study focused only on short-term relief, but it is encouraging that this treatment might have the potential to help patients long-term. Our work provides the basis for future, prospective studies that involve larger numbers of patients.”

An estimated 12 percent of the U.S. population suffers from migraines – recurring attacks of throbbing or pulsing moderate to severe pain. A subset of these patients, along with those who suffer from other types of headaches, do not respond to treatment. During a migraine, people are often very sensitive to light, sound and may become nauseated or vomit. Migraines are three times more common in women than in men.

The researchers reviewed data for patients who received ketamine infusions for intractable migraine headaches – migraines that have failed all other therapies. On a scale of 0-10, the average migraine headache pain rating at admission was 7.5, compared with 3.4 on discharge. The average length of infusion was 5.1 days, and the day of lowest pain ratings was day 4. Adverse effects were generally mild.

Dr. Schwenk said while his hospital uses ketamine to treat intractable migraines, the treatment is not yet widely available. Thomas Jefferson University Hospital will be opening a new infusion center this fall that will treat more patients with headaches using ketamine. “We hope to expand its use to both more patients and more conditions in the future,” he said.

“Due to the retrospective nature of the study, we cannot definitively say that ketamine is entirely responsible for the pain relief, but we have provided a basis for additional larger studies to be undertaken,” Dr. Schwenk added.