MRI Scans Could Be Used To Improve ADHD Diagnoses

New research suggests that using MRI scans could help medical professionals improve diagnoses of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) by making it easier to distinguish between different subtypes.

The study, published in the journal Radiology, uses brain scans to identify the three primary subtypes of ADHD. These are predominantly inattentive, predominantly hyperactive/impulsive, and a combination of the two. Diagnoses are currently done based on symptoms, so the team hope that by using MRI scans, they can speed up the time it takes patients to access treatment.

"The main aim of the current study was to establish classification models that can assist the psychiatrist or clinical psychologist in diagnosing and subtyping of ADHD based on relevant radiomics signatures," co-author Dr Qiyong Gong of Sichuan University said in a statement.

The team at the West China Hospital where Dr Gong works looked at MRI scans of 83 children between the age of seven and 14 that were newly diagnosed (and so never treated) for ADHD. They also looked at the brain scans of 87 children of similar age and with no ADHD. The team found no difference in brain volume between the two groups or in the volume of gray and white matter.

The main differences were in the alteration of three brain regions, specifically the area around the left central sulcus, the left temporal lobe, and the bilateral cuneus. The scientists also looked at differences within the ADHD group and discovered features that allowed them to tell the difference between the three subtypes.

The research is a first step in a new field, but it appears promising. The team could tell if a child was suffering from ADHD with 74 percent accuracy, as well as determine if it was either inattentive ADHD or the combined subtype 80 percent of the time.

"This imaging-based classification model could be an objective adjunct to facilitate better clinical decision making," Dr Gong said. "Additionally, the present study adds to the developing field of psychoradiology, which seems primed to play a major clinical role in guiding diagnostic and treatment planning decisions in patients with psychiatric disorders."

The researchers plan to recruit more patients to improve their analysis. ADHD affects between 5 and 7 percent of children and adolescents worldwide.

We Could Be Reaching Our Limits For Athletic Achievement

There were just two running world records broken at the Rio Olympics in 2016: Wayde van Niekerk, from South Africa, in the men's 400m and Almaz Ayana, from Ethiopia, in the women’s 10,000m.

Then, at this year's athletics world championships in London, only one athlete succeeded in breaking a world-record. That honor went to Portugal's Ines Henriques for the women's 50km race walk. Although an extremely impressive personal achievement, the fact that it was a record-breaker is not exactly surprising seeing as it was the very first year the event was contested. (Organizers introduced the event to ensure gender equality. Men have been able to compete in the 50km race walk since 1932.)

This might not be a short-term dip in record-breaking moments, experts say. It could be the start of a new, long-term trend.

While improvements in training and nutrition in the 20th century saw athletic achievement improve in leaps and bounds, many scientists believe we're now extremely close to reaching the human body's full potential for endurance sports. This means that the era of record-breaking, at least as far as professional runners are concerned, could be coming to an end. To break the natural limits of human physiology and beat existing records, athletes may have to turn to artificial technology and doping.

This argument is backed up by research. In 2008 – before Usain Bolt smashed existing records for the men's 100m in 2009 – a study found that athletes have already accomplished 99 percent of what is physically possible according to human biology. 

Many factors are needed to make the "perfect" runner. Vincent Pialoux, deputy head of Lyon's Inter-University Laboratory of Human Movement Biology, identified "three major physiological and biomechanical criteria” in an article published by AFP. These are endurance, the ability to create energy using oxygen, and motor efficiency (an athlete’s ability to save energy).

"Of these three factors, if we take the best data measured in the laboratory on different athletes, we arrive at times well below the limits predicted" by models based on the evolution of performance, he said.

No professional athlete has ticked all the boxes so the "perfect" runner is, at least for the time being, strictly theoretical. Still, now that we are approaching our biological limitations, will we see more incidents of doping, stem-cell therapy, and genetically engineered athletes?

"The transformation of man into an animal capable of running a marathon in one hour and 40 minutes would take a long time, if it is possible, and there are an incalculable number of scientific limits," added performance expert Pierre Sallet from Athletes for Transparency.

And, as he pointed out, "there will always be one limit: keeping the person alive."

Global Powers Agree To Refrain From Fishing In Arctic Ocean For 16 Years To Conduct Research First

Here’s a nugget of good news for your weekend: Global powers have agreed to prohibit commercial fishing in the Arctic Ocean for at least 16 years. This moratorium will allow researchers to study the ecology of the high Arctic, which is thawing at an incredibly swift rate. 

The delegation includes nations with Arctic shorelines as well as non-Arctic countries. In all, nine nations and the European Union have agreed to the legally binding agreement. 

Once signed by the governments involved, the parties under its terms will be part of a joint scientific research program. This will include research into local fish populations and the effects of commercial activities in the region.

Those with Arctic shorelines include the United States, Russia, Canada, Denmark, and Norway. Those with trawling fleets but no Arctic shoreline are China, Japan, South Korea, Iceland, and the European Union.

"This is a landmark agreement," said David Balton, the deputy assistant secretary for oceans and fisheries at the State Department, to The New York Times. "It’s a rare case of governments doing something in advance, to prevent a problem from arising."

This agreement comes despite tensions between many of these nations, most notably the United States and Russia. However, both these countries have much at stake too.

The deal means none of these nations can trawl the frigid waters for 16 years, or until there is a sustainable fishing plan in place. This protects a 2.8-million-square-kilometer (1.1-million-square-mile) zone above Alaska and Chukotka.

"In the future if fish stocks are plentiful enough to support a commercial fishery there, they will be part of the management system and presumably their vessels will have the opportunity to fish for those stocks," Balton told Reuters.

The involvement of the United States is perhaps a tad surprising, considering President Trump’s climate change doubts. However, the US had already agreed to a moratorium in 2015. That had little impact, however, if the other nations did not also participate in the deal.

This agreement is much-needed: The Arctic Ocean was once an impenetrable block of ice, but as breaks in the sea ice open up due to global warming, opportunities for shipping routes are also becoming a possibility. Compared to other regions in the world, parts of the Arctic are warming twice as fast. 

This rapid loss of sea ice is particularly noticeable during the summer when as much as 40 percent of the central Arctic Ocean has open water.

Scott Highleyman, an official at the Ocean Conservancy, told Reuters: “This precautionary action recognizes both the pace of change in the Arctic due to climate change as well as the tradition of Arctic cooperation across international boundaries.”

The deal will be automatically renewed every five years unless one of the parties objects or they all come to a resolution.

Almost All Global Cholera Epidemics During The Past 50 Years Can Be Traced Back To One Place

Cholera is still very much a modern disease, infecting millions and causing the deaths of close to 100,000 people around the globe each year. Caused by a bacteria, it now seems that nearly all of the explosive epidemics seen within the last 50 years have originated from one region: Asia.  

This astonishing and potentially groundbreaking discovery has been reported in two papers published this week in Science, one of which focused on the cholera epidemics that have struck the Americas, and another that looked at those which have burned through Africa. From sequencing and then comparing the genomes of over a thousand samples of the disease, it seems the road leads all the way back to the Far East.

This is a fascinating finding for a number of reasons. Since the 1800s there have been seven cholera pandemics, with the current pandemic having started in the 1960s. It is caused by a single lineage of the bacterium Vibrio cholerae known as 7PET. This pandemic has led to various epidemics, with particularly large ones occurring in South America and Africa.

The first epidemic from this most recent spread in Africa sprung up in the 1970s, while in South America there were two; one started in Peru in 1991, while another was identified in Haiti in 2010. There has been a long-running, and often vitriolic debate over where these epidemics originated, with some arguing that in certain regions of Africa, the V. cholerae is endemic, surviving in reservoirs in the environment for years before rearing its head and starting a new epidemic.

But this research shows that this theory is unlikely to be completely accurate. While it is true that some strains of cholera are indeed endemic, the studies found that those which cause the massive epidemics that spread quickly and kill thousands are all members of the 7PET lineage, and so all originated in Asia.

“Our results show that multiple new versions of 7PET bacteria have entered Africa since the 1970s,” explained François-Xavier Weill, who led the African research. “Once introduced, cholera outbreaks follow similar paths when spreading across that continent. The results give us a sense of where we can target specific regions of Africa for improved surveillance and control.”

But not only that, it means that when a cholera outbreak occurs, researchers can first test to see if it is 7PET, and if it is, measures can be stepped up to contain the potential new epidemic. It also means that the complete eradication of cholera in places like Africa is absolutely achievable, which is no doubt going to be welcome news to the World Health Organization, which plans on cutting cholera deaths by 90 percent by 2030.