news 2016

Researchers at the MRC Centre for Virus Research at the University of Glasgow will be working with a team at the Research Center Aggeu Magalhães at the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, Pernambuco, Brazil after receiving a joint award of around £300,000 to fund research into the Zika virus. The main objective of the project is to study the presence and epidemiology of the Zika virus in Brazil and to understand how the immune system of people infected with the virus responds to the infection.

Understanding the textures and patterns of pancakes is helping UCL scientists improve surgical methods for treating glaucoma. The appearance of pancakes depends on how water escapes the batter mix during the cooking process and this varies with the thickness of the batter, according to new UCL research.

Ocean acidification (the ongoing decrease in the pH of the Earth's oceans, caused by the uptake of CO2 from the atmosphere), is affecting the formation of the skeleton of coralline algae which play an important part in marine biodiversity, new research from the University of Bristol has found. Coralline red algae form maerl beds which provide important habitat in shallow waters, including the UK coastal shelf.

Researchers from King's College London and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute have for the first time demonstrated a direct link between the Wbp2 gene and progressive hearing loss. The scientists found that loss of Wbp2 expression led to progressive high-frequency hearing loss in mice as well as in two clinical cases of children with deafness with no other obvious features.

A new art display to showcase how patients and clinicians are working with researchers to improve cancer care has been launched at a special event. The Imperial Butterfly Artwork Installation: Bringing Research to the Clinic is an art installation of 250 ceramic pieces in the waiting area of Clinic 8, an out-patient cancer clinic at Charing Cross Hospital, part of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust.

The rate that fish are captured by predators can double when boats are motoring nearby, according to pioneering work led by the University of Exeter and co-authored by the University of Bristol, published today in Nature. Dr Stephen Simpson of Exeter's Biosciences department and an international research team, including Bristol's Dr Andy Radford , found that noise from passing motorboats increases stress levels in young coral reef fish and reduces their ability to flee from predators.

Scientists from the University of Liverpool have taken a step closer to understanding how tendon injuries in animals and humans could be prevented. For the first time, the team from the Institutes of Ageing and Chronic Disease and Integrative Biology , in collaboration with researchers at Queen Mary University of London, were able to show how the types of proteins differ in parts of the tendon, and importantly how this changes as the tendon ages.

Tumours kill off surrounding cells to make room to grow, according to new research from the University of Cambridge. Although the study was carried out using fruit flies, its findings suggest that drugs to prevent, rather than encourage, cell death might be effective at fighting cancer - contrary to how many of the current chemotherapy drugs work.

Part of the immune system that drills into invading bacteria and splits them open has been visualised in nanoscopic detail, with surprising results. Membrane attack complexes (MACs) are structures made of proteins that assemble in the body when an infection is detected. They latch on to the membranes of invading bacteria, such as meningitis, and punch a hole in them.

Researchers have built the first biologically realistic mathematical model of how the brain plans and learns when faced with a complex decision-making process. By combining planning and learning into one coherent model, we've made what is probably the most comprehensive model of complex decision-making to date Johannes Friedrich Researchers have constructed the first comprehensive model of how neurons in the brain behave when faced with a complex decision-making process, and how they adapt and learn from mistakes.

Only two per cent of patients with life-threatening bleeding after serious injury receive optimal blood transfusion therapy in England and Wales, according to research led by Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) and NHS Blood and Transplant. The NIHR-funded study estimates that nearly 5,000 trauma patients sustain major haemorrhage in England and Wales each year and that one-third of those die.

Scientists have revealed that protein clumps associated with Alzheimer's disease are also found in the brains of people who have had a head injury. Although previous research has shown that these clumps, called amyloid plaques, are present shortly after a brain injury - this study shows the plaques are still present over a decade after the injury.

The first ever Britain-wide assessment of the value of wild flowers as food for pollinators, led by the University of Bristol, shows that decreasing resources mirror the decline of pollinating insects, providing new evidence to support the link between plant and pollinator decline. In recent years, there have been considerable concerns over threats to wild bees and other insect pollinators which are vital to the success of important food crops and wild flowers.

It has long been argued that women are under-represented and marginalised in relation to men in the world's news media. New research, using artificial intelligence (AI), has analysed over two million articles to find out how gender is represented in online news. The study, which is the largest undertaken to date, found men's views and voices are represented more in online news than women's.

Survey finds local authorities falling short on respite care There are serious failings in the accessibility and accuracy of short break statements among local authorities in England, according to new research by the University. Short breaks or respite care is an important support service that allows families and disabled children to have time apart.

Oxford scientists have for the first time been able to identify the origins of some severe disease-causing mutations within the testicles of normal men. This discovery will help our understanding of how certain serious genetic disorders can occur in the offspring of healthy parents, who do not themselves have the genetic defect.

Oxford University scientists researching PAD4, a protein that plays a role in the development of inflammatory diseases like arthritis and which is regularly found in cancers have uncovered the protein's role in cancer development. Their results are published online by the journal Science Advances . Peptidyl arginine deiminase 4 (PAD4) is an enzyme that plays a role in genetic expression - turning our genetic code into functional products in the body.

New research using Artificial Intelligence finds men's views and voices more prominent than women's It has long been argued that women are under-represented and marginalised in relation to men in the world's news media. New research, by Bristol and Cardiff universities, using artificial intelligence (AI), has analysed over two million articles to find out how gender is represented in online news.

Not only is Greenland's melting ice sheet adding huge amounts of water to the oceans, it could also be unleashing 400,000 metric tons of phosphorus every year - as much as the mighty Mississippi River releases into the Gulf of Mexico, according to a new study. Phosphorus is a key nutrient that could, if it reaches the open ocean, enrich waters of the Arctic Ocean, potentially stimulating growth of the marine food chain.

New technique will make blood transfusions easier At the moment blood can only be stored for up to 42 days without freezing techniques Current freezing techniques can damage red blood cells Scientists have developed a new approach for the long-term storage of biological tissue and blood samples making blood transfusions easier.