Your favorite music can send your brain into a pleasure overload

We all know that moment when we're in the car, at a concert or even sitting on our sofa and one of our favorite songs is played. It's the one that has that really good chord in it, flooding your system with pleasurable emotions, joyful memories, making your hair stand on edge, and even sending a shiver or "chill" down your spine. About half of people get chills when listening to music. Neuroscientists based in France have now used EEG to link chills to multiple brain regions involved in activating reward and pleasure systems. The results are published in Frontiers in Neuroscience.

Rapid prototyping: Testing heavy equipment in software

The process of developing new generations of commercial vehicles and heavy equipment is complex. The hardware-in-the-loop technique gives researchers at Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft the opportunity to reproduce and virtually test machines in a software simulation, making machine development faster and more affordable. This technology also enables the testing of malfunctions and critical borderline situations without endangering people or the machine.

Proteogenomic study on circulating proteins gives new insights for translational studies, drug development

A new paper from the international SCALLOP consortium, led from Karolinska Institutet in collaboration with Pfizer Research and Development, shows that differences in plasma protein biomarker levels are controlled by hundreds of genetic variants across the human genome, and that these insights can be used to predict which drug targets that are likely to be effective future medicines. The study has been published in the October issue of Nature Metabolism.

New method shows potential for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease

In Alzheimer's disease, a protein (peptide) forms clumps in the brain and causes sufferers to lose their memory. In a recently published article, a research group at Uppsala University described a new treatment method that increases the body's own degradation of the building blocks that lead to these protein clumps.

Focus on COVID-19 deaths in under-65s for better insights into infection rates across populations, say researchers

Simply comparing the total number of deaths across countries may provide a misleading representation of the underlying level of transmission of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, because of large differences in reported COVID-19 death rates in elderly populations in different countries.

Hospitals plan to meet urgent need for post COVID-19 rehabilitation

As more people survive COVID-19 hospitalization, the need for rehabilitation may become increasingly important, according to a new study by Harvard Medical School researchers published in PM&R .

Asian-Australians hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic

More than four in five Asian-Australians say they have experienced instances of discrimination during the COVID-19 pandemic, new analysis from The Australian National University (ANU) shows.

COVID-19 lockdowns cause polio spike in Pakistan

A spike in the number of polio cases in Pakistan—the last refuge of the virus in the world along with neighboring Afghanistan—is being attributed by health experts to disruption in vaccination services caused by lockdowns and restrictions against spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Boosting the capacity of supercapacitors

Carefully designed covalent organic frameworks could make supercapacitor electrodes that have a greater ability to store electric charge.

The role of the sun in the spread of viral respiratory diseases

Why do most viral epidemics spread cyclically in autumn and winter in the globe's temperate regions? According to an interdisciplinary team of researchers of the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics, the University of Milan, the Lombardy regional agency for the environment and the Don Gnocchi Foundation, the answer is intimately related to the sun. Their theoretical model shows that both the prevalence and evolution of epidemics are strongly correlated with the amount of daily solar irradiation that hits a given location on the Earth at a given time of the year. The work of the Italian team was recently published in the iScience journal.

More than half of the Dutch population expressed privacy concerns relating to the coronavirus app

According to research by University of Twente researchers, last summer, 68% of Dutch people were moderately to very concerned about possible privacy issues resulting from the type of information a coronavirus app collects. In addition to privacy-related concerns, many citizens were also worried that an app might create a false sense of security, potentially making people more careless. At present, the CoronaMelder app has already been downloaded by 3.6 million users.

Biomimicry control for COVID diagnostics

Containing the scourge of COVID-19 requires testing of individuals, and isolating those who test positive, together with recent contacts, so as to prevent further spread. It is therefore critical to ensure that testing is independently verified so as to assure its accuracy.

Why robots and artificial intelligence creep us out

People tend to accept robots with humanlike characteristics up to a point. Then, things get strangely uncomfortable.

Flexible and transparent electronics fabricated using a two-dimensional semiconductor

In recent years, engineers worldwide have been trying to create electronic components that are increasingly flexible and versatile, as this could enable the fabrication of more sophisticated devices and robotic systems, such as electronic skins (e-skins) or wearable sensors. The overall objective of this particular area of research is to develop flexible electronics that can be manufactured and implemented on a large scale, but that also exhibit a high device density and excellent performance.

Blood test predicts ovarian cancer better than previously thought

A blood test already available to GPs in the UK is more predictive of ovarian cancer than previously thought and could also help pick up other forms of cancer, according to new research published in PLOS Medicine today (Wednesday) and funded by Cancer Research UK and NIHR.

COVID-19 and public compliance

A new study, led by the University of St Andrews, sheds fresh light on the conditions under which people in groups follow the behavior of others, which can help understand human behavior in relation to COVID-19 restrictions.

Underlying design mechanism and morphology of humanized bone probed

A team of biomedical engineers from Australia and Germany studied how human and mouse cells communicate with each other and found that this humanized tissue is physiologically integrated into single functional bone tissue which retains species-specific ultrastructural differences.

Seven different 'disease forms' identified in mild COVID-19

In a study recently published in the journal Allergy, a team of MedUni Vienna scientists led by immunologist Winfried F. Pickl and allergologist Rudolf Valenta (both from the Center for Pathophysiology, Infectiology and Immunology) showed that there are seven forms of disease in COVID-19 with mild disease course, and that the disease leaves behind significant changes in the immune system, even after 10 weeks. These findings could play a significant role in the treatment of patients and in the development of a potent vaccine.

Abnormal blood pressure levels while sleeping increase risk of heart disease, stroke

People who experience high blood pressure while sleeping are more likely to experience future cardiovascular disease especially heart failure, even when their daytime blood pressure is within normal ranges, according to new research published today in the American Heart Association's flagship journal Circulation.

Europe imposes new virus curbs as exasperation, anger grows

Germany on Monday led a further tightening of coronavirus restrictions in Europe that have triggered anger and frustration across the continent, while the COVID-19 crisis in the United States deepened.

Ambitious but controversial: Japan's new hydrogen project

Japan's new 2050 deadline for carbon neutrality has thrown a spotlight on its efforts to find new, greener fuel options, including an ambitious but controversial liquid hydrogen venture.

Global coronavirus death toll tops 1.2 million

More than 1.2 million people have died of coronavirus around the globe, according to an AFP tally from official sources at 0745 GMT on Monday.

Biomarker combination predicts kidney injury in critically ill children

Researchers at the University of Liverpool have identified a unique method of identifying the early signs of a potentially serious condition known as Acute Kidney Injury (AKI).

Canada should approve HIV self-testing

Canada should integrate self-testing for HIV into the health system to help reduce the burden of the disease, argues a commentary published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal.