A famous Grouch Marx comedy bit goes that he wouldn't want to be part of any club that would have him as a member. Elitism sells has value.

In a famous "Seinfeld" episode, customers dutifully lined up for lunch and if they deviated from protocol, the Soup Nazi banished them. Such high-falutin' behavior works, according to a new paper in the Journal of Consumer Research. At least when it comes to luxury brands, the ruder the sales staff the better the sales, say scholars from the University of British Columbia's Sauder School of Business. 

Consumers who get the brush-off at a high-end retailer can become more willing to purchase and wear pricey togs.

New research looking at the success of clinical trials of stem cell therapy shows that, when trials appear to be more successful, more discrepancies in trial data are also evident.

Discrepancies were defined as two (or more) reported facts that could not both be accurate because they were logically or mathematically incompatible. For example, one trial reported that it involved 70 patients, who were divided into two groups of 35 and 80.

The researchers found eight trials that each contained over 20 discrepancies.

The meta-analysis of 49 randomized controlled trials of bone marrow stem cell therapy for heart disease in the British Medical Journal identified and listed over 600 discrepancies within the trial reports. 

One of the foremost biomedical mysteries of the past century is the origin of the 1918 pandemic flu virus and its unusual severity, which resulted in a death toll of approximately 50 million people. 

A new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) sheds light on the devastating 1918 pandemic and suggests that the types of flu viruses to which people were exposed during childhood may predict how susceptible they are to future strains, which could inform vaccination strategies and pandemic prevention and preparedness. 

Researchers writing in
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS)
have identified natural human antibodies against the virus that causes Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), a step toward developing treatments for the newly emerging and often-fatal disease.

Currently there is no vaccine or antiviral treatment for MERS, a severe respiratory disease with a mortality rate of more than 40 percent that was first reported in Saudi Arabia in 2012.

Your steak may be costing more than you realize, according to a paper in PNAS which estimates that steaks and hamburgers are a significant source of greenhouse gas emissions.

Rising incomes in emerging economies will mean greater demands for meat so it will either become a food solely for rich elites or science improvements will make it less strenuous.

Tart cherry juice in the morning and evening may help you sleep better at night, according to a paper presented today at the
American Society of Nutrition
meeting.

Insomnia is a common health problem among older adults, impacting an estimated 23 to 34 percent of the population ages 65 and older. Insomnia – defined as trouble sleeping on average more than three nights per week – can be an annoyance for some, but long-lasting sleeplessness can seriously affect health, especially in the elderly.