Vitamin D, also known as cholecalciferol, is a fat-soluble vitamin and prohormone that can be obtained through food or sun exposure. This is essential for bone development and maintenance and has additional functions, including inflammation reduction, antioxidant defense, and neuroprotection. People can get Vitamin D by exposing to the sun, eating some foods like fatty fish, or taking vitamin supplements. There are two forms of vitamin D: ergocalciferol (D2) and cholecalciferol (D3). Sunlight changes 7-dehydrocholesterol in the skin into D3. It goes through two hydroxylation processes, the fir ..read more

Researchers at La Sorbonne, France, have found pathogen bacterial communities attached to microfibers floating in the north-western Mediterranean Sea, among which is included Vibrio parahaemolyticus, a potential human and animal health hazard that causes gastroenteritis associated with the consumption of raw or undercooked fish and shellfish. This is an important finding because these microorganisms could threaten bathing and seafood consumption. The research detected 195 bacteria types with a strong presence on the microplastic’s surface. Microfibers are the most common type of plastic in the ..read more

In the UK, approximately 90% of individuals with diabetes have type 2 diabetes mellitus. It is a leading cause of sickness and death affecting more than four million people. It also accounts for 10% of the expenditure of the National Health Service of this country.  Lower blood sugar levels can considerably reduce complications related to diabetes, such as nerve damage, eye problems, kidney problems, and foot problems. However, it is challenging to select the correct drug for a patient. A large-scale study performed at the University of Exeter and funded by the Medical Research Council ha ..read more

In our daily lives, we are exposed to a myriad of chemicals in the environment and goods, such as food, toiletry products, and plastic containers. Despite constant institutional efforts, laboratories worldwide have been able to assess a small fraction of these chemicals for harmful effects, and the reason is that evaluating each of them, on average, takes years and is very costly. Toxicity prediction through computational methods is crucial to help accelerate the identification of harmful substances, significantly lowering the costs and reducing animal testing. Over the years, researchers ..read more

Opinion I am a big fan of the Nobel Prizes, especially those given out in chemistry and medicine. If you have followed their announcements over the years, it is a fascinating sequence showing how science evolved in the last 120 years and where it is heading.  A couple of weeks ago, we learned of the first Nobel prizes awarded since the arrival of the “new normal.” In medicine, it was awarded to the development of methods that allowed genome sequencing of Neanderthals and the surprising discovery that Homo sapiens (i.e. us) had bred with them. One half of the Nobel prize in chemistry was a ..read more

The COVID‑19 vaccine t offers acquired immunity to individuals against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2) c that outbreak in 2019 According to reports published by national public health agencies, healthcare workers have administered 12.7 billion doses of COVID‑19 vaccines globally 22 September 2022. Numerous of these vaccines, such as the Moderna vaccines and Pfizer–BioNTech have been created using RNA to trigger or initiate an immune response in the body. RNA vaccines were the initial ones authorized in the United States, the United Kingdom, and the European Un ..read more

The notion of local ownership has increasingly permeated the fields of peacebuilding, development, and humanitarianism since in 1995 the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development designated it as a precondition for effective initiatives. In the wake of major International Organizations’ (IOs) commitments (see United Nations General Assembly, 2015) and agreements between major donors such as the 2016 Grand Bargain, international intervention in the conflict and post-conflict settings is witnessing the imperative of establishing relationships with relevant actors in the concerned ar ..read more

A recent study held by the University of Calgary, Canada found that the screen time of children and adolescents increased by 52% during the pandemic while children’s engagement in moderate to vigorous physical activity during the pandemic decreased by 32%. According to the research published in JAMA Pediatrics, on average younger population spent 4.1 hr/day on screen compared with the pre-pandemic baseline of 2.7hr/day, which is 84 min more per day. Researchers gathered information from all around the world including Asia, Europe, North America, Australia, New Zealand, South America, and the M ..read more

Following the coronavirus disease (COVID‑19) outbreak in 2019, researchers began developing vaccines to generate acquired immunity against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‑CoV‑2). These vaccines are extensively endorsed in plummeting the extent of COVID‑19, besides lowering mortality because of this illness. Current reports mention that COVID‑19 vaccines successfully averted 14.4 million to 19.8 million deaths across 185 nations and regions from December 2020 to 2021. A recent South African case-control study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine reported ..read more

Imagine extraterrestrial micro monsters swimming, growing, and reproducing in an immense ocean of liquid water, trapped under an ice crust. This may sound like science fiction, but this could be happening right now —not in a far, far away galaxy, but in our own solar system. When Galileo Galilei discovered four Jupiter’s moons, he probably didn’t think he looked at entire habitable worlds. More than 400 years later, astronomers have gathered sufficient evidence to consider Ganymede and Europa great candidates to host life.   Ganymede, Europa, and Callisto surfaces are characterized b ..read more