A revered contemplative practice for centuries, meditation has recently inspired research into its therapeutic value for everything from anxiety disorders to heart attack prevention. A painful, progressive autoimmune disease, rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is associated with a high risk of depression—double the risk of the healthy population, by conservative estimates—and various forms of psychological distress.
The world’s most common joint disease, osteoarthritis (OA) is a major cause of disability among adults over the age of 50. Whether physical activity is beneficial or detrimental to weight-bearing joints, knees in particular, has been open to debate. Some studies implicate physical activity in provoking knee OA, while others suggest that physical activity may actually protect the knee joint from the disease.
Determining the genetic profile of a particular lung tumor can help clinicians make the crucial decision about which chemotherapy treatment to try first.
A painful and debilitating condition that affects patients with kidney failure may be more common than previously believed and appears to be strongly associated with prior exposure to certain contrast agents used in imaging studies. In addition, individuals with this syndrome – called nephrogenic systemic fibrosis (NSF) – appear to have a significantly increased risk of dying.
A new study finds that young girls and women are more likely to believe that negative past events predict future events, compared to boys and men. And that, according to researchers, may help explain why females have more frequent and intense worries, perceive more risk, have greater intolerance for uncertainty, and experience higher rates of anxiety than males.
The types of friendships adolescents have often reflect their childhood relationships and predict how they do in the future. In a new study, researchers found that antisocial teenagers’ friendships tend to involve less listening, eye contact, and responsiveness, and that these teens spend more time talking about deviant topics such as substance abuse and breaking the law.
A hallmark of human nature is the ability to share information and to comprehend the thoughts and intentions of others. This capability involves social cognition (the cognitive processes involved in social interaction) and makes a significant contribution to the foundations for language development, as well as social competence. It also sets us apart from other primates.
Researchers at the National Institutes of Health have found that more than 50 percent of the current asthma cases in the country can be attributed to allergies, with approximately 30 percent of those cases attributed to cat allergy.
People with heart disease should take special precautions before undergoing any kind of surgery, even noncardiac surgery, to reduce their risk of a cardiac event, according to new joint guidelines from the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association.
Giardia lamblia, one of the most common human parasites in the United States, causes more than 20,000 intestinal infections a year, often through contact with contaminated drinking or swimming water. In the Sept. 28 issue of Science, an international team led by researchers at the MBL describe the complete genome (genetic sequence) of Giardia, which could lead to the development of new drugs to combat this persistent infection, called giardiasis.