800 new viruses in humans
Scientists have mapped 500 previously unknown microorganisms and 800 new bacterial viruses in the human intestine. The bacterial viruses (also called bacteriophages) attack intestinal bacteria, said researchers. Understanding the intestinal bacteria interactions can help develop a more selective way to treat diseases. To map the microorganisms, researchers from Technical University of Denmark Systems Biology developed a principle for analysing DNA sequence data, which they’ve named the co-abundance principle. The principle assumes that different pieces of DNA from the same organism will occur in the same amount in a sample, and that this amount will vary over a series of samples.
Casual sex boosts your well-being
Do not let that depression mount over your head. Casual hookups are actually good for your overall well-being, researchers say. “If you want to have casual sex, you should. If you do not want to have casual sex, you should not,” said researchers from New York University and Cornell University. The effects of casual sex depend on the extent to which this behaviour is congruent with one’s general personality tendencies, they explained. For the study, they chose a group of students who kept a weekly diary over the course of 12 weeks documenting casual sex and its effect on their overall well-being. The team found that socio-sexually unrestricted students reported higher well-being after having casual sex compared to not having sex. The research appeared in the journal Social Psychology and Personality Science.
Blood test to detect Alzheimer’s
British scientists have identified a set of 10 proteins in the blood that can predict the onset of Alzheimer’s and call this an important step towards developing a test for the incurable brain-wasting disease. Such a test could initially be used to select patients for clinical trials of experimental treatments being developed to try to halt progression of Alzheimer’s, the researchers said, and may one day move into routine use in doctors’ clinics. “Alzheimer’s begins to affect the brain many years before patients are diagnosed (and) many of our drug trials fail because by the time patients are given the drugs, the brain has already been severely affected,” said Simon lovestone of Oxford University, who led this work from King’s College london.