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Magazine
In the Sept. 29 SN: Tomorrow’s burger, inside three big physics experiments, enterovirus outbreak patterns, Jupiter’s wacky magnetism, crop pests like it warm, firefly flashing methods and more.
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News
Pregnant women’s use of opioids is on the rise
08/09/2018 - 16:00 Health, Human DevelopmentPregnant women aren’t immune to the escalating opioid epidemic.
Data on hospital deliveries in 28 U.S. states shows the rate of opioid use among pregnant women has quadrupled, from 1.5 per 1,000 women in 1999 to 6.5 per 1,000 women in 2014, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports.
The highest increases in opioid use among pregnant women were in Maine, New Mexico...
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News
Human brains make new nerve cells — and lots of them — well into old age
04/05/2018 - 14:50 Neuroscience, Human Development, CellsYour brain might make new nerve cells well into old age.
Healthy people in their 70s have just as many young nerve cells, or neurons, in a memory-related part of the brain as do teenagers and young adults, researchers report in the April 5 Cell Stem Cell. The discovery suggests that the hippocampus keeps generating new neurons throughout a person’s life.
The finding contradicts a...
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Feature
How to build a human brain
02/20/2018 - 15:30 Human DevelopmentIn a white lab coat and blue latex gloves, Neda Vishlaghi peers through a light microscope at six milky-white blobs. Each is about the size of a couscous grain, bathed in the pale orange broth of a petri dish. With tweezers in one hand and surgical scissors in the other, she deftly snips one tiny clump in half.
When growing human brains, sometimes you need to do some pruning.
The...
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Scicurious
Even brain images can be biased
12/15/2017 - 07:00 Neuroscience, Human DevelopmentAn astonishing number of things that scientists know about brains and behavior are based on small groups of highly educated, mostly white people between the ages of 18 and 21. In other words, those conclusions are based on college students.
College students make a convenient study population when you’re a researcher at a university. It makes for a biased sample, but one that’s still...
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50 years ago, folate deficiency was linked to birth defects
11/30/2017 - 07:00 Human Development, HealthFolic acid
Pregnant women who do not have enough folic acid — a B vitamin — in their bodies can pass the deficiency on to their unborn children. It may lead to retarded growth and congenital malformation, according to Dr. A. Leonard Luhby…. “Folic acid deficiency in pregnant women could well constitute a public health problem of dimensions we have not originally recognized,” he says...
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News
Animal study reveals how a fever early in pregnancy can cause birth defects
10/18/2017 - 14:00 Health, Human DevelopmentCertain birth defects of the face and heart can occur when babies’ mothers have a fever during the first trimester of pregnancy, a crucial time in an embryo’s development. Now scientists have figured out the molecular players that make it so.
In an experiment with chicken embryos, a temporary rise in incubation temperature — meant to mimic feverlike conditions — was enough to produce...
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Feature
Birth control research is moving beyond the pill
08/22/2017 - 12:30 Health, Human DevelopmentMention “the pill,” and only one kind of drug comes to mind. The claim that oral contraceptives have on that simple noun testifies to the pill’s singular effect in the United States. Introduced in 1960, the pill gave women reliable access to birth control for the first time. The opportunity to delay having children opened the door to higher education and professional careers for many women....
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News
Drinking sugary beverages in pregnancy linked to kids’ later weight gain
07/10/2017 - 00:05 Health, Human DevelopmentAn expectant mom might want to think twice about quenching her thirst with soda.
The more sugary beverages a mom drank during mid-pregnancy, the heavier her kids were in elementary school compared with kids whose mothers consumed less of the drinks, a new study finds. At age 8, boys and girls weighed approximately 0.25 kilograms more — about half a pound — with each serving mom added per...
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News
African farmers’ kids conquer the marshmallow test
06/19/2017 - 07:00 Psychology, Human DevelopmentChildren of Nso farmers in Cameroon know how to master the marshmallow test, which has tempted away the self-control of Western kids for decades.
In a direct comparison on this delayed gratification task, Cameroonian youngsters leave middle-class German children in the dust when challenged to resist a reachable treat while waiting for another goodie, a new study finds.
Of 76 Nso 4-...
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News
For humans, the appeal of looking at faces starts before birth
06/08/2017 - 12:00 Human DevelopmentFascination with faces is nature, not nurture, suggests a new study of third-trimester fetuses.
Scientists have long known that babies like looking at faces more than other objects. But research published online June 8 in Current Biology offers evidence that this preference develops before birth. In the first-ever study of prenatal visual perception, fetuses were more likely to move...