Nutrition Review

When it comes to diets, cookies and cake are off the menu. Now, in a surprising discovery, researchers from Tel Aviv University have found that dessert, as part of a balanced 600-calorie breakfast that also includes proteins and carbohydrates, can help dieters to lose more weight -- and keep it off in the long run.

A new study published in the journal Respirology reveals that a high level of soft drink consumption is associated with asthma and/or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Led by Zumin Shi, MD, PhD, of the University of Adelaide, researchers conducted computer assisted telephone interviewing among 16,907 participants aged 16 years and older in South Australia...

University of Illinois researchers determined that an adult stem cell present in muscle is responsive to exercise, a discovery that may provide a link between exercise and muscle health. The findings could lead to new therapeutic techniques using these cells to rehabilitate injured muscle and prevent or restore muscle loss with age.

It can be difficult to distinguish between people with normal age-associated memory loss and those with amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI). However people with aMCI are at a greater risk of developing Alzheimer's disease (AD), and identification of these people would mean that they could begin treatment as early as possible.

Postmenopausal women may be at higher risk of having a stroke than they think. A new study by researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center and colleagues found that traditional risk factors for stroke -- such as high cholesterol -- are not as accurate at predicting risk in postmenopausal women as previously thought.

A new study led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health suggests that hyperglycemia (high blood sugar) injures the heart, even in patients without a history of heart disease or diabetes. Researchers found that elevated levels of glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c), a marker for chronic hyperglycemia and diabetes, were associated with minute levels of the protein troponin T (cTnT), a blood marker for heart damage.

In the largest and longest head-to-head comparison of two anti-clotting medications, warfarin and aspirin were similar in preventing deaths and strokes in heart failure patients with normal heart rhythm, according to late-breaking research presented at the American Stroke Association's International Stroke Conference 2012.

We've heard obesity can be "spread" between friends when we copy each other's eating habits, but a new study in mice suggests obesity could actually be infectious. That's right, infectious. As in, something you can catch.In the study, mice engineered to have a particular immune deficiency developed fatty liver disease and got fatter when fed a Western-style diet. But strikingly, when these immune-deficient mice were put in the same cage as healthy mice, the healthy mice started to come down with symptoms of liver disease, and also got fatter.

Severe, rapid memory loss may be linked to -- and could predict -- a future deadly stroke, according to research presented at the American Stroke Association's International Stroke Conference 2012. Researchers found that people who died after stroke had more severe memory loss in the years before stroke compared to people who survived stroke or people who didn't have a stroke.

Most athletes can testify to the pain-relieving, recovery-promoting effects of massage. Now there's a scientific basis that supports booking a session with a massage therapist: On the cellular level massage reduces inflammation and promotes the growth of new mitochondria in skeletal muscle. The research, involving scientists from the Buck Institute for Research on Aging and McMaster University in Hamilton Ontario appears in the February 1st online edition of Science Translational Medicine.