Press releases

When evaluating facial attractiveness, participants may fail to notice a radical change to the outcome of their choice, according to a study by researchers at Lund University, Sweden, and New York University. Equally surprising, the study shows that participants may produce confabulatory reports when asked to describe the reasons behind their choices. The findings appear in the October 7 issue of Science.

A report by the Karolinska Institutet, in conjunction with the Stockholm School of Economics, exposes stark inequalities in patient access to cancer treatment across Europe and urges action by decision makers to redress these inequalities.

The Lennart Nilsson Award for the current year goes to the internationally renowned nature photographer Frans Lanting.

Swedes eat on average twice as much meat, and considerably more fruit and vegetables in the early 21st century than in the 1870s. Nevertheless, the surface area required to produce our food has decreased, measured per person. But this decrease is largely based on non-sustainable use of resources.

Being physically active in midlife could decrease a person¡¦s risk of dementia and Alzheimer¡´s disease (AD) later in life, concludes an article published online today (Tuesday October 4, 2005) by THE LANCET NEUROLOGY.

The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet has today decided to award The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for 2005 jointly to Barry J. Marshall and J. Robin Warren for their discovery of “the bacterium Helicobacter pylori and its role in gastritis and peptic ulcer disease”

Microarray technology could be used to tailor therapy according to the individual, and prevent breast cancer patients from having to undergo painful unsuccessful therapies. In a study published in the journal Breast Cancer Research, researchers analysed tumour tissue samples and identified a group of 64 genes that can be used to predict a patient’s response in the five years after adjuvant therapy for breast cancer.

Physicists usually describe the world from the vantage point of its smallest component parts. But quantum theory does not allow itself to be conceptually crammed into such a framework. Instead, in her dissertation at Uppsala University in Sweden, Barbara Piechocinska takes her point of departure in the mathematics of the dynamic whole and finds that time thereby takes on new meaning.

Pain in the back and neck leads to impaired memory and powers of concentration. Moreover, such pain hastens mental aging. This has been shown by Stefan Söderfjell in a new dissertation at Umeå University in Sweden.

A dissertation from Göteborg University in Sweden asserts that non-violent actions in the form of civil disobedience and the construction of alternative projects can promote democratization, equality, and human rights.