According to the public databases, there are currently approximately 1,900 locations in the human genome that produce microRNAs (miRNAs), the small and powerful non-coding molecules that regulate numerous cellular processes by reducing the abundance of their targets. New research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) this week adds another roughly 3,400 such locations to that list. Many of the miRNA molecules that are produced from these newly discovered locations are tissue-specific and also human-specific. The finding has big implications for research into how miRNAs drive disease.

In a symposium on social psychology, psychologists are challenging the beliefs of other psychologists about the effectiveness of traditional strategies for encouraging healthy eating. 

A paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association observed whether or not photographs of vegetables on a school lunch tray had an impact on the amount of vegetables eaten. The study found that placing photos of carrots and green beans did increase the amounts of vegetables eaten during lunch, but it still was not at levels consistent with government-recommended dietary guidelines. 

A volunteer receives a trial Ebola vaccine at the Centre for Clinical Vaccinology and Tropical Medicine in Oxford, southern England January 16, 2015. Eddie Keogh/Reuters

Recently, Phase II and III trials of two vaccines for Ebola started in West Africa. The development of possible vaccines is welcome news. Like most vaccine trials, the current Ebola trials are being conducted under ethical guidelines derived from US standards for clinical research in human beings.

After an interventional radiology intranasal treatment, migraine patients report using less pain-relief medicine for headaches, according to a paper at the Society of Interventional Radiology's Annual Scientific Meeting.

Clinicians used a treatment called image-guided, intranasal sphenopalatine ganglion (SPG) blocks to give patients enough ongoing relief that they required less medication to relieve migraine pain.

Too cold for a penguin? An Ice Age brought on by global warming so severe penguins had to move?

Indeed. During the last interglacial, what is colloquially called an ice age though it has been such non-stop for a few million years, only three populations of emperor penguins may have survived, because much of the rest of Antarctica was uninhabitable due to the amount of ice. 

In a new study, 221 college students participated in an online chat room in which they watched a fellow student get "bullied" right before their eyes.

Only 10 percent of the students who noticed the abuse directly intervened, either by confronting the bully online or helping the victim.

The abuse wasn't real - the bully and the victim were part of the experiment - but the participants didn't know that.

"The results didn't surprise me," said Kelly Dillon, lead author of the study and a doctoral student in communication at The Ohio State University.

"Many other studies have shown bystanders are reluctant to get involved when they see bullying. The results disappointed me, as a human, but they didn't surprise me as a scientist."

The therapeutic promise of human stem cells is indisputably huge, but the process of translating their potential into effective, real-world treatments involves deciphering and resolving a host of daunting complexities.

Writing in the February 25 online issue of the journal PLOS ONE, researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine, with collaborators from The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI), have definitively shown for the first time that the culture conditions in which stem cells are grown and mass-produced can affect their genetic stability.

by Marsha Lewis, Inside Science

(Inside Science TV) – Scientists often examine matter that is invisible to the naked eye. This hidden atomic world is a mystery for most people, but now a scientist created a way for people to imagine what they might see as their own bodies interact with the atoms that surround them.

Academia could take some lessons from Silicon Valley about diversity. Credit: Wikimedia

Last week, MIT released a report that closely examines the state of diversity within the university.

The report considers MIT’s diversity not just in terms of students and faculty, but also looks at the Institute’s non-faculty research staff who represent approximately 28% of the institution as a whole.

The activity of the Sun is an important factor in the complex interactions that control our climate. We don't really even understand the impacr of the sun - it is not constant over time, but has greater significance when the Earth is cooler, according to a new paper in Geology.

There has been discussion as to whether variations in the strength of the Sun have played a role in triggering climate change in the past, but more and more research results clearly indicate that solar activity - i.e. the amount of radiation coming from the Sun - has an impact on how the climate varies over time.