Scientists used brain signals recorded from epilepsy patients to program a computer to mimic natural speech — an advancement that could one day have a profound effect on the ability of certain patients to communicate. The study was supported by the National Institutes of Health’s Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Technologies (BRAIN) Initiative.
Limited access to essential medicines for treating chronic diseases is a major challenge in low and middle-income countries. Although India is the largest manufacturer of generic medicines, there is a paucity of information on availability, price and affordability of essential anti-cancer medicines used for treating childhood cancers.
As part of Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar’s cross-cutting Department initiatives to address the opioid epidemic, the National Institutes of Health today selected four research sites for the HEALing Communities Study in four states hard hit by the opioid crisis. This ambitious study aims to reduce overdose deaths by 40 percent over three years in selected communities by testing a set of proven prevention and treatment interventions, such as distribution of naloxone to reverse overdose and linking individuals in the criminal justice system with treatment for opioid addiction.
With the increasing threat of antibiotic resistance, there is a growing need for new treatment strategies against life threatening bacterial infections. Researchers at Lund University in Sweden and the University of Copenhagen may have identified such an alternative treatment for bacterial meningitis, a serious infection that can lead to sepsis. The study is published in Nature Communications.
The biomolecule ribonucleic acid (RNA) is pivotal to cell function. RNA plays various roles in determining how the information in our genes drives cell behavior. One of its roles is to carry information encoded by our genes from the cell nucleus to the rest of the cell where it can be acted on by other cell components. Thanks to a program supported by the National Institutes of Health, researchers have now defined how RNA also participates in transmitting information outside cells, known as extracellular RNA or exRNA.
Light physical activity such as gardening, strolling through a park, and folding clothes might be enough to significantly lower the risk of cardiovascular disease among women 63 and older, a new study has found. This kind of activity, researchers said, appears to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease events such as stroke or heart failure by up to 22 percent, and the risk of heart attack or coronary death, by as much as 42 percent.
A sound, a smell, a word can all flood our minds with memories of past experiences. In a study of epilepsy patients, researchers at the National Institutes of Health found that split seconds before we recall these events tiny electrical waves, called ripples, may flow through key parts of our brains that help store our memories, setting the stage for successful retrieval.
Researchers say a widely-used antifungal drug may hold promise for treating people with cystic fibrosis, a life-threatening genetic disorder that causes serious damage to the lungs. In studies using human cells and animals models, the researchers found that the medication, called amphotericin, helps lung cells function in a way that could make it easier for patients to fight chronic bacterial lung infections that are a hallmark of the disease.
Researchers have identified changes in brain connectivity and brain activity during rest and reward anticipation in children with anhedonia, a condition where people lose interest and pleasure in activities they used to enjoy. The study, by scientists at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), part of the National Institutes of Health, sheds light on brain function associated with anhedonia and helps differentiate anhedonia from other related aspects of psychopathology.
An analysis of a previous study has found more evidence to support giving the steroid betamethasone to pregnant women at risk of late-preterm delivery (between 34 and 36 weeks of gestation), according to a network funded by the National Institutes of Health. Hospital stays for infants whose mothers received the drug cost less on average, compared to stays for infants whose mothers did not take the drug. The study appears in JAMA Pediatrics.
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