The winners of the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physics are:

• Takaaki Kajita Kajita (Super Kamiokande)
• Arthur McDonald (Sudbury Neutrino Observatory - SNO)

“for the discovery of neutrino oscillations, which shows that neutrinos have mass"

Lung cancer screening programs that utilize standardized reporting and include cardiothoracic surgeons as part of a multidisciplinary team can successfully be adopted into clinical practice without an increase in surgical intervention for non-cancerous disease, according to an article in the October 2015 issue of The Annals of Thoracic Surgery.

Key points

Lung cancer screening programs can be safely and effectively adopted in clinical practice with low rates of surgical intervention for non-cancerous disease

Surgical intervention for a non-cancer diagnosis was rare, at 0.24%, which is comparable to the National Lung Screening Trial.

To better understand global weather patterns and increase scientific collaboration between the U.S. and India, researchers supported by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) have completed a month-long cruise studying summer monsoon conditions in the Bay of Bengal.

Summer, or southwest, monsoons are moisture-soaked seasonal winds that bring critical rainfall to the Indian subcontinent during the June-September wet season. An abundant season provides sustaining rainfall that replenishes water reservoirs and reaps bountiful crop harvests. By contrast, a weak season could lead to drought, soaring food prices and a battered economy.

Whether or not a coastal city floods during a hurricane depends on the storm, tide and sea level, and now a team of climate scientists show that the risk of New York City flooding has increased dramatically during the industrial era as a result of human-caused climate change. During "SuperStorm" Sandy in the fall of 2012 most of New York City's transportation tunnels flooded and the storm surge breached the sea walls on the southern tip of Manhattan Island at Battery Park, flooding subway tunnels.

 The strength of the surge is not just dependent on the storm's force, but also on the size of the storm, the state of the tides and sea level.

The sonic hedgehog gene, best known for controlling embryonic development, also maintains the normal physiological state and repair process of an adult healthy lung, if damaged, according to new research. 

Tissues are not all created equal in their ability to regenerate. Skin and blood cells are continually turning over, making entirely new populations of cells every few days. At the other end of the spectrum, heart and brain cells regenerate slowly, if at all, after injury. Between these two extremes are tissues such as the lung and liver, which have little cellular turnover in normal adults, but can regenerate extensively after injury. Such tissues, overall, are thought to be quiescent.

Working as an occupational medicine physician in 2003, I became interested in metabolic syndrome. I had a number of requests coming from corporate clients to address the rise of obesity and diabetes in the workforce. Human resource directors, wellness teams and CEOs were keenly aware that the health costs of their employees were driven more by lifestyle factors than anything else and I thought I might be able to help. Using the Diabetes Prevention Program as a model, I pitched and implemented a "metabolic clinic" for one of my client companies which performed yearly blood tests and wellness screens.

An enhanced inflammatory response could be the key link between high saturated fat intake - a recognized risk factor for obesity-related disorders - and the development of diseases like type 2 diabetes and atherosclerosis.

A new study in the Journal of Nutritional Biochemistry demonstrates that ingesting fats similar to those in a Mediterranean-type diet, featuring low saturated fat and high monounsaturated fat, appears to decrease the inflammatory response, both in comparison to a high saturated fat diet, as well as in relation to a low-fat diet.

Goldenrod, Himalayan balsam, Chinese windmill palm: three plants, one problem. All are native to continents other than Europe, but were introduced to Switzerland as garden or ornamental plants. At some point they "escaped" into the wild, where they now threaten the native flora.

This phenomenon isn't limited to Switzerland: biological invasions happen on every continent every day. A major driver of this is global trade, which is increasingly shifting to the internet and being conducted on auction platforms like eBay. As a result, one click is all it takes to spread potentially invasive plants from continent to continent - and unintentionally encouraging biological invasions.

Monitoring online auctions

More than half (53 percent) of U.S. consumers want to know what’s in their DNA, according to a new survey, yet only 7 percent of respondents say that their doctor has discussed genetic screening with them.

The nationwide survey, conducted by marketing research company ORC International among a representative sample of 1,020 adults, explored knowledge of and attitudes toward genetic testing among adult consumers. The strong interest in genetic screening that is evident from the survey can be attributed to a variety of factors, but may point to an interest among consumers in using genetic screening to be more proactive about their healthcare.