Editors: Natalia
Gavrilova and
Stacy Tessler Lindau
CCBAR
2011 Conference to be held Tuesday, October 25, 2011 in Chicago:
The
Chicago Core on Biomeasures in Population-Based Health and Aging
Research (CCBAR) at the NORC University of Chicago Center on Demography
and Economics of Aging will host a fall conference entitled "Biosocial
and Communication Technology-Based Approaches to Urban Health and
Aging" on Tuesday, October 25th, 2011 from 7:30am to 5pm at the
Gleacher Center in downtown Chicago. Rose Anne Kenny, MD, PI of the
innovative Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing will present the keynote
lecture. Other confirmed speakers include Cheryl Clark, MD from
Harvard on the Jackson Heart Health Study and Bill Funk, PhD from
Northwestern on minimally invasive methods for quantifying
environmental toxin exposure. Please contact Pleasant Radford
(pradford@babies.bsd.uchicago.edu) by
August 31 if you are interested in participating.
CCBAR member, Natalia Gavrilova, PhD, gave a lecture about biosocial
survey methods at the international seminar "Mortality in Central Asia"
organized by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) in Almaty,
Kazakhstan (July 6-7, 2011). Participants were demographers and
statisticians (including representatives of governmental organizations)
from all five countries of the Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan,
Tadzhikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan). This lecture,
building on several others given by Gavrilova over the last several
years, prompted significant interest among participants. Some
Central Asian countries (Kyrgyzstan in particular) plan to conduct
population-based surveys collecting biomarkers, so their
representatives were most interested in existing experience of
conducting such surveys in the U.S.
The
Evolution of Grandparents
Senior citizens may have been the secret of our species' success
Trial
puts
niacin and cholesterol dogma in the line of fire
Pulling
down
the plug on atherosclerosis: Cooling down the inflammasome
Atherosclerotic lesions can result in fatal cardiovascular disease, but
what triggers the formation of the atheroma plaques and their
progression still begs further investigation. In 'Bench to Bedside',
Göran K Hansson and Lars Klareskog peruse how the NLRP3
inflammasome can be activated by choleste...
New
approaches
to disease mapping in admixed populations
Admixed populations such as African Americans and Hispanic Americans
are often medically underserved and bear a disproportionately high
burden of disease. Owing to the diversity of their genomes, these
populations have both advantages and disadvantages for genetic studies
of complex phenotypes. Adva...
Psychiatric
disorders:
The stress of city life
Social stress processing in healthy individuals is affected by city
living and an urban upbringing
Demographic
history
and rare allele sharing among human populations [Genetics]
High-throughput sequencing technology enables population-level surveys
of human genomic variation. Here, we examine the joint allele frequency
distributions across continental human populations and present an
approach for combining complementary aspects of whole-genome,
low-coverage data and targete...
Will
medicine
ever be able to halt the process of ageing?
Anti-ageing medicine may not be the most well developed branch of
healthcare and medical research, but one thing it doesn't lack is self
confidence. 'Anti-aging medicine is the pinnacle of...
City
Living
May Shape How the Brain Processes Stress [Medical News &
Perspect...
Adherence
to
a Low-Risk, Healthy Lifestyle and Risk of Sudden Cardiac Death A...
Context Sudden cardiac death (SCD) accounts for more than half of all
cardiac deaths; the majority of SCD events occur as the first
manifestation of heart disease, especially among women. Primary
preventive strategies are needed to reduce SCD incidence.
Objective To estimate the degree to which adhe...
NIH-funded
study proposes new method to predict fertility rates
Researchers supported by the National Institutes of Health have
developed a new statistical technique to forecast changes in fertility
rates. The new method mathematically compensates for uncertainty and is
expected to allow governments to plan more reliably for the
infrastructure and social services needed to accommodate large-scale
population changes.
NIH tips
for older adults to combat heat-related illnesses
Older people can face risks related to hot weather. As people age,
their bodies lose some ability to adapt to heat. They may have medical
conditions that are worsened by heat. And their medications could
reduce their ability to respond to heat.
NIH-funded
study shows reduction in death for men with intermediate-grade pro...
Short-term hormone therapy given in combination with radiation therapy
to men with early-stage prostate cancer increased their chances of
living longer compared to treatment with radiation therapy alone,
according to a clinical trial supported by the National Cancer
Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health. Benefits of
the combined treatment were limited mainly to patients with
intermediate-risk disease and were not seen for men with low-risk
prostate cancer, researchers say. The results appeared in the July 14,
2011, New England Journal of Medicine. The trial was conducted by the
Radiation Therapy Oncology Group.
NIH
investigators discover new mechanism that may be important for learning
a...
New findings in mice suggest that the timing when the neurotransmitter
acetylcholine is released in the brain's hippocampus may play a key
role in regulating the strength of nerve cell connections, called
synapses. Understanding the complex nature of neuronal signaling at
synapses could lead to better understanding of learning and memory, and
novel treatments for relevant disorders, such as Alzheimer's disease
and schizophrenia.
Receptor
limits the rewarding effects of food and cocaine
Researchers have long known that dopamine, a brain chemical that plays
important roles in the control of normal movement, and in pleasure,
reward and motivation, also plays a central role in substance abuse and
addiction. In a new study conducted in animals, scientists found that a
specific dopamine receptor, called D2, on dopamine-containing neurons
controls an organism's activity level and contributes to motivation for
reward-seeking as well as the rewarding effects of cocaine.
NIH funds
new research toward an HIV cure
Three research teams focused on developing strategies that could help
to rid the body of HIV are receiving grants totaling more than $14
million a year, for up to five years, the National Institute of Allergy
and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) of the National Institutes of Health
announced today.
Federal
report shows drop in adolescent birth rate
The adolescent birth rate declined for the second consecutive year,
preterm births declined for the third consecutive year, adolescent
injury deaths declined, and fewer 12th graders binge drank, according
to the federal government's annual statistical report on the well-being
of the nation's children and youth.
Thinking
globally to improve mental health
Mental health experts are calling for a greater world focus on
improving access to care and treatment for mental, neurological, and
substance use (MNS) disorders, as well as increasing discoveries in
research that will enable this goal to be met.
NIH
effort seeks to identify measures of nutritional status
The National Institutes of Health has undertaken a new program to
discover, develop and distribute measures of nutritional status. The
Biomarkers of Nutrition for Development (BOND) Program brings together
experts in the field of nutrition to provide advice to researchers,
clinicians, program- and policymakers, on the role of food and
nutrition in health promotion and disease prevention.
T1 Translational
Research: Novel interventions for prevention and treatment of
age-related conditions (R21) 2011/07/25 - 2014/09/08
http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PAS-11-280.html
T2 Translational Research: Research leading to new health care
practices, community programs and policies affecting older persons
(R21) 2011/07/25 - 2014/09/08
http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PAS-11-281.html
Leveraging Existing Data or Longitudinal Studies to Evaluate Safety and
Effectiveness of Pharmacological Management of Chronic Pain in Older
Adults (R03) 2011/07/19 - 2011/11/04
http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/rfa-files/RFA-AG-12-006.html
Specialized
Centers
of
Research (SCOR) on Sex Differences (P50)
Funding Opportunity RFA-OD-11-003 from the NIH Guide for Grants and
Contracts. The ORWH and participating organizations and institutes seek
to expand the Specialized Centers of Interdisciplinary Research (SCOR)
on Sex Differences. These centers will provide opportunities for
interdisciplinary approaches to advancing studies in sex differences
research. Each SCOR should develop a research agenda bridging basic and
clinical research underlying a health issue that affects women.
Exceptional,
Unconventional
Research
Enabling Knowledge Acceleration
(EUREKA)...
Funding Opportunity RFA-NS-12-005 from the NIH Guide for Grants and
Contracts. This FOA solicits Research Project Grant (R01) applications
from institutions/organizations proposing exceptionally innovative
research on novel hypotheses or difficult problems, solutions to which
would have an extremely high impact on biomedical or biobehavioral
research in the epilepsies. This FOA is for support of new projects,
not continuation of projects that have already been initiated. It does
not support pilot projects, i.e., projects of limited scope that are
designed primarily to generate data that will enable the PD/PI to seek
other funding opportunities. Interventional clinical trials are also
not appropriate for this FOA.
NIH
Fiscal
Policy
for Grant Awards FY 2011
Notice NOT-OD-11-068 from the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts
NIMHD
Health
Disparities
Research (R01)
Funding Opportunity RFA-MD-12-001 from the NIH Guide for Grants and
Contracts. The purpose of this Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA)
is to solicit innovative research that can directly and demonstrably
contribute to the elimination of health disparities. Research aims may
include, but are not limited to, biological mechanisms; behavioral
strategies; lifestyle factors; environmental, structural, and economic
factors; cultural and family influences; delivery system interventions;
medical procedures and regimens (including alternative therapy), and
medical assistive devices and health information technologies. Projects
may involve primary data collection or secondary analysis of existing
datasets.
The 7th
Chicago Core on Biomeasures in Population-Based Health and Aging
Research Conference will be held in Chicago Gleacher Center, October
25, 2011
Please contact Pleasant Radford
(pradford@babies.bsd.uchicago.edu) by August 31 if you would like
to present
or participate in the conference.
Gerontological
Society
of
America's 64th Annual Scientific Meeting,
November 18-22, 2011, Boston Hynes Convention Center, Boston, MA.
Abstracts Deadline: March 15, 2011
Population
Association
of
America Annual meeting, San Francisco, CA.
The 2012 Annual Meeting will be held May 3-5 at the Hilton San
Francisco Union Square Hotel. The 2012 Call for Papers will be
available at the end of July, http://paa2012.princeton.edu/.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
This Newsletter is supported by a grant from the National
Institute on
Aging, National Institutes of Health (Grant No. 5 P30 AG012857)
If you would like to unsubscribe please notify us at ngavrilova@babies.bsd.uchicago.edu