SciPod

Broadening Experiences in Scientific Training – or ‘BEST’ – is a program that aims to help biomedical students to explore and pursue expanded career options beyond traditional academic positions. While the program has been in place for a few years, the views of participating faculty members on the value of BEST’s career development initiatives had never been collected. To fill this gap, Dr Stephan...

Despite dramatic advances in neuroscience and biology in the 20th and 21st centuries, our understanding of the brain remains very limited. Dr Yan M Yufik , Head at Virtual Structures Research Inc, USA, is a physicist and cognitive scientist who has spent over 20 years combining experimental findings and theoretical concepts in domains as diverse as neuroscience and thermodynamics to form a theory...

Foreign animal disease outbreaks in livestock systems have far-reaching economic, trade and food security implications. Biosecurity strategies can enhance the resilience of livestock production; however, understanding the behaviors of people involved in agriculture is critical – and more challenging. In a new approach, an innovative US-wide project is integrating social science, human decision mak...

Dr Christine Pfund is a researcher at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA. With a strong network of colleagues and collaborators, her work focuses on developing, implementing, documenting, and studying interventions to optimise research mentoring relationships across science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine. Read on to discover how the success of these initiatives has resul...

Our kidneys are primarily responsible for filtering waste out of the body and into urine. However, with aging, kidney dysfunction begins to develop. Although no symptoms appear for years, this dysfunction can eventually progress to severe kidney failure. If caught early, the adverse outcomes of kidney dysfunction can be prevented. But unfortunately, the detection and management of kidney disease r...

Identifying students who are at risk of withdrawing from higher education is of key importance, as it allows educators to devise and implement intervention strategies that could support students in completing their studies. With this in mind, Dr Naif Radi Aljohani and his colleagues at King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia have recently devised a technique that could help to predict early drop...

Lifestyle factors and behavioural changes, such as diet modifications, are gaining interest as methods to modify or even prevent the global progression of chronic diseases, such as heart conditions and type 2 diabetes. Dr Konstantinos Makris (con-stan-teen-os Mah-kris), at the Cyprus International Institute for Environmental and Public Health within the Cyprus University of Technology, and his col...

Floods devastate communities across the globe. A single flood disaster can cause the loss of thousands of lives, and the displacement of millions of people. The devastating effect is exacerbated by the difficulty in monitoring floods and evaluating the information to make the best responsive decisions. To help communities and emergency response teams better predict and prepare for flooding events,...

Facilities for recycling metal parts at the locations they are required would be a major milestone in the global struggle towards sustainable industry. Yet for all its advantages, the innovations required to realise such a goal are a daunting prospect. Now, Andrew LaTour and his colleagues at MolyWorks Materials are bringing the idea one step closer to reality, through the development of their ‘Mo...

Amyloids are aggregates of polymerised proteins. The polymerised proteins do not fold as they should and adopt shapes that enable multiple copies to stick together. In humans, these clusters of proteins form fibrils and the presence of these amyloid protein clusters are associated with disease pathologies. In a recent study, Dr Sidharth Mahapatra and colleagues at Stanford University assessed thei...

The use of radiation therapy to treat cancer has improved the long-term outcome of thousands of patients but is associated with serious side effects. Photodynamic therapy (PDT), a targeted light-based technique, has been approved as an effective treatment for some forms of cancer with fewer side effects than radiotherapy. However, the effectiveness of this technique depends on fine-tuning its appl...

Because of growing international trade, increasing numbers of invasive pest insects are being transported throughout the world. If they become established, invasive insects can have enormous impacts on agriculture, human health and natural ecosystems. However, it can be difficult to control them without causing further damage to the surrounding environment. Dr Robert K. Vander Meer of the USDA Agr...

Global Navigation Satellite Systems such as GPS are the backbone of many global communications, but they are not immune to failure. Progeny Systems Corporation is dedicated to mitigating such disasters if and when satellite-based communications fail, by developing Earth-based systems that work in comparable ways to synchronised satellite networks. As an alternative to GPS, the company’s technology...

Dogs are renowned for their status as man’s best friend. Based first at the University of Colorado and now at the University of Minnesota in the Twin Cities, Dr Jaime Modiano and his team have spent the last 25 years trying to understand how cancer develops at a basic level, aiming to use this knowledge to improve the health and wellbeing of both humans and their companion animals.

In recent years, dramatic advances have been made in brain science and molecular genetics. However, there is currently a shortage of psychiatrists with the scientific training necessary to take this knowledge and apply it in the clinic. Psychiatrist and neuroscience researcher, Dr Susan Voglmaier of the University of California, San Francisco, runs a research training program that supports the nex...

Both diabetic adults and premature babies are at risk for a similar type of eye disease that involves the growth of abnormal, blood vessels in the retina, the photosensitive layer of the eye. When this eye disease occurs in diabetics, it is called diabetic retinopathy and when it occurs in premature infants, it is called retinopathy of prematurity. The pathologic vessels, seen in both of these dis...

When an artery becomes blocked or damaged, a mechanical scaffold called a stent is often implanted into the vessel to improve blood flow. However, metallic stents can cause re-narrowing at the sites where they are implanted. This process is known as restenosis, which can lead to lethal complications. Dr York Hsiang , Professor of Surgery at the University of British Columbia, and his team use micr...

Robots that assist us with both everyday and highly specialised tasks are no new concept, but so far, their actual development has appeared to be far from becoming a reality. Yet through the research of Dr Paul Robertson , Chief Scientist at Dynamic Object Language Labs (DOLL) in Massachusetts, such sophisticated technology is now looking increasingly feasible. By considering how robots can be pro...

Schizophrenia is a serious psychiatric disorder that affects around 1% of the global population, producing debilitating symptoms that significantly impact upon the quality of life of sufferers. Even with treatment, prognosis is often poor with a high risk of relapse. Dr Samuel Clark of Terran Biosciences Inc and colleagues at Stony Brook University, New York, are investigating the potential of blo...

There are numerous health benefits related to eating fibre-containing foods, including lowering the levels of serum glucose and lipids, thus reducing the risk of type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Furthermore, by creating an increased feeling of fullness, eating fibre-rich foods reduces caloric intake and obesity. Professor Douglas Goff from the University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada, researches th...

Mental health conditions such as anxiety disorders significantly impact on the quality of life of sufferers, their physical health and psycho-social functioning. Given the high prevalence and extent of impairment inflicted on affected individuals, the economic cost to public health is substantial. Professor Christine Larson at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA, seeks to identify new and m...

According to the World Health Organisation, between 5 and 10 million people die globally of kidney disease each year. There has been an important shift towards recognising chronic kidney disease (CKD) as a major public health problem that requires early management. Protein energy wasting is a maladaptive metabolic state resulting in severe malnutrition and one of the major causes of CKD-related de...

Corrosion and scaling processes in water heating and cooling systems can create the need for hugely costly repairs. Until now, however, techniques to monitor the extent of the damage they inflict have been severely limited. In a 2013 study, Dr Oliver Opel and his colleagues at Leuphana University of Luenburg in Germany made significant strides towards tackling the issue by devising a method to acc...

New advances in neural engineering have led to devices that can be operated using the nerves of the user, but the effectiveness and safety of these devices over long periods of use is a key concern. Professor Dominique Durand , Director of the Neural Engineering Center at Case Western Reserve University, leads a team of scientists looking to improve neuroprosthetics through developing new methods...

As we develop ever more complex medical diagnostic tools and tests with ever increasing sensitivity, detection of disease becomes quicker and easier. However, recent work by Professor Wendy Rogers at Macquarie University in Australia and her team of international colleagues shows that the early detection of some cancers is not as beneficial as we might first think. Their work looks at the negative...