Obstructive sleep apnea decreases blood flow to the brain, elevates blood pressure within the brain and eventually harms the brain's ability to modulate these changes and prevent damage to itself, according to a new study published by The American Physiological Society. The findings may help explain why people with sleep apnea are more likely to suffer strokes and to die in their sleep.

Sleep apnea is the most commonly diagnosed condition amongst sleep-related breathing disorders and can lead to debilitating and sometimes fatal consequences for the 18 million Americans who have been diagnosed with the disorder. This study identifies a mechanism behind stroke in these patients.

Females of all ages are less active than their male peers according to two studies presented today which reveal the gender difference in activity levels among school children and the over 70s. Both studies show males to be more physically active than females.

At least in the United Kingdom.  

The two studies are being presented at the UK Society for Behavioural Medicine annual conference (incorporating the National Prevention Research Initiative conference) at the University of Exeter (UK).

Two new efforts have taken a famous supernova remnant from the static to the dynamic. A new movie of data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory shows changes in time never seen before in this type of object. A separate team will also release a dramatic three-dimensional visualization of the same remnant.

Nearly ten years ago, Chandra's "First Light" image of Cassiopeia A (Cas A) revealed previously unseen structures and detail. Now, after eight years of observation, scientists have been able to construct a movie that tracks the remnant's expansion and changes over time.

If your mother smoked, you're more likely to be an aggressive kid, according to a new Canada-Netherlands study published in the journal Development and Psychopathology.

And mothers who smoke, give birth under 21 and are poor should have caused North American to be overrun by the societal equivalent of Middle East dictators by now -  so take what you want from that.  While previous studies have shown that smoking during gestation causes low birth weight, this research claims mothers who light up during pregnancy predispose their offspring to an additional risk: violent behavior. 

For a long time, we have been told that exercise is key to weight loss.   If you don't have time to exercise, or can't, your excuse is built in.   

Not so, says a recent international study.  It comes down to knowing how many calories your body needs and eating that or less.   Exercise can simply increase the calories you may ingest without gaining weight.  Oddly, we knew this in 1908 but it seems to have been lost somewhere.

A team of researchers at Princeton University and The Cancer Institute of New Jersey has identified a long-sought gene that is fatefully switched on in 30 to 40 percent of all breast cancer patients, spreading the disease, resisting traditional chemotherapies and eventually leading to death.

The gene, called "Metadherin" or MTDH, is located in a small region of human chromosome 8 and appears to be crucial to cancer's spread or metastasis because it helps tumor cells stick tightly to blood vessels in distant organs. The gene also makes tumors more resistant to the powerful chemotherapeutic agents normally used to wipe out the deadly cells.