The health of about half of the world’s Indigenous peoples – 28 populations in 23 countries from the Arctic through to Oceania – have been mapped out in a recent study out of Australia. This global health map includes Indigenous peoples from Africa, Pakistan, India, Nepal, China, Thailand, Myanmar, the Americas, Scandinavia, Circumpolar Russia, Greenland, […]
Posts by SMCCadmin (SMCCadmin)
This is why you feel groggy after sleeping in a new place
When sleeping in an unfamiliar environment, half of your brain doesn’t really sleep. Instead, that hemisphere stays awake to “guard” against potential threats. In a new study, researchers from Brown University monitored the brain activity of 35 people in a sleep lab over the course of two nights. The first night sleeping in the new […]
Tweet louder, I can’t hear you: Highway noise disrupts information transfer between bird species
Communication between birds is disrupted near major roadways, where the noise levels are unnaturally high. According to new research from University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, this avian communication breakdown may help explain the pattern of reduced biodiversity near highways. Authors of the new study were curious about how building homes in […]
Dinosaur population doomed millions of years before the asteroid
The dinosaurs were on their way out before the asteroid hit, researchers say. It seems the big lizards’ numbers were gradually declining for at least 40 million years before the final extinction event. This decrease in dinosaur population likely favoured the rise of mammals, which began flourishing in ecological niches previously occupied by dinosaurs. Using […]
Warmer labs for mice make for more accurate cancer research results
New research shows that keeping laboratory mice warmer could mean more realistic results in cancer research studies. Lab temperatures are often 4-10 degrees colder that the toasty 30 degrees Celsius preferred by mice. Authors of a new study out of Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, New York, suggest the mice use more energy to […]
Mingling lab and pet store mice helps mimic human-like immune system
Letting lab mice mix with their pet-store cousins may help future research by better mimicking adult human immune systems, according to the results of a new study. Normally, adult lab mice live in abnormally clean environments, which means their immune systems rarely get exposed to different types of bacteria and viruses. Mice in a pet […]
A missing piece in the North American monkey puzzle
Fossilized monkey teeth, found during the expansion of the Panama Canal, suggest that monkeys arrived in Central and North America much earlier than previously thought. Researchers believed that monkeys did not reach Central America until a strip of land between North and South America, called the Isthmus of Panama, formed 3.5 million years ago. But […]
Ancestors of modern birds saved by seeds 
The secret of survival for bird-like dinosaurs was simple: eating seeds. The reason behind the survival of the ancestors of modern birds has puzzled researchers for years, and a recent Canadian study of fossil dinosaur teeth may have provided the answer. According to a new hypothesis from dinosaur specialists at the Philip J. Currie Dinosaur […]
Palliative care viewed as a stigma, despite improving quality of life
Canadians with cancer and their caregivers, associate “palliative care” with impending death, and consequently are not taking advantage of the benefits early palliative care can bring to a patients’ quality of life, according to the authors of a new study. Originally, in the 1960s, palliative care referred to end-of-life care, mainly for cancer patients. The […]
Biologics and Biosimilars | SMCC Webinar
Biologics and Biosimilars | SMCC Webinar | January 7, 2016 | Video available Biopharmaceuticals, or Biologics have successfully improved the care of several hard to treat conditions, such as rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn’s disease and cancer. More of these complex biological drugs are coming. In the US over 900 biologics are being developed for more than 100 diseases. While they […]
Une mutation génétique à l’origine d’une maladie rare qui frappe les Inuits au Québec
Des chercheurs ont identifié la mutation génétique responsable d’une maladie rare qui frappe 1 Inuits sur 2500 dans le nord du Québec. Cette maladie nommée glycogénose type IIIa cause des hypoglycémies et des retards de croissance tout en s’attaquant aux muscles et au foie. Pour ce faire, les auteurs ont séquencé le génome de 5 enfants inuits et ont identifié […]
Une langue se diversifie même dans une population isolée
L’évolution d’une langue suit l’évolution génétique d’une population donnée au fil du temps révèle une nouvelle étude. Toutefois, une langue peut changer de manière spontanée dans des populations isolées. Comme les gènes qui changent au cours du temps par le processus des mutations, les phonèmes qui composent une langue, comme le son /k/ dans “cou” et “kiwi”, peuvent […]
Fossil discovered by young boy in PEI shines light on the origin of turtles
Researchers have discovered a new genus and species of reptile from a 300-million-year-old fossil from Prince Edward Island. The fossil was found in PEI by a young boy and its family, and the species was named in his family’s honour, Erpetonyx arsenaultorum. This discovery indicates that reptiles at the end of this era were more […]
Facebook could know you better than your spouse
If you have 100 or more Likes on Facebook then your computer believes it knows you better than the average person, and if you have 300 or more, then it believes it could know you better than even your spouse. Researchers analysed both individuals’ responses to a personality questionnaire and obtained information on Facebook […]
If you’re outgoing, so is your avatar
Judging someone’s personality is no easy task, especially when all you can see is an avatar and not the real person. However, new research suggests that people can make some accurate personality judgements after seeing customized avatars, at least for some people. The researchers found that outgoing and sociable individuals typically create avatars that communicate […]
For sleeping children, quality is more important than quantity
For young children, the quality of sleep may be more important than the duration of sleep when it comes it academic performance, according to a new study. The researchers found that a high percentage of time in bed spent sleeping influenced positively a child’s grades in math, English, and French as a second language, while […]