We've had 50 years of very-expensive, government-mandated penalties against cigarette companies that have funded programs to reduce cigarette smoking - anything that does so should be welcomed. 

Yet that hasn't been the case for e-cigarettes. While patches have been adored with only modest success in lowering smoking rates - willpower remains the determining factor in smoking cessation - e-cigarettes are being assaulted in a culture war almost as powerful as smoking itself.

At a meeting in San Jose of an organization named AAAS, experts from Germany, New Zealand, South Africa, the UK and USA debated whether electronic cigarettes are just another addiction or a public health opportunity?.

Children obtain better and more age-appropriate sleep in the presence of household rules and regular sleep-wake routines, according to sleep researchers.

The researchers found that well-established rules for getting good sleep, such as limited caffeine and a regular bedtime, led to sufficient sleep quantity and adequate sleep quality. In contrast, when parents and children had electronic devices on in the bedroom after bedtime, sleep deficiency was more likely.

Reducing the encroachment of technology and media into sleep time and supporting well-known sleep hygiene principles should be a focus of public health intervention goals for sleep health, the researchers said.

People 60 or older, especially minorities and women, have a lower risk of stroke if the top number (systolic) in their blood pressure is below 140 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg), according to a study presented at the American Stroke Association's International Stroke Conference 2015.

A report published in JAMA in 2014, advised doctors to aim for blood pressure readings of less than 150/90 mm Hg when treating patients 60 or older who do not have diabetes or chronic kidney disease. That raised the standard for systolic blood pressure, by 10 points from previous guidance, stirring controversy among healthcare providers, agencies and professional groups.

Some of the coldest air of the 2014-2015 winter season is settling over the eastern two-thirds of the U.S., an Arctic air mass that brought wind chills from below zero to the single numbers from the Midwest to the Mid-Atlantic.

It is certainly cold on the surface, but infrared NASA satellite imagery revealed even colder temperatures in cloud tops associated with the air mass.

Evolution starts species off on different paths and even if they arrived in one spot from common descent in the past, they can't reproduce. So in modern times an elephant is not hybridizing with a manatee, or a human with a lemur. Tree frogs...well, yes, but who can explain tree frogs? That did happen, two species were able to interbreed after 34 million years, and sunfish who hybridized after nearly 40 million years.

There may be a new explanation for why fad diets tend to cluster in pockets - and it may help companies spend their marketing money a little smarter also.