New Northwestern Medicine research on the brains of individuals 90 years and older who had superior memories until their deaths revealed widespread and dense Alzheimer’s plaques and tangles in some cases, considered full-blown Alzheimer’s pathology.
Critical legal, ethical, financial and political issues that affect high-profile litigation will be the focus during an upcoming conference hosted by Northwestern Law, Nov. 16 and 17 at the Law School. Wednesday afternoon features an interview with Chief Judge Diane Wood, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
A diverse group of Chicago journalists have received Social Justice News Nexus fellowships from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications. The fellows will report on environmental and energy justice over the next six months, producing in-depth investigative and immersive stories on topics including illegal dumping, air pollution monitoring, food deserts, renewable energy jobs, and contamination and industrial development in minority neighborhoods.
Northwestern University political science professors Alvin B. Tillery Jr., Jaime Dominguez and Laurel Harbridge are available to comment on the presidential election in its final stretch – early predictions, impact of Latino voters, what to make of tightening polls and more.
A Northwestern University study of the collaboration patterns sheds light on how the experiences of STEM female and male faculty vary. Researchers have found that female faculty (in six different disciplines) have as many collaborators, or co-authors, as male faculty and that female faculty tend to return to the same collaborators a little less than males. But they also found that females are underrepresented in large teams in genomics (a subdiscipline of molecular biology), which could indicate a negative cultural milieu.
Scientists have identified for the first time the region in the brain responsible for the “placebo effect” in pain relief, when a fake treatment actually results in substantial reduction of pain, according to new research from Northwestern Medicine and the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago (RIC). Pinpointing the sweet spot of the pain killing placebo effect could result in the design of more personalized medicine for the 100 million Americans with chronic pain.
What you tweet says a lot about your politics and who you are going to vote for in this highly volatile presidential election, according to TweetCast, an online tool developed by Northwestern University computer scientists. The algorithm, trained on Twitter users, can predict whether citizens will vote for Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. Perhaps more surprising, the tool also predicts which states will go blue or red (Democrat or Republican).
Northwestern University’s Mercouri Kanatzidis has received the 2016 Samson Prime Minister’s Prize for Innovation in Alternative Fuels for Transportation. Totaling $1 million, the Samson Prize is the world’s largest monetary prize awarded in the field of alternative fuels. Kanatzidis equally shares the prize with MIT’s Gregory Stephanopoulos. The two researchers are being honored for their innovative scientific contributions to alternative fuel development. Kanatzidis’ citation notes his “seminal contributions in the design of nanostructured thermoelectric materials, which convert heat to electricity.”
Sir Fraser Stoddart, Board of Trustees Professor of Chemistry in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern University, today (Oct. 5) was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.
Northwestern University scientists have discovered a new pathway in the brain that can be manipulated to alleviate depression. The pathway offers a promising new target for developing a drug that could be effective in individuals for whom other antidepressants have failed.
A Northwestern University research team has developed a 3-D printable ink that produces a synthetic bone implant that rapidly induces bone regeneration and growth. This hyperelastic “bone” material, whose shape can be easily customized, one day could be especially useful for the treatment of bone defects in children. Antibiotics also can be incorporated into the ink to reduce infection. The printed biomaterial’s many unique properties set it apart from current bone repair materials.
Stress of racial discrimination may help explain racial/ethnic differences in achievement
The Northwestern University Center for Public Safety (NUCPS) is offering a two-day workshop on research-proven strategies for improving and strengthening police-community relations.
Relying on clinical symptoms of memory loss to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease may miss other forms of dementia caused by Alzheimer’s that don’t initially affect memory, reports a new study.
A research team led by a Northwestern University scientist has discovered that male animals, through their invisible chemical “essence,” prime female animals for reproduction but with the unfortunate side effect of also hastening females’ aging process.
A research team led by a Northwestern University scientist has discovered that male animals, through their invisible chemical “essence,” prime female animals for reproduction but with the unfortunate side effect of also hastening females’ aging process. The females sense the two signals and respond by altering their physiology. These findings in roundworms, which echo those made in mammalian studies, could lead to therapies that delay puberty and prolong fertility in humans as well as combat aging.
Women’s decreased ability to produce healthy eggs as they become older may be due to excessive scarring and inflammation in their ovaries, reports a new study in mice. This is the first study to show the ovarian environment ages and that aging affects the quality of eggs it produces. These findings could result in new treatments that preserve fertility by delaying ovarian aging.
The number of new cases of metastatic prostate cancer climbed 72 percent in the past decade from 2004 to 2013, reports a new Northwestern Medicine study. The authors suspect the recent trend of fewer men being screened and more aggressive disease may be contributing to the rise. The largest increase in new cases was among men 55 to 69 years old, which rose 92 percent in the past decade. This rise is troubling because men in this age group are believed to benefit most from prostate cancer screening and early treatment.
Two Northwestern University neuroscientists have identified the neurochemical signal likely missing in Parkinson’s disease by being the first to discover two distinctly different kinds of neurons that deliver dopamine to an important brain region responsible for both movement and learning/reward behavior. The findings provide a new framework for understanding the role of the dopamine system in movement control and learning/reward and how dysfunction of the dopamine system can result in a range of neurological disorders.
The OpEd Project’s Public Voices Fellowship, first launched at Northwestern five years ago, is seeking a new crop of underrepresented voices. First piloted at Yale, Stanford and Princeton universities, the international initiative is expanding across the country to increase the range of voices and the quality of ideas heard in the world.
Northwestern University will soon begin a search for the next dean of the School of Education and Social Policy (SESP). This individual will succeed Dean Penelope Peterson, who is retiring from Northwestern on Aug. 31, 2017.
The new window onto the universe just opened a little bit wider. For the second time in history, an international team of scientists, including Northwestern University astrophysicists and a laser scientist, has detected gravitational waves and a pair of colliding black holes. This time, the gravitational waves resulted in a longer signal, or chirp, providing more data. The higher-frequency gravitational waves from the lower-mass black holes of the second pair better spread across the LIGO detectors’ sweet spot of sensitivity.
Northwestern University astrophysicists have predicted history. They show their theoretical predictions last year were correct: The historic merger of two massive black holes detected Sept. 14, 2015, could easily have been formed through dynamic interactions in the star-dense core of an old globular cluster. These binary black holes are born in the cluster’s chaotic “mosh pit,” kicked out of the cluster and then eventually merge into one black hole. LIGO’s first detection of colliding black holes is perfectly consistent with the Northwestern model.
Crucial details were overlooked in the 40-year-old Florida murder case involving a man sentenced to death row for killing four people found in a furniture store, according to a new Medill Justice Project investigation.
Those who rage with frustration during a marital spat have an increased risk of cardiovascular problems such as chest pain or high blood pressure later in life, according to new research from Northwestern University and the University of California, Berkeley.
Exposure to bright light alters your metabolism, reports a new study. Scientists found bright light exposure increased insulin resistance compared to dim light exposure in both the morning and the evening. In the evening, bright light also caused higher peak glucose (blood sugar) levels. Over time, excess blood glucose can result in increased body fat, weight gain and a higher risk for diabetes.
A class of drug that inhibits estrogen production and is used to treat breast cancer has been found to quickly and effectively suppress dangerous brain seizures, according to a new Northwestern University study. The effect was profound, say the neuroscientists, who conducted the study in an animal model of status epilepticus, a condition characterized by a prolonged episode of seizure activity. The results show that clinically available drugs could be effective therapies for suppressing seizures in humans.
What should caregivers do when their loved one is checking in on social media at the bank, essentially announcing their whereabouts? What if they are posting too often or don’t remember making online purchases?
Most insects have dedicated sensory systems to detect water vapor in the air, but little has been known about how they work. Now, Northwestern University and Lund University (Sweden) researchers are the first to discover a sensory system that directly detects humidity. The scientists have identified key genes involved in the fruit fly’s ability to detect changes in external humidity, and they also discovered the sensory neurons -- the fly’s humidity receptors -- in a strange, small sac in the insect’s antennae.
Northwestern University professor James Spillane is available to talk about the ongoing debate over Common Core, including the decision by some states to drop the standards altogether.
Shakespearean-era recipes offer much more than the history of puddings and pies. They also capture a surprisingly creative and intellectually-rich world of the early modern English housewife, according to a new book by Northwestern University’s Wendy Wall.
Low-income families of children with food allergies spend 2.5 times more on emergency department and hospitalization costs nationally, according to new research. The dependence on emergency care means children with food allergies from low-income families may not be able to afford foods free of their food allergen, obtain epinephrine or see an allergist who would counsel them on prevention and management of their food allergies.
Finding the vulnerable points where HIV enters the female reproductive tract is like searching for needles in a haystack. But using the light of a firefly gene, scientists have solved that challenge by creating a glowing map of the very first cells to be infected with a HIV-like virus. In an animal model, scientists showed for the first time that HIV enters cells throughout the entire female reproductive tract, not just the cervix as previously thought. Now scientists know where to attack it.
In 1848, Louis Pasteur showed that molecules that are mirror images of each other had exactly opposite rotations of light. When mixed in solution, they cancel the effects of the other, and no rotation of light is observed. Now, a research team from Northwestern University and the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in France is the first to demonstrate that a mixture of mirror-image molecules crystallized in the solid state can be optically active.
A stunning explosion of zinc fireworks occurs when a human egg is activated by a sperm enzyme, and the size of these “sparks” is a direct measure of the quality of the egg and its ability to develop into an embryo. The discovery has potential to help doctors choose the best eggs to transfer during in vitro fertilization.
Coral reefs are early casualties of climate change, but not every coral reacts the same way to the stress of ocean warming. Northwestern University researchers have developed the first-ever quantitative “global index” detailing which of the world’s coral species are most susceptible to coral bleaching and most likely to die. Based on historical data, the index can be used to compare the bleaching responses of the world’s corals and to predict which corals may be most affected by future bleaching events.
Nate Silver’s improbably entertaining book on statistics and forecasting, “The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail -- but Some Don’t,” is Northwestern University’s One Book One Northwestern all-campus read for the 2016-17 academic year
Students in the inaugural class of Northwestern University’s innovative college prep program for Chicago students will tour top-tier universities over spring break, a significant milestone in their journey to higher education.
Sir Richard Blundell, the David Ricardo Professor of Political Economy at University College London, and János Kollár, the Donner Professor of Science and Professor of Mathematics at Princeton University, are the recipients of the prestigious 2016 Nemmers prizes in economics and mathematics, respectively. Northwestern University announced the recipients of the 2016 Erwin Plein Nemmers Prize in Economics and the 2016 Frederic Esser Nemmers Prize in Mathematics today. The prizes are awarded every other year in recognition of major contributions to new knowledge or the development of significant new modes of analysis.
The infant daughters of women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) show a higher level of an enzyme that activates testosterone and may be an early sign of developing the complex genetic disease, according to a new Northwestern Medicine study.
Genes are not destiny in determining whether a person will suffer from depression, reports a new study. Nurture can override nature. When rats genetically bred for depression received the equivalent of rat “psychotherapy,” their depressed behavior was alleviated. And, after the depressed rats had the therapy, some of their blood biomarkers for depression changed to non-depressed levels.
Northwestern University professor of screenwriting David E. Tolchinsky is available to comment on the emotional and physical power of ISIS recruiting videos.
Higher oxytocin levels in the third trimester of pregnancy predicts the severity of postpartum depression symptoms in women who previously suffered from depression, reports a new study. The finding indicates the potential for finding biomarkers to predict depressive symptoms postpartum and begin preventive treatment. Depression biomarkers should be screened in pregnancy, just like gestational diabetes, scientists said.
A new study provides a major link between low levels of vitamin D and aggressive prostate cancer. Northwestern Medicine research showed deficient vitamin D blood levels in men can predict aggressive prostate cancer identified at the time of surgery.
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