There's a concern that global warming may push Earth's climate system past a "tipping point," where rapid melting of ice and further warming may become irreversible. It's a hotly debated conjecture because there is no picture of what this point of no return may look like.

To try and find some answers about the future, researchers have probed the geologic past and drawn some conclusions about mechanisms of abrupt climate change. The study pinpoints the emergence of synchronized climate variability in the North Pacific Ocean and the North Atlantic Ocean a few hundred years before the rapid warming that took place at the end of the last ice age about 15,000 years ago.

It's no surprise when obese preschoolers have obese parents. It's actually expected. So it's not a surprise when obesity treatment is more effective when it targets both parent and child compared to when only the child is targeted.

Children enrolled in this study were overweight or obese and had one parent who participated in the study who also was overweight or obese, according to body mass index (BMI) measurements, calculated based on height and weight.

For two decades, women at risk of developing placental blood clots have been prescribed the anticoagulant low molecular weight heparin (LMWH) but it's ineffective, according to a clinical trial published today in The Lancet.

As many as one in 10 pregnant women have a tendency to develop  thrombophilia
- blood clots in their vein. These women have been injected with LMWH daily, which means hundreds of needles over the course of their pregnancy. 

In 2012, scientists involved in the ENCODE (Encyclopedia of DNA Elements) project stated that 80% of our genome is functional - that it has some biochemical function. 

The finding was controversial, with critics arguing that the biochemical definition of 'function' was too broad - just because an activity on DNA occurs, it does not necessarily have a consequence. For functionality, you need to demonstrate that an activity matters. 

Fragile X syndrome (FXS) is a genetic disorder that causes obsessive-compulsive and repetitive behaviors, and other behaviors on the autistic spectrum, as well as cognitive deficits. It is the most common inherited cause of mental impairment and linked to autism.

Researchers have published a study that sheds light on the cause of autistic behaviors in FXS. The study describes how MMP-9, an enzyme, plays a critical role in the development of autistic behaviors and synapse irregularities, with potential implications for other autistic spectrum disorders.

Vouchers to buy fresh fruits and vegetables at farmers markets increase the amount of produce in the diets of some families on welfare, according to a new paper in research in Food Policy which suggests that farmers market vouchers can be useful tools in improving access to healthy food.  Perhaps. Half of the people dropped out of the test even though they got more money to shop for produce at farmer's markets.

The analysis was designed to validates a new provision in the Agricultural Act of 2014 that seeks to get low-income families buying produce at farmers markets rather than supermarkets.