violent video games

Video game

Researchers reported that the college students and the type of video games they played may cause to parallel risky drug and alcohol use as well as inferior personal relationships & low levels of self-esteem.

The students who were 20-22 years old on average & mostly received course credit for their study participation, also recounted their drug and alcohol use, perceptions of self-worth and social acceptance, and the quality of their relationships with friends and family.

For example, compared with young women, young men reported video gaming three times as often and reported playing violent video games nearly eight times as often. Young men were also more likely to use the Internet for entertainment, daily headline news, and pornography, while young women more often used the Internet for email and schoolwork. However, regardless of gender, clear correlations were seen between frequent gaming and more frequent alcohol and drug use and lower quality personal relationships, as well as more frequent violent gaming and a greater number of sexual partners and low quality personal relationships.

The investigators linked similar negative outcomes with Internet use for chat rooms, shopping, entertainment, and pornography, but a contrasting "plethora of positive outcomes" with Internet use for schoolwork. Continued analyses of video game and Internet use should improve the overall understanding of health and development among emerging young adults, she and colleagues note.

Hormone

Postpartum depression

Researchers said, spiking & sinking levels of a hormone that prepares a pregnant woman may tells why some women suffer postpartum depression. In a research more then of 500 women, researchers at the University of California, Irvine, found 200 out of 250 women who had postpartum depression also had high levels of a hormone circulating in the placenta midway through pregnancy.

Corticotropin releasing hormone (CRH), is normally produced in tiny amounts by the hypothalamus near the brain in response to stress. In pregnant women, the placenta pumps out 100 times more CRH than is normally produced by the hypothalamus. The hormone has been nicknamed the "placental clock" because it is thought to prepare the woman's body for childbirth. CRH triggers a cascade of reactions in the pituitary and adrenal glands that culminates in increased output of stress hormones like cortisol.

Previous research suggested an overactive stress response plays a role in heart disease, Alzheimer's disease and autoimmune disorders. Stress hormones produced by a dysfunctional endocrine system may also trigger mental disorders like depression.

Postpartum depression strikes those who experience the biggest change in the hormone levels. Women who had high levels of CRH 25 weeks into their pregnancy were more likely to experience postpartum depression. Postpartum depression affects as many as 1 in 5 women 4 to six weeks after childbirth, and 7% of new mothers suffer a major depression. If not addressed, women can become so despondent they attempt suicide, and some harm or neglect their newborns. Previous bouts of depression, a lack of social support, low self-esteem and a stressful pregnancy all increase the likelihood of postpartum depression, according to the study, which appeared in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

The report suggested that a routine blood screening, which would coincide with a commonly performed prenatal diabetes test, could determine levels of the hormone at around 25 weeks to identify women at risk.

Older women

Older women better

Researchers reported that older mothers have better job of raising their children than younger mother do. In a research they studied that, 30 years of data to show that calves born to the oldest killer whales were 10% more likely to survive the critical first year of life than calves born to younger mothers.

Eric Ward of the Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Seattle and colleagues wrote in the journal Frontiers in Zoology:"Older mothers appear to be better mothers, producing calves with higher survival rates."

Killer whale females become mature at around 15 & stop reproducing at around 40. For years researchers thought humans were the only creatures that had evolved menopause, and one theory was that having a healthy and unencumbered grandmother around to help take care of the babies benefited babies and mothers alike.

But killer whales, Orcinus orca, also have menopause. The mammals live long lives, with males living up to 50 years and females living to be as old as 90.

Ward's team used 30 years of data on the charismatic black-and-white carnivores to see which mothers did the best at raising calves.

Older females may be more successful in raising young because of maternal experience, or they may allocate more effort to their offspring relative to younger females.

Earth-hunter telescope

Earth-hunter telescope prepared for launch

NASA unveiled a modest telescope with a sweeping mission to discover if there are any Earth-type planets orbiting distant stars.

Though astronomers have found more than 330 planets circling stars in other solar systems, none has the size and location that is believed to be key to supporting life. Named after the 17th century astronomer who figured out the motions of planets, Kepler is scheduled for liftoff on March 5 aboard an unmanned Delta 2 rocket from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

Once in position trailing Earth in orbit, Kepler will spend at least 3 1/2 years focused on a star-rich patch of sky between the constellations Cygnus and Lyra.

Equipped with a 95 megapixel camera the largest ever flown in space Kepler will attempt to find Earth-sized planets flying across the face of their parent stars.

Scientists say it will be a bit like trying to spot a gnat in the glare of a floodlight.

To an outside observer, a planet as large as Jupiter temporarily blots out about 1% of visible light from the sun as it makes its transit. Passage of Earth-like worlds produce a change in brightness of about 84 parts in a million.

Kepler will need to keep extraordinarily still for weeks at a time, breaking its gaze only once a month for 12-hour radio linkups with Earth. Data from 170,000 target stars will be relayed for scientists on the ground to analyze.

The selected stars are just a fraction of the estimated 4 million objects that will fall within Kepler's view, but scientists want to maximize the telescope's observing time to make sure they catch as many blinking stars as possible.

To find a planet like Earth, scientists will need to catch at least four transits, a process that will take about 3 1/2 years. Ground-based telescopes will be used to verify results.

No one knows how many stars have solid-body planets like Earth orbiting in what are called habitable zones, places where liquid water can exist.

Water is believed to be crucial for life, although that evidence is based on a sample of one Earth.

Breast cancer

New tool predicts women's outcome in breast cancer

Canadian researchers said, evaluating how various proteins interact in tumors can help predict a woman's chances of surviving breast cancer.

Knowing from the outset that a particular woman's prognosis is bad could allow doctors to give her aggressive treatment right away, but often it is difficult to know which breast cancer patients will do well and which will not.

The researchers analyzed networks of proteins chemical compounds vital in cellular processes in breast cancer tissue from about 400 women in the US & Europe. They found that women who survived the disease had a different organization of the network of proteins within the cancer cells than those who died.

The researchers observed 30,000 protein interactions involving about 8,000 proteins, then identified a core group of about 250 proteins most important in forecasting patient survival. Many of them regulate the actions of other proteins.

If a newly diagnosed patient has protein interactions that suggest a bad outcome, a doctor could give more aggressive treatment through surgery, chemotherapy and radiation.

Mount Sinai Hospital has a patent on the process and the researchers have formed a Toronto-based company called DyNeMo Biosystems to explore commercial applications.

Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer death among women worldwide, with about 465,000 dying annually.