The right combination of certain species can provide up to 60% more nutrients than if someone ate the same quantity of even a highly nutritious species, according to an analysis by Cornell University researchers.

“This research hopefully highlights the importance of biodiversity, not just because of a moral quandary that we’re causing a mass extinction on Earth, but also because biodiversity can lead to better outcomes for fishery sustainability,” said first author Sebastian Heilpern, a postdoctoral fellow who has done previous research related to this in the Amazon River.

In the study, Heilpern and colleagues began by identifying a list of fish species that people are known to consume. Heilpern cross-checked it with existing nutrient content data for each species. From there, researchers determined the fish species that are found in every country or territory on Earth. The biogeographic and nutrient data was then fed into a computer model.

“We can then ask, out of all these combinations of potential options of species, which ones could we select and how much of each, in a way that would provide us with sufficient nutrition to meet a person’s diet [needs] with the lowest amount of fish biomass,” Heilpern said.

The model revealed that when fisheries are more biodiverse, an optimal diet that uses the lowest quantity of fish skews towards species with traits that can give them greater resilience to anthropogenic pressures like overexploitation and climate change. Such species tend to be smaller, lower on the food chain, and can be substituted with a wider range of other small species that contain similar levels of nutrients, thereby providing people with many potential alternatives.

Smaller species, like sardines, tend to be more ecologically resilient because they grow at faster rates than larger species. Additionally, optimal species are able to tolerate wider temperature ranges, making them more resilient to climate shocks.

The investigation showed that tropical coastal countries tend to have the most biodiverse fisheries, including countries in the Coral Triangle in the Pacific Ocean, Australia, India and the Amazon. The U.S. has good biodiversity, though Americans tend to consume a select few species; only 10 species account for up to 90% of fish that Americans eat.

The study was funded by the Schmidt Sciences programs, Cornell University, the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, and the David and Lucile Packard Foundation.

The study, which analyzed blood samples provided by 330 pregnant women from the Atlanta metropolitan area, is believed to be the first to investigate how exposure to ambient fine particulate matter (PM2.5) commonly found in air pollution affects the metabolism of pregnant women and contributes to increased risks of preterm and early term births.

“The link between air pollution and premature birth has been well established, but for the first time we were able to look at the detailed pathway and specific fine particles to identify how they are reflected in the increased risk of adverse birth outcomes,” says Donghai Liang, PhD, study lead author and associate professor of environmental health at the Rollins School of Public Health. “This is important because if we can figure out the ‘why’ and ‘how’ then we can know better how to address it.”

Why This Matters

Previous research has shown pregnant women and fetuses are more vulnerable than other populations to exposure to PM2.5 — which is emitted from combustion sources such as vehicle exhaust, industrial processes, and wildfires — including increased likelihood of preterm births (less than 37 weeks of gestation), which is the leading cause of death globally among children under the age of five. Preterm birth is also linked to complications such as cerebral palsy, respiratory distress syndrome, and long-term noncommunicable disease risks, while early term births (37-39 weeks of gestation) are also associated with increased neonatal morbidity and developmental challenges. Approximately 10% of the preterm births in the world are attributable to PM2.5 exposure.

Key Findings

• This was the first study to uncover the specific pathways and molecules involved in energy and amino acid metabolism that may explain how exposure to PM2.5 contributes to preterm and early term births.
• The researchers identified two substances — cortexolone and lysoPE(20:3) — as factors in the relationship between short-term air pollution exposure and elevated risk of early births, offering a potential mechanism through which air pollution triggers premature labor.
• The study highlighted disruptions in protein digestion and absorption — which are vital to fetal development and immune function — as potential links between air pollution and early births, also offering new potential targets for prevention efforts.
• Of the 330 women who participated in the Emory study, 66 (20%) delivered preterm babies and 54 (16.4%) delivered early term babies, both of which are significantly higher than the prevalence in the general U.S. population.

What The Experts Say

“As an air pollution scientist, I do not think air pollution is going away anytime soon. Even at lower levels, we continue to see harmful health effects, but we can’t just ask people to simply move away from highly polluted areas,” Liang says. “So, from a clinical intervention standpoint, that’s why it’s critical to gain a better understanding on these pathways and molecules affected by pollution. In the future, we may be able to target some of these molecules to develop effective strategies or clinical interventions that could help reduce these adverse health effects.”

Scientists at UC San Francisco have discovered how pancreatic cancer cells thrive in the lungs or liver, environments that are as distinct to cells as the ocean and desert are to animals. The spread of cancer cells to organs like these often produces the very first symptoms of pancreatic cancer. But by that time, the pancreatic cancer has spread out of control.

The findings, published May 21 in Nature, create new opportunities to treat pancreatic cancer, which is notoriously resistant to many therapies. The study was funded in part by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the American Association for Cancer Research.

In the study, researchers wanted to know what allowed cells to survive in one place instead of the other. To do this, they analyzed data from MetMap, a project at the Broad Institute, an independent research organization, to find pancreatic cancer cell lines that had a tendency to colonize either the lung or the liver. Then, they looked for genomic differences that could reveal why, or even how, these cells preferred one organ over the other.

Their analysis turned up a protein called PCSK9 that controls how cells obtain cholesterol. When PCSK9 levels are low, pancreatic cancer cells consume nearby cholesterol, which is abundant in the liver. When PCSK9 levels are high, the cancer cells produce their own cholesterol. They also make molecules that protect them from damage by oxygen, a perfect adaptation to survival in the lungs.

When the team forced pancreatic cancer cells that were destined for the liver to express PCSK9, the cells made a detour to the lungs.

“Cancers persist by adapting to live in new tissues and organs, and we found that pancreatic tumors use PCSK9 to adapt as they spread,” said Rushika Perera, PhD, the Deborah Cowan Endowed Associate Professor of Anatomy at UCSF and senior author of the paper. “It opens the door to fighting metastatic cancer growth by manipulating how cells acquire their cholesterol.

Coordinated by Neurocenter Finland, this major project by the University of Eastern Finland and the University of Oulu examined the prevalence of epilepsy in patients with FTD. The research dataset is one of the largest in the world, and the results have been published in the prestigious JAMA Neurology journal.

Epilepsy occurred years before the FTD diagnosis

Epilepsy is known to be associated with Alzheimer’s disease, for example, but data on the on the connection between FTD and epilepsy remains scarce. The newly published study fills this information gap and shows that epilepsy is considerably more common in patients with FTD than previously estimated.

The study analysed patient data from the university hospitals of Kuopio and Oulu from the period 2010-2021. Out of a total of 12,490 medical records, the study identified 245 patients with FTD and 1,326 patients with Alzheimer’s disease. In addition to examining the prevalence of epilepsy in these patients, the prevalence was also examined in healthy controls.

“Our results show that epilepsy is considerably more common among those with FTD than those with Alzheimer’s disease or in healthy controls,” says Doctoral Researcher Annemari Kilpeläinen, the first author of the research article and a medical specialist in neurology.

“It is noteworthy that epilepsy occurred in some patients with FTD already ten years before their dementia diagnosis, and it was more common in all the examined stages of the disease than previous international studies have reported.”

The prevalence of epilepsy was assessed at several time points from ten years before to five years after the dementia diagnosis. In patients with FTD, the prevalence of epilepsy increased over time, and five years after the diagnosis approximately 11% had epilepsy. In addition to epilepsy diagnoses, medications used for epilepsy were more common in patients with FTD, which strengthens the reliability of the results.

Epilepsy might be left undiagnosed

Diagnosing epilepsy in patients with FTD may be challenging as the symptoms of the disease may resemble epileptic seizures. This may lead to underdiagnosis and delays in treatment. However, untreated epilepsy can significantly worsen patients’ condition.

“Identifying epilepsy is important because its treatment can improve patients’ functional capacity and quality of life. Knowledge about the association between epilepsy and FTD raises new research questions: do these diseases share some pathophysiological mechanisms and could some FTD symptoms be caused by alterations in the specific electrical systems of the brain,” says the project’s principal investigator, Associate Professor and Director of UEF Brain Research Unit Eino Solje.

An extensive research project brings together different fields of science

The recently published study is part of an extensive project that combines exceptionally extensive real-life patient data with different kinds of unique registers. The project involves a strong cooperation between the University of Oulu and the University of Eastern Finland as well as different fields of science, including between researchers in the fields of medicine and law. Kuopio University Hospital and Oulu University Hospital are part of the international European Reference Network EpiCARE and recognised centres in the field of epilepsy treatment and research.

The study was led by a team of researchers from Queen’s University Belfast, Edith Cowan University Perth (ECU), and the Medical University of Vienna and Universitat Wien.

The findings reveal that increasing the diversity of flavonoids within your diet could help prevent the development of health conditions such as type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease (CVD), cancer and neurological disease.

Flavonoids are found in plant foods like tea, blueberries, strawberries, oranges, apples, grapes, and even red wine and dark chocolate.

Published in Nature Food, the study tracked over 120,000 participants aging from 40 to 70 years old for over a decade. It is the first study of its kind to suggest that there is a benefit to consuming a wide range of flavonoids beyond that of simply consuming a high quantity.

ECU Research Fellow, first author and co-lead of the study Dr Benjamin Parmenter, made the initial discovery that a flavonoid-diverse diet is good for health.

“Flavonoid intakes of around 500 mg a day was associated with a 16% lower risk of all-cause mortality, as well as a ~10% lower risk of CVD, type 2 diabetes, and respiratory disease. That’s roughly the amount of flavonoids that you would consume in two cups of tea.”

Dr Parmenter added, however, that those who consumed the widest diversity of flavonoids, had an even lower risk of these diseases, even when consuming the same total amount. For example, instead of just drinking tea, it’s better to eat a range of flavonoid-rich foods to make up your intake, because different flavonoids come from different foods.

“We have known for some time that higher intakes of dietary flavonoids, powerful bioactives naturally present in many foods and drinks, can reduce the risk of developing heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and neurological conditions like Parkinson’s,” study co-lead Professor Aedín Cassidy from the Co-Centre for Sustainable Food Systems and Institute for Global Food Security at Queen’s said.

“We also know from lab data and clinical studies that different flavonoids work in different ways, some improve blood pressure, others help with cholesterol levels and decrease inflammation. This study is significant as the results indicate that consuming a higher quantity and wider diversity has the potential to lead to a greater reduction in ill health than just a single source.”

Professor Tilman Kuhn from the Medical University of Vienna, Universitat Wien and Queen’s University Belfast was also a co-lead author, noted that the importance of diversity of flavonoid intake has never been investigated until now, making this study very significant as the findings align with popular claims that eating colourful foods are invaluable to maintain good health.

“Eating fruits and vegetables in a variety of colours, including those rich in flavonoids, means you’re more likely to get the vitamins and nutrients you need to sustain a healthier lifestyle,” he said.

The first-ever dietary guidelines for flavonoids were released recently recommending increasing the consumption of flavonoids to maintain health.

“Our study provides inaugural evidence that we may also need to advise increasing diversity of intake of these compounds for optimal benefits,” Dr Parmenter said.

“The results provide a clear public health message, suggesting that simple and achievable dietary swaps, such as drinking more tea and eating more berries and apples for example, can help increase the variety and intake of flavonoid-rich foods, and potentially improve health in the long-term,” Professor Cassidy added.

A new study published in Communications Earth and Environment by UC Merced professors Adeyemi Adebiyi and John Abatzoglou finds that the Central Valley accounts for about 77% of fallowed land in California and is associated with about 88% of major anthropogenic, or human-caused, dust events.

“Idled farmland and dust are particularly concentrated in Kern, Fresno and Kings counties, where annual crops such as wheat, corn, and cotton are fallowed as part of agricultural practices or a combination of water and economic decisions,” said Abatzoglou, a climatologist in the Department of Management of Complex Systems in the School of Engineering. “When fields are unplanted, wind erosion can create dust.”

Dust can be laced with chemicals and pathogens that cause severe respiratory illnesses or death. For example, Valley fever, caused by a fungus, relies on dust to spread. Particulate matter has also been linked to various forms of dementia, cardiovascular problems, COPD, asthma, and perhaps surprisingly, longer and more painful menstrual cycles. Vulnerable groups disproportionately bear these health impacts.

In addition to health problems, a significant reduction in visibility during dust storms has resulted in fatal traffic accidents. Dust storms can also reduce agricultural productivity due to the loss of fertile topsoil and abrasion of crops by airborne particles, which is particularly critical given the state’s role as the leading agricultural producer in the United States.

“California, particularly the Central Valley, has not been considered an important dust source,” said Adebiyi, who studies dust and its impacts as a member of the Department of Life and Environmental Sciences in the School of Natural Sciences and as an affiliate of the Health Sciences Research Institute. “However, we’re beginning to see, with recent events, that the Central Valley is a major contributor, and much of its dust comes from agricultural sources.”

Although researchers don’t fully understand dust’s effects on climate, they do know that when dust settles on the Sierra Nevada snowpack, it darkens the snow and encourages melting earlier in the year than usual. That impacts critical water resources for people around the state.

Fallowed acreage varies year to year, but the researchers found that the geographic coverage of these unfarmed lands expanded between 2008 and 2022, and that growth could be linked to an increase in dust activities.

Although it is common to rotate crops and idle lands regularly, the expansion of unplanted lands is partly due to the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, which requires farmers to limit the water they use yearly.

“The goal of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act is clearly to balance groundwater, which is important for California’s future,” Adebiyi said. “However, there are unintended consequences to nearby communities, such as potential dust that comes from farmland fallowed due to SGMA, and what is crucial are those mitigation efforts that can reduce wind erosion.”

The researchers suggested farmers consider cover crops or ground cover that increases soil health and reduces dust.

Widespread dust events are generally driven by weather, such as strong winds or storms, but dust becomes more likely when soil is dry and disturbed, the latter being human-caused, Abatzoglou said. Human activity, including construction and farming, heavily drives localized dust.

Continued research, such as this study and another recent one that resulted in a report from a coalition called UC Dust, will help researchers better understand dust’s impacts on a wide range of concerns and challenges.

“A better understanding of what likely dominates anthropogenic dust from agricultural sources may help us better represent the overall impacts of dust in other parts of the country and the world,” Adebiyi said.

One of the biggest unknowns in simulating climate and health impacts of dust in the future is how anthropogenic dust may change.

“Because our study points to fallowed or idled farmlands as a dominant contributor, that may change how we estimate overall dust impact,” he said.