Knowledge Update

New York, Nov 19 (IANS) Increased sensitivity to uncertain threat, or fear of the unknown, is common to many anxiety disorders, including panic disorder, social anxiety disorder and specific phobias, says a study.

The finding could help steer treatment of these disorders away from diagnosis-based therapies to treating their common characteristics.

"Knowing that sensitivity to uncertain threat underlies all of the fear-based anxiety disorders also suggests that drugs that help specifically target this sensitivity could be used or developed to treat these disorders," said senior author on the study K. Luan Phan, Professor at the University of Illinois in Chicago.

"A treatment, or set of treatments, focused on sensitivity to uncertain threat could result in a more impactful and efficient way of treating a variety of anxiety disorders and symptoms," Stephanie Gorka from the University of Illinois College of Medicine, added. 

Uncertain threat is unpredictable in its timing, intensity, frequency or duration and elicits a generalised feeling of apprehension and hypervigilance.

When a person is sensitive to uncertain threat, they can spend the entire day anxious and concerned that something bad could happen to them, Gorka said.

Panic disorder is one example -- patients are constantly anxious over the fact that they could have a panic attack at any moment, she said.

Predictable threat, on the other hand, produces a discreet fight-or-flight response that has a clear trigger and it abates once the threat has resolved.

For the study, the researchers looked at data from participants who underwent a task in two different studies performed at the University of Illinois at Chicago. 

The two studies, of participants aged 18 to 65, included 25 participants with major depressive disorder; 29 with generalised anxiety disorder; 41 with social anxiety disorder; and 24 with a specific phobia. 

Forty one control participants had no current or prior diagnoses of psychopathology.

The researchers measured the participants' eye-blink responses to predictable and unpredictable mild electric shocks to the wrist. To elicit blinking during the shock-task, the participants heard short, acoustic tones via headphones.

The study, published in the Journal of Abnormal Psychology, found that participants with social anxiety disorder or a specific phobia blinked much more strongly during the unpredictable shocks, when compared to participants without a mental health diagnosis.

​New York, Nov 18 (IANS) Giving more power to its 1.2 billion daily users, Facebook will now allow them to automatically launch its crisis response tool "Safety Check" in case of an earthquake, terror attack, tsunami and so on.

Tel Aviv, Nov 18 (IANS) Coca-Cola has designed a "Selfie bottle" that will take your self-portrait which you can instantly share with your friends on online platforms like SnapChat, Facebook and Instagram. The bottle is fitted with an in-built camera at its base and a sensor to detect when it is tilted to 70-degree, at which point the camera takes a snap of its owner mid-drink, Drum News reported on Friday. The "Selfie Bottle" has been devised by Gefen Team for the Coca-Cola Summer Love campaign -- Israel's largest outdoor brand event. "Users tag themselves and their friends in photos on Coca-Cola's social media assets. It really does the trick and makes the partygoers more present and active during the event, knowing they can share their special moments just by drinking," Coca-Cola said in a statement. However, there are no reports when the "Selfie Bottle" will make it to the market.

​Madrid, Nov 18 (IANS) Japanese gaming giant Nintendo on Friday launched Pokemon Sun and Pokemon Moon, the latest games in the series, in Japan and the US, four months after the release of Pokemon Go. The release of the seventh generation of the multi-billion dollar franchise, which has not launched any new games in the series since October 2013, coincides with the 20th anniversary of the launch of the original Pokemon video games and follows the stupendous success of Pokemon Go, which has been downloaded over 500 million times. The new games, designed for Nintendo's 3DS portable game console, will be released in Europe on November 23 and Nintendo has already shipped 10 million copies throughout the world, EFE news cited the company as saying in a statement. Nintendo, who said during the release of its results for the first quarter of the Japanese financial year (April-September) that the success of Pokemon Go helped boost sales of software in the Pokemon series during the same period, hopes the effect is enhanced with the new games. The starting price of the games is 4,980 yen in Japan, $39.99 in the US and 44.95 euros in Europe. The games take place in the Alola region, composed of four tropical islands and an artificial one, and feature a total of over 800 pocket monsters for the players to hunt. A few Pokemon-enthusiasts had recently grabbed pirated copies of the game leading Nintendo to ban them from its online network.

​London, Nov 18 (IANS) Reducing sodium intake may provide significant improvements in kidney and heart health among patients suffering from chronic kidney disease, new research has found. The study showed that in patients with chronic kidney disease, dietary sodium restriction reduced albuminuria -- an indicator of kidney dysfunction -- and blood pressure levels, whereas paricalcitol -- a vitamin D receptor activator -- in itself had no significant effect on these measures. However, the combination of paricalcitol and a low sodium diet resulted in the lowest albuminuria levels in patients. "The study found that sodium restriction provided a relatively large beneficial effect, whereas the effect of paricalcitol was small. Thus, the impact of the combined intervention was largely due to the protective effect of sodium restriction," said Martin de Borst from University Medical Center Groningen, in The Netherlands. Urinary excretion of proteins, including albumin, is an indicator of chronic kidney disease. Therapies that reduce such albuminuria can slow kidney function decline and also have beneficial effects on the heart and blood vessels, the researchers said. Unfortunately, currently available therapies do not eliminate albuminuria in many patients, leaving these individuals with what is known as residual albuminuria. The findings appear in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.

​London, Nov 18 (IANS) Although well associated with lowering cardiovascular disease risk high-density lipoprotein (HDL) -- known as good cholesterol -- may not always be able to protect against heart disease.

A new study has suggested that it increases the inflammatory response of certain immune cells called macrophages.

This can potentially counteract its well-established anti-inflammatory effect in various other cell types, the study said.

"Good cholesterol's functions are not as simple as initially thought, and appear to critically depend on the target tissue and cell type," said Marjo Donners of Maastricht University, the Netherlands.

"In the end, it is the balance between its pro- and anti-inflammatory effects that determines clinical outcome," Donners added.

In the study, the researchers found that HDL treatment enhanced inflammation in macrophages, in contrast to its effects in other cell types. Similarly, macrophages taken from mice with elevated HDL levels showed clear signs of inflammation.

This pro-inflammatory effect induced by HDL showed enhanced pathogen protection, the researchers said.

Lung macrophages ingested disease-causing bacteria upon exposure to HDL. On the other hand, mice with low HDL levels were impaired at clearing these bacteria from the lungs. 

The results demonstrate that HDL's pro-inflammatory activity supports the proper functioning of macrophage immune responses.

According to Donners, these findings suggest that patients with persistent infections or specific immune disorders might benefit from HDL-raising therapies.

The research could also lead to the development of cell-specific therapies that exploit the benefits of HDL-targeted therapies while avoiding the side effects, the researchers noted.

The study was published in the journal Cell Metabolism.

​New Delhi, Nov 18 (IANS) Leveraging India's growing importance as a resource hub, the University of New South Wales (UNSW) has launched a unique 'Diya' (light initiative to catalyse higher education in this country and to forge sustainable partnerships with Indian institutions in the field.

The initiative is symbolic of the illumination that higher education can bring in the lives of people, UNSW President and Vice Chancellor Professor Ian Jacobs said during a lecture on 'Education, Technology and Transformational Change', adding that through it, the university aims to provide degree education at and through UNSW for as many as 1 lakh Indian students across the next decade.

"We plan to facilitate this with investment in educational technology, including online teaching and learning, through mutually beneficial partnerships across India's higher education system and with India's national and state governments," Jacobs explained.

He added that the UNSW Diya initiative will demonstrate the varsity's commitment to building much-needed capacity in India's higher education system, to expanding the skills needed to drive India's development agenda and to power its economy. It will also in a large way contribute to the government's ambitious plans including Make in India, Startup India and Digital India.

Jacobs also announced the launch of UNSW's scholarship programmes for Indian students which aim at helping them achieve their potential, and enhance the experience of individuals who might otherwise struggle financially to maintain a place at university. He pointed out that in addition to UNSW Diya, these new India Scholarships too will bring the transformative power of a UNSW education to outstanding Indian students at the undergraduate, postgraduate and research levels.

UNSW is also actively partnering with the Indian government on a series of initiatives that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has unveiled in the recent past. One of them is SWAYAM - an Information Technology platform which will host a Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) and provide high quality education on various subjects from school level -- class 9-12 to undergraduate and postgraduate students -- covering all disciplines.

"Increasingly, the future will depend on non-traditional forms of education, especially on digital delivery, which offers incredible opportunities for providing educational opportunities to millions who would otherwise have no access to the best teachers and resources. Online learning will prove transformational in making India competitive with the world," he said.

Meanwhile, UNSW is also actively partnering with the Indian government on its Smart Cities agenda by working on a major symposium for next year. 

"We will be bringing our expertise on Low Carbon Living, Built Environment, Materials Science and Computer Science and Engineering. Discussions are currently underway between the Ministry of Electronics and IT and the Australian Centre for Cyber Security at UNSW on a series of programmes related to creating greater awareness on cyber security," Jacobs stated.

He also touched upon the point of how given the current global political scenario, Australia could well be a good option as an academic destination for Indian students. 

"While it's perhaps too early to assess the impacts of the Brexit vote in the UK or the Trump vote in America, I believe that the relative stability of Australia in an uncertain world makes it a highly attractive option for Indian students seeking an international education. Many young Indian students will in future see Australia as at least as an attractive option as the USA and UK."

To bolster its partnership with India, the university had in July appointed former Indian Consul General, career diplomat and educator Amit Dasgupta as its inaugural India Country Director. The appointment is aimed at helping UNSW work across the highest levels of government and industry to ensure India becomes one of its flagship partnerships.

Jacobs was on a three-city tour to India which included visits to Hyderabad, Delhi and Mumbai. He and his team held a series of meetings and talks with government officials and corporate heads during the visit to enhance relations between the two countries. Strengthening education, research and knowledge exchange in India has been on top of the agenda during the Vice Chancellor's entire stay in India.

​Moscow, Nov 18 (IANS) Multitasking is harder for men because they need to mobilise additional areas of their brain and use more energy than women when switching attention between tasks, says a study.

"Our findings suggest that women might find it easier than men to switch attention and their brains do not need to mobilise extra resources in doing so, as opposed to male brains," said one of the researchers, Svetlana Kuptsova from National Research University Higher School of Economics in Moscow, Russia.

Such differences are typical of younger men and women aged 20 to 45, according to findings published in the journal Human Physiology.

Regardless of gender and age, task switching always involves activation in certain areas of the brain, more specifically, bilateral activation of the dorsolateral prefrontal areas, inferior parietal lobes and inferior occipital gyrus.

However, experiments conducted in this study demonstrated that in women, task switching appears to require less brain power compared to men, who showed greater activation in the dorsolateral prefrontal areas as well as the involvement of supplementary motor areas and insula, which was not observed in women.

The experiments involved 140 healthy volunteers, including 69 men and 71 women aged between 20 and 65. 

The participants were asked to perform a variety of tasks. In one of the experiments using functional MRI, they were asked to perform a test that required switching attention between sorting objects according to shape (round or square) and number (one or two).

The use of functional MRI allowed the researchers not only to observe the participants' behaviour, but also to see what was going on in the brain as the participants switched between tasks and detect differences in brain activation between men and women.

The researchers found that the gender differences in the extent of brain activation when switching between tasks only occurred in participants younger than those aged 45 to 50, while those aged 50 and older showed no gender differences either in brain activation or speed of task switching.

​New York, Nov 18 (IANS) There has been a decline in the percentage of women working at Microsoft, said the company's diversity report, adding that the technology giant saw "modest gains" in the representation of African Americans, Black and Hispanic/Latino(a) employees.

By the end of September 2016, women made up 25.8 percent of Microsoft's global workforce which is a one percent drop from previous year's 26.8 percent, said the report release on Thursday. 

In 2014, 29 percent of Microsoft's global workforce comprised of women.

"This decline was largely due to the business decision we shared last year to restructure our phone hardware business (Nokia), which resulted in the closure of some factories outside the U.S. The workforce at these factories had a higher representation of women, so their closure impacted our total representation of women," said Gwen Houston, Chief Diversity & Inclusion Officer at Microsoft.

The diversity repport provides a glimpse of the gender and racial composition of Microsoft's employee population as of September 30, 2016.

Microsoft is creating and delivering compelling career development offerings for women and racial/ethnic minorities, Houston said.

New York, Nov 18 (IANS) People who show strong curiosity traits on personality tests perform better on creative tasks, according to a new study.

This is especially true for those with a strong diversive curiosity trait, or curiosity associated with the interest in exploring unfamiliar topics and learning something new, the study said.

The findings contribute to a growing body of evidence suggesting that testing for curiosity traits may be useful for employers, especially those seeking to fill complex jobs, said lead author of the study Jay Hardy, Assistant Professor College of Business, the Oregon State University, US.

"This research suggests it may be useful for employers to measure curiosity, and, in particular, diversive curiosity, when hiring new employees," Hardy said.

Diversive curiosity is a trait well-suited to early stage problem-solving because it leads to gathering a large amount of information relevant to the problem. That information can be used to generate and evaluate new ideas in later stages of creative problem-solving.

On the other hand, people with strong specific curiosity traits, or the curiosity that reduces anxiety and fills gaps in understanding, tend to be more problem-focused.

While diversive curiosity tends to be a more positive force, specific curiosity tends to be a negative force.

For the study, researchers asked 122 undergraduate college students, to take personality tests that measured their diversive and specific curiosity traits.

They then asked the students to complete an experimental task involving the development of a marketing plan for a retailer. 

Researchers evaluated the students' early-stage and late-stage creative problem-solving processes, including the number of ideas generated. 

The students' ideas were also evaluated based on their quality and originality.

The findings, published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, indicated that the participants' diversive curiosity scores related strongly to their performance scores. 

Those with stronger diversive curiosity traits spent more time and developed more ideas in the early stages of the task. 

Stronger specific curiosity traits did not significantly relate to the participants' idea generation and did not affect their creative performance.