Latest news with #DavidJones
Hans India
19 hours ago
- Health
- Hans India
This new AI tool can detect 9 types of dementia from single brain scan
New Delhi: In a significant achievement for identifying neurodegenerative diseases early, a team of US researchers has developed a new artificial intelligence (AI) tool that helps clinicians detect brain activity patterns linked to nine types of dementia using a single and widely available scan. The tool, StateViewer, not only helped in early detection but also provided accurate diagnosis -- it identified the dementia type in 88 per cent of cases, including Alzheimer's disease. It also enabled clinicians to interpret brain scans nearly twice as fast and with up to three times greater accuracy than standard workflows, according to the research, published online in the journal Neurology. Researchers from the Mayo Clinic trained and tested the AI on more than 3,600 scans, including images from patients with dementia and people without cognitive impairment. Currently, diagnosing dementia requires cognitive tests, blood draws, imaging, and clinical interviews, and yet, distinguishing conditions such as Alzheimer's, Lewy body dementia and frontotemporal dementia remains a challenge. 'Every patient who walks into my clinic carries a unique story shaped by the brain's complexity,' said David Jones, a Mayo Clinic neurologist. 'StateViewer reflects that commitment -- a step toward earlier understanding, more precise treatment, and, one day, changing the course of these diseases,' added Jones, director of the Mayo Clinic Neurology Artificial Intelligence Programme. The tool analyses a fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography (FDG-PET) scan, which shows how the brain uses glucose for energy. It then compares the scan to a large database of scans from people with confirmed dementia diagnoses and identifies patterns that match specific types, or combinations, of dementia. While Alzheimer's affects memory and processing regions, Lewy body dementia involves areas tied to attention and movement. Frontotemporal dementia alters regions responsible for language and behaviour. StateViewer displays these patterns through colour-coded brain maps that highlight key areas of brain activity, giving all clinicians, even those without neurology training, a visual explanation of what the AI sees and how it supports the diagnosis. Dementia affects more than 55 million people worldwide, with nearly 10 million new cases each year. Alzheimer's disease, the most common form, is now the fifth-leading cause of death globally.
Daily Mail
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Julie Bishop celebrates her 69th birthday in style as she lives it up on lavish Dubai getaway
Former Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop rang in her 69th birthday in style on Thursday, soaking up the sun and glamour of Dubai. The ever-stylish political trailblazer shared a series of joyful snaps to social media, showing her living her best life at luxury hotspot Atlantis The Royal. One photo captured the fashionable former MP raising a toast at an upscale restaurant, while another showed a lavish birthday cake being presented to her at an upmarket venue. A third image revealed Julie beaming as she skipped playfully around a beachside recliner, clearly enjoying her milestone celebration. 'Dubai at its finest @atlantistheroyal. Thank you @deanwalshtravels,' she captioned the photo carousel, which garnered many likes and well wishes from fans and friends. From A-list scandals and red carpet mishaps to exclusive pictures and viral moments, subscribe to the DailyMail's new showbiz newsletter to stay in the loop. Ms Bishop, who has long been dubbed the 'Minister for Fashion,' was glowing throughout the celebration. In March, Ms Bishop proved she is every bit the 'Minister for Fashion' on the digital cover for the Australian Women's Weekly. The fashionista stepped into a chic designer piece for her glamorous photo shoot in Sydney 's Centennial Park. Dressed in a stylish Carla Zampatti pants suit with a bow collar, the former Deputy Liberal leader cut her best supermodel look for the high-profile magazine. Ms Bishop, who is an ambassador for retail giant David Jones, styled her blonde hair in a chic short cut for the cover and accessorised with a set of gold earrings. The AWW praised Ms Bishop's fashion chops in the accompanying caption, before providing a sneak peek at their interview inside the latest issue. 'Six years post-politics Julie Bishop wears the title of Minister of Fashion "as a badge of pride",' shared the magazine. 'From her youth, Julie has been fascinated with fashion; one of her earliest memories is watching her mother stitch a ballgown. It looked to be an exciting getaway for the former Minister for Foreign Affairs 'Throughout her political career, she was a continuous advocate for the Australian fashion world and believed her fashion diplomacy "gave a sophisticated edge to Australia's image overseas". 'Today, Julie is still a media fascination - blending power, diplomacy, and fashion effortlessly.' The publication went on to reveal that Ms Bishop sat down for a chat 'about life after politics, privacy, paparazzi and why fashion diplomacy is still a top priority.' It comes after Ms Bishop was spotted in Centennial Park in Sydney in January modelling outfits from Australian fashion brands. She appeared in her element on the day and has every reason to smile. Ms Bishop is currently dating Stephen Gray, who she 'soft-launched' on her social media account in July 2023.
Times
3 days ago
- General
- Times
What can we learn from three great minds who retreated from the world?
The subtitle of this book sets a false trail. 'Why writers, artists and thinkers retreat,' it says, and Guy Stagg goes on to describe the withdrawal from the world of three mysticism-haunted greats: Ludwig Wittgenstein, David Jones and Simone Weil. Or, as he describes them, the saint, the hermit and the martyr. Wittgenstein's retreat, Stagg suggests, was moral. The philosopher worked as a gardener at Klosterneuburg Abbey in Austria as part of his lifelong quest to become a better man. Jones's purpose was creative: he visited a religious community on Caldey Island to paint and write as well as pray. Weil was plagued by migraine. Listening to plainchant helped to relieve it. So she travelled to the Abbey Saint-Pierre de Solesmes in France. Her motivation was therapeutic, as Stagg describes it. Three different motivations. Three dissimilar paths — although all three seem to have spent much of their lives wrestling with God. But Weil, Jones and Wittgenstein are linked by war, childlessness and suicide as well as genius and retreat. Jones fought at the Somme and, more than 20 years later, gave us In Parenthesis (1937), his epic work about a soldier's experience of the First World War. During the same conflict, Wittgenstein volunteered to man an observation post, and was decorated for courage. Weil served with the International Brigades in the Spanish civil war. A coroner later found her to have starved herself to death. At least two of Wittgenstein's brothers killed themselves, and Wittgenstein himself repeatedly considered doing the same. Jones was so depressed when his lover broke off their engagement that, according to one account, 'he seemed close to suicide'. Death, childlessness and war. Monks, nuns and friars live towards the first, embrace the second (at least in most cases) and pursue the last, at least metaphorically: spiritual battle is an ancient metaphor. But withdrawal from the world, undertaken for the wrong reasons, can be a kind of suicide, Stagg suggests. He sees through the vogue for retreat: 'Health spas and holiday rentals and summer festivals all advertise themselves as some kind of refuge.' These can degenerate into 'nothing more than a self-righteous holiday … no flight from the ego but sinking deeper into ourselves'. Spoken by some, this judgment would sound harsh. Written by Stagg, it comes over as measured because it's done with self-knowledge. He says that the first half of his twenties was marred by 'heavy drinking and deep depression' before going on to suggest that the appeal of religious life can be 'a simple wager: forfeiting the chance of pleasure to protect yourself from pain'. Oscar Wilde wrote that experience is the name that men give to their mistakes. Stagg seems to have learnt from his, and this book shows him still learning. • The 21 best history books of the past year to read next Is Stagg a believer himself? This is his second book. His first, The Crossway, published in 2018, described a journey he took from Canterbury to Jerusalem. So at the least he's religion-curious. But he doesn't say. His method is to alternate a chunk of writing about his subjects with another section about himself: he follows in Wittgenstein's footsteps to the ornate, operatic setting of Klosterneuburg, in Jones's to the modern community at Caldey, where there are sometimes no boats to the mainland, and in Weil's to Solesmes, 'hemmed in on one side by water, and by the high street on the other side'. The back and forth holds one's attention. If Weil begins to try one's patience, or Jones or Wittgenstein does, theauthor steps in. And the other way round. Stagg writes masterfully. How plainchant was reconstituted, how Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus works or how stained glass is assembled are three subjects with little if anything in common. Stagg describes and makes sense of them all in a way that can hold the general reader. He can evoke a sense of place and give a sense of people: the three religious devotees who host him at the three monasteries he visits are utterly unlike each other: one once worked on Wall Street, a second joined his monastery in his twenties, another was a press photographer for Formula 1. Stagg writes of Brother Titus, the petrolhead turned guest-master at the monastery on Caldey, that he does not spend his days thinking about God and Heaven and whether he is saved. 'It's what's down here that matters. It's what happens in this life that counts,' Titus says. Amen to that, some would say — adding that retreat and withdrawal are escapism, an avoidance of dealing with reality, and that to live an exceptional life, or to try to, is self-delusion. 'Pick a quarrel, go to war,/ Leave the hero in the bar,' Auden wrote. 'Hunt the lion, climb the peak:/ No one guesses you are weak.' The verse suggests that the best life is the humdrum one. • Read more book reviews and interviews — and see what's top of the Sunday Times Bestsellers List Stagg argues that for the artist 'retreat can play a vital role in the early stages of an artistic career. When a writer is learning their craft, or a painter is searching for material, there is value in creating work without any audience.' In this version of events, one withdraws from the world so that one may later re-enter it. But neither Wittgenstein nor Weil, as Stagg makes clear, retreated to further their philosophy or their writing. It's true that writers, artists and thinkers may improve their art or craft by retreating, but ultimately they withdraw for the same reason that any everyman or everywoman withdraws. Believers say that one retreats to seek God. And perhaps that's as good an explanation as one is going to get — if one truly withdraws to do so, retreat may turn out well, but if one withdraws to run away from life outside, it may well not. The merit of this book is that it demonstrates how damaging that search can be if undertaken for the wrong reasons — because it can intensify loneliness, depression and suicidal impulses. At the same time it demonstrates how necessary that search is, because where there is no failure, there can be no learning and hence no progress. 'I glimpsed the hardness at the heart of the religious calling: in order to be saved, you must die to the world,' Stagg writes. 'Which may explain why over time my subjects' lives began resembling thesicknesses they were supposed to cure.' The World Within: Why Writers, Artists and Thinkers Retreat by Guy Stagg (Scribner £20 pp320). To order a copy go to Free UK standard P&P on orders over £25. Special discount available for Times+ members
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
Scientists make surprising discoveries in fight against emerging public health threat: 'The goal now should be to make their efforts count'
Scientists make surprising discoveries in fight against emerging public health threat: 'The goal now should be to make their efforts count' Microplastics are everywhere. They're in our oceans, our food, and even our bodies. According to a new University of Portsmouth study highlighted how public volunteers can help combat this invisible threat. What's happening? Researchers at the University of Portsmouth in the U.K. published a study examining the effectiveness of different protocols to capture plastic pollution on coastlines and whether volunteers can help fill crucial data gaps, like those reported by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis. The research compared three leading microplastic and mesoplastic sampling methods across southern England, including two citizen science protocols and one used by European researchers. The goal was to determine which approaches are the most accurate, efficient, and easy to use. The findings revealed that while there's no one-size-fits-all method, public participation is a powerful tool. One technique, the Big Microplastic Survey, often detected more plastic than others, while AUSMAP was the fastest and most accessible. The EU's MSFD method provided the most accurate lab results but isn't practical without lab access or formal training. "In a perfect world, yes, we'd all be using the same protocol," Dr. David Jones, lead author of the study, said, per the University of Portsmouth. "But the variations in coastal geomorphology around the world make this challenging. We are not going to stop volunteers from getting involved — nor should we. The goal now should be to make their efforts count, even if their methods differ." Why are microplastics important to study? Plastic pollution is one of the most widespread environmental issues and is increasingly becoming a human health crisis. According to the study, up to 13 million tons of plastic enter our oceans every year. Larger plastics break down into smaller pieces called microplastics and mesoplastics, which can be easily ingested by marine life and passed on to humans through the food chain. Recent studies have detected plastic particles in human blood, lungs, and even the placenta. While we're just beginning to understand the long-term health impacts, early research suggests potential links to inflammation, hormone disruption, and increased toxicity. Better data collection leads to better chances to address the issue and protect our long-term health. "When it comes to understanding our plastic-choked coastlines, every piece of data counts — no matter how it's collected," Dr. Michelle Hale, co-author of the study, said, per the University of Portsmouth. What's being done about plastic pollution? While international organizations work toward global protocols, this research highlights the role of everyday people in tracking and combating pollution. Volunteer-based methods may not be perfect, but they are valuable, especially as researchers work to bridge the gap between different tools and environments. Do you think America has a plastic waste problem? Definitely Only in some areas Not really I'm not sure Click your choice to see results and speak your mind. The study advocates for improved systems that allow for more effective comparison of data from various methods. In the meantime, individual action still matters. Reducing reliance on single-use plastics, choosing reusable alternatives, and supporting policies to limit plastic pollution can all contribute to the solution. Join our free newsletter for weekly updates on the latest innovations improving our lives and shaping our future, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet. Solve the daily Crossword
Fibre2Fashion
5 days ago
- Business
- Fibre2Fashion
M&S partnership highlights retail opportunities in Australia
Insights Pioneering wholesale deal puts M&S Fashion lines in * * David Jones stores across Australia. David Jones stores across Australia. High per-capita clothing consumption makes Australia an attractive market for international brands. Free Trade Agreement offers tariff benefits, easing entry for British brands. Two-way trade between the UK and Australia reached $ * * . * * billion in * * * * . To read the full story, become a PRIME member today. All Corporate Members and TexPro Subscribers are eligible to access F2F PRIME CONTENT using the same login credentials. Latest News Insights Latest News Insights Exclusive Industry Articles & Features Exclusive Industry Articles & Features Detailed Article Analytics & Insights Digital Edition of Fibre2Fashion Magazine Digital Edition of Fibre2Fashion Magazine Get notified in your mailbox
