Washington, April 7: Smoking cigarettes is not the only risk factor for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), it may also change the body''s immune responses to bacteria that commonly cause exacerbations of the disease, according to a study in mice.

Washington, Apr 7: People who gain weight early in life are three times more likely to develop mobility problems in old age, even if they eventually lose weight, says a new study from Wake Forest University School of Medicine.

Lead researcher Denise Houston added that dropping weight later in life could lead to problems with mobility because weight loss later in life is usually involuntary and the result of an underlying chronic condition.

London, Apr 7: In a novel study, French scientists have found that transplanted hands successfully activate the brain region linked to muscular movement, thus raising the prospect of regaining full movement.

It is known that motor cortex, the part of the brain region that maintains a physical map of the body with different areas registering sensations in different body parts.

When the hand gets amputated the brain region linked to it goes unused.

Washington, April 7: A new study led by UK and German researchers has shown that schizophrenia patients can correctly see through an illusion known as the ‘hollow mask’ illusion, probably because their brain disconnects “what the eyes see” from what “the brain thinks it is seeing”.

The observations made during the study attain significance as they may help understand why cannabis users may also be less deceived by the illusion whilst on the drug.

The study — carried out by scientists at the Hannover Medical School in Germany and UCL Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience in the UK — confirms that people with schizophrenia are immune to certain vision illusions, and that they are not fooled by the ‘hollow mask’ illusion.

Washington, Apr 7: Using insecticides-chemical or biological-to kill older mosquitoes may be a more sustainable way of controlling malaria, according to entomologists.

Andrew Read, a Penn State professor of biology and entomology, says that the new approach to attack older mosquitoes may lead to evolution-proof insecticides that never become obsolete.

London, Apr 7: Unlike men, women do not engage in risky financial decisions when given testosterone, Swedish researchers have shown.

Although earlier studies have found correlations between testosterone levels and risky behaviour in men, including one that found that male securities traders with more testosterone in their saliva made riskier financial decisions, the latest study has suggested that women are a safer pair of hands on the stock-market trading floor than men when given the hormone.