Knowledge Update

​London, Dec 19 (IANS) Skin plays a significant role in harbouring and transmitting trypanosomes -- the parasite that causes the Human African Trypanosomiasis, more commonly known as African sleeping sickness, which is often fatal if left untreated, a new research has found.

The findings could have a major impact on the way the disease is diagnosed, treated and potentially eradicated.

The disease, which kills thousands in Sub-Saharan Africa every year, is primarily transmitted to humans via the bite of an infected tsetse fly as it takes a blood meal, with diagnosis then confirmed through the presence of parasites in the blood.

The current study, published recently in the journal eLife, showed that substantial quantities of trypanosomes that cause the disease can exist within the skin and can be transmitted back to the tsetse fly vector.

"Our results have important implications with regard to the eradication of sleeping sickness. Firstly, our findings indicate that current diagnostic methods, which rely on observing parasites in the blood, should be re-evaluated and should include examining the skin for parasites," said lead researcher Annette MacLeod from University of Glasgow in Britain.

"In terms of treatment, it may also be necessary to develop novel therapeutics capable of targeting sources of infection outside the blood circulation and in the reservoirs underneath the skin," MacLeod noted.

The team of researchers from University of Glasgow's Wellcome Trust Centre for Molecular Parasitology and the Institut Pasteur in Paris were also able to observe the presence of parasites in human skin biopsies from individuals who displayed no symptoms. 

The study's findings suggest skin-dwelling parasites could be sufficiently abundant in the skin to be ingested, transmitted and so able to spread the disease further.

​New Delhi, Dec 12 (IANS) In a bid to digitally transform the Indian manufacturing industry, Microsoft on Monday showcased three Internet of Things (IoT) solutions here.

The three solutions that are powered by Microsoft Azure Cloud are offered by three startups -- Precimetrix, Teramatrix and Covacsis Technologies -- to help manufacturing

New Delhi, Dec 12 (IANS) Music label and content producer Saregama India Ltd has implemented a Dell-EMC data solution to help accelerate production and distribution of its digital media business.

Tokyo, Dec 12 (IANS) The Japanese government will allow employment of skilled foreign workers in the agricultural sector in special zones, in a bid to ease the labour shortage in the country.

New York, Dec 11 (IANS) Contrary to popular perception, running actually reduces inflammation in knee joints and slows the process that leads to osteoarthritis, a study said. "This idea that long-distance running is bad for your knees might be a myth," said study co-author Matt Seeley, Associate Professor of exercise science at Brigham Young University in Utah, US. In the study published in the European Journal of Applied Physiology, the researchers measured inflammation markers in the knee joint fluid of several healthy men and women aged 18-35, both before and after running. The researchers found that the specific markers they were looking for in the extracted synovial fluid -- two cytokines named GM-CSF and IL-15 -- decreased in concentration in the participants after 30 minutes of running. When the same fluids were extracted before and after a non-running condition, the inflammation markers stayed at similar levels. "What we now know is that for young, healthy individuals, exercise creates an anti-inflammatory environment that may be beneficial in terms of long-term joint health," said study lead author Robert Hyldahl from Brigham Young University. Hyldahl added the study results indicate running is chondroprotective, which means exercise may help delay the onset of joint degenerative diseases such as osteoarthritis.

​London, Dec 11 (IANS) For individuals suffering from various mental illness, pets can provide them with unconditional support as well as help manage stigma, a research suggests. The study found that the consistent presence and close physical proximity of their pets can provide an immediate source of calm and therapeutic benefit for people with mental health conditions. "The people we spoke to through the course of this study felt their pet played a range of positive roles such as helping them to manage stigma associated with their mental health by providing acceptance without judgement," said lead author Helen Brooks from University of Manchester in Britain. For 60 per cent of study participants, pets played a central role in the social networks of people managing a long-term mental health problem. "Pets were also considered particularly useful during times of crisis. Pets provided a unique form of validation through unconditional support, which they were often not receiving from other family or social relationships," Brooks added. According to the participants, one reason for this was that their pet helped by distracting them from symptoms and upsetting experiences such as hearing voices or suicidal thoughts. Participants from the study were quoted as saying: "I felt in a sense that my cat was familiar, in that he understood or was an extension of my thoughts." However, despite the identified benefits of pet ownership, pets were neither considered nor incorporated into the individual care plans for people with mental conditions, the researchers said, suggesting that pets should be considered a main source of support in the management of long-term mental health problems. For the research, published in the journal BMC Psychiatry, the team interviewed 54 participants, aged 18 and above, who were under the care of community-based mental health services and had been diagnosed with a severe mental illness.

New York, Dec 11 (IANS) Aiming for a weekend getaway? Do not chalk out events, it may spoil the fun as it may seem like another work. According to researchers, scheduling a leisure activity like seeing a movie or taking a coffee break at a specific time led people to anticipate less enjoyment and actually enjoy the event less than if the same activities were unplanned. "People associate schedules with work. We want our leisure time to be free-flowing," said Selin Malkoc, Assistant Professor at the Ohio State University in the US. However, that does not mean one should not plan at all. The research showed that roughly planning an event (but not giving a specific time) led to similar levels of enjoyment as unplanned events. "Time is supposed to fly when you're having fun. Anything that limits and constrains our leisure chips away at the enjoyment," Malkoc added. In the study, the team analysed 13 separate studies that looked at how scheduling leisure activities affects the way we think about and experience them. In one study, college students were given a calendar filled with classes and extracurricular activities and asked to imagine that this was their actual schedule for the week. Half of the participants were then asked to make plans to get frozen yogurt with a friend two days in advance and add the activity to their calendar. The other half imagined running into a friend and deciding to get frozen yogurt immediately. Results showed that those who scheduled getting frozen yogurt with their friend rated the activity as feeling more like a "commitment" and "chore" than those who imagined the impromptu get-together. "If you schedule leisure activities only roughly, the negative effects of scheduling disappear," Malkoc said. "People don't want to put time restrictions of any kind on otherwise free-flowing leisure activities," she noted, in the paper published in the Journal of Marketing Research.

​London, Dec 11 (IANS) Cancer patients who also suffer from diabetes also risk heart damage because of chemotherapy, a study has found.

The study found that cardiotoxicity induced by chemotherapy with anthracyclines is being increasingly reported, mainly because a smaller proportion of patients now die from cancer.

"In the coming years this cardiotoxicity looks set to increase the burden of heart failure in cancer survivors," said Ana Catarina Gomes, cardiologist in training at the Hospital Garcia de Orta in Almada, Portugal.

"The good news is that cardiotoxicity can be reversible in the early stages before overt heart failure develops. Surveillance programmes are hugely beneficial, particularly in the first year of treatment when up to 80 per cent of the systolic dysfunction develops," Gomes added.

The research investigated factors that could affect the likelihood of patients having heart damage after treatment with anthracyclines.

Of 83 patients included in the surveillance programme, 54 had breast cancer, 20 had lymphoma and nine had gastric cancer.

"Patients with diabetes had a significantly greater decrease in global longitudinal strain during treatment, despite having baseline levels similar to non-diabetics," the research noted.

According to Gomes, sub-clinical reduction in global longitudinal strain is an early predictor of heart failure and was particularly pronounced in patients with diabetes.

"It is possible that the trend for greater reduction in patients with hypertension might become statistically significant in a larger study," Gomes added.

The researchers hypothesised that cancers themselves could have direct cardiotoxic effects induced by cytokines.

The cardiotoxic effects may vary with the type of cancer, study noted.

Researchers suggested that cancer patients should strictly control cardiovascular risk factors with lifestyle changes and, if necessary, with medication.

The findings were presented at EuroEcho-Imaging 2016 in Leipzig, Germany.

​Washington, Dec 11 (IANS) Monkeys have the vocal tracts to produce human speech sounds, but what they lack is a speech-ready brain, a new study has found.

The study, conducted by researchers from the US and Europe and published this week in the US journal Science Advances, used X-ray video to see within the mouth and throat of macaque monkeys induced to vocalise, eat food or make facial expressions, Xinhua news agency reported.

The scientists then used these data to build a computer model of a monkey vocal tract, allowing them to answer the question "what would monkey speech sound like, if a human brain were in control?"

The results showed that monkeys could easily produce many different sounds, enough to produce thousands of distinct words.

For example, monkeys could produce comprehensible vowel sounds -- and even full sentences -- with their vocal tracts if they had the neural ability to speak.

However, the researchers noted that while monkeys would be understandable to the human ear, they would not sound precisely like humans.

Therefore, the researchers concluded that previous research -- largely based on plaster casts made from the vocal tracts of a monkey cadaver -- underestimates primate vocal abilities and that evolution of human speech capabilities required neural changes rather than an adaptation of vocal anatomy.

"Now nobody can say that it's something about the vocal anatomy that keeps monkeys from being able to speak -- it has to be something in the brain," said Asif Ghazanfar, Professor of psychology at the Princeton University and one of the study leaders.

"Even if this finding only applies to macaque monkeys, it would still debunk the idea that it's the anatomy that limits speech in nonhumans."

Thore Jon Bergman, Assistant Professor of psychology and ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Michigan, who is familiar with the research but was not involved in it, said the research could help narrow down the origin of human speech.

"It looks like mainly neuro-cognitive -- as opposed to anatomical -- differences contribute to the broader range of sounds we produce relative to other primates," Bergman said in a statement released by the Princeton University.

"An important part of understanding human uniqueness is to know what our relatives do," he said.

"This study shows the anatomical capability to make a variety of sounds, as we do with speech, was present long ago. This is useful for understanding the starting point for the evolution of language."

​New York, Dec 11 (IANS) Bestowing considerable power in the CEOs may not create value for the firm during industry-wide downturns, a study led by Indian-origin scientist has found.

"We look at severe industry downturns. The essential idea is, when you have concentrated power in the hands of the CEO or a small group of decision-makers, does that lead to better decision-making or worse?" said Vikram Nanda, Professor at the University of Texas - Dallas, US.

The study found that for innovative firms with powerful CEOs, an industry downturn results in a notable decrease in the firm's value, or book-to-market ratio, relative to a less powerful CEO.

Conversely, for competitive industries and high-discretion industries with powerful CEOs, a downturn results in a decrease in firm value.

In the study, the team wanted to look at crisis situations in which urgency -- the speed of making a decision -- could potentially be really important.

They found that a small concentration of power does not work well, even in times of crisis.

Although decisions may be made faster because only one or two persons need to weigh in, but it could be detrimental if the CEO does not get input from other sources.

Instead, companies should keep their information channels open. The search for more information should not be sacrificed by urgency, the study suggested.

Regulatory response has been to increase the power of the board or make the board independent of the CEO. Although there is some skepticism about the benefits of intervention, such as independent audit committees, on average, these regulations have helped, Nanda said.

"CEOs can actually benefit from having a board of independent members, or having different voices in the boardroom. That can lead to better decision-making. It would be positive for the firm to view it from that perspective. Many of them do, but there are always people who want more power and more authority, and don't want to have people looking over their shoulder. On the other hand, that may be what helps a firm deal with a crisis," Nanda noted.

The study was published online in the journal Group & Organization Management.