The A&P Professor Science & Education Updates - Issue #174

Life Science

Participation of females in clinical trials for drugs and devices continues to lag behind their representation in the specific disease population in many critically important disease areas despite efforts to improve the situation, according to a new study by Harvard Medical School investigators at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. 

Thanks to scientists collecting and analyzing vast amounts of data, we know a lot about exercise and how it's good for your health.

With direct brain stimulation, mice learned to recognize an imaginary scent—and helped researchers understand a key piece of the olfactory puzzle.

Tympanometers to detect hearing problems can cost thousands. So engineers designed a version that costs $28 when paired with a smartphone.

New research has suggested that inflammation in the gut can reach far beyond the digestive system to affect other areas, like skin. This work is helping to reveal the many biological mechanisms that link the microbial community in the gut to human health.

Fentanyl is up to 100 times more potent than morphine and many times that of heroin. Drug users generally don’t know when their heroin is laced with fentanyl, so when they inject their usual quantity of heroin, they can inadvertently take a deadly dose of the substance. Read more from STAT.

Within hours of birth, newborns begin to distinguish between sounds and become sensitive to language information.

New research has suggested that inflammation in the gut can reach far beyond the digestive system to affect other areas, like skin. | Immunology

The acute effects of various respiratory viral infections have been well studied, with extensive characterization of the clinical presentation as well as viral pathogenesis and host responses. However, over the course of the recent COVID-19 pandemic, the incidence and prevalence of chronic sequelae after acute viral infections have become increasingly appreciated as a serious health concern. Post-acute sequelae of COVID-19, alternatively described as “long COVID-19,” are characterized by symptoms that persist for longer than 28 days after recovery from acute illness. Although there exists substantial heterogeneity in the nature of the observed sequelae, this phenomenon has also been observed in the context of other respiratory viral infections including influenza virus, respiratory syncytial virus, rhinovirus, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus, and Middle Eastern respiratory syndrome coronavirus. In this Review, we discuss the various sequelae observed following important human respiratory viral pathogens and our current understanding of the immunological mechanisms underlying the failure of restoration of homeostasis in the lung.

Teaching & Learning

Science epistemology is the foundation of how biology constructs knowledge but is often implicit in undergraduate research experiences (UREs). This study describes the development of one student’s ...

TAPP News & Notes

Can bolstering student confidence, while using gamification to provide some fun, spaced retrieval practice be an answer?