Lab Report

Air travellers should be extra vigilant about hand hygiene. Disease-causing bacteria can linger on surfaces commonly found in plane cabins for up to a week, say Auburn University researchers who presented their findings at last week's annual meeting of the American Society for Microbiology. The researchers tested the ability of two bacteria, MRSA and E.coli O157:H7, to survive on surfaces in aircraft. MRSA lasted longest (168 hours) on material from the seat-back pocket, while E. coli O157:H7 survived longest (96 hours) on the material from the armrest.

If you're planning to have children, keeping your cholesterol in check can help. A study of 501 couples in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism found that when both people had high cholesterol levels they took the longest time to achieve pregnancy. If the woman had a high cholesterol level and the man did not, the couple also took longer to get pregnant when compared to those in which both partners had healthy cholesterol levels. The researchers theorised that blood cholesterol might be related to fertility as the body uses cholesterol to manufacture sex hormones like testosterone and oestrogen. However, the study didn't state exactly how long the couples took to achieve pregnancy.
 

Its use remains controversial, but e-cigarettes seem to be more successful at helping people stub out than other method. A University College London survey of nearly 6,000 smokers in England found that those trying to quit smoking without professional help are about 60 per cent more likely to report success if they use e-cigarettes rather than just willpower or over-the-counter nicotine replacement therapies such as patches or gum. "It is not clear whether long-term use of e-cigarettes carries health risks but from what is known about the contents of the vapour, these will be much lower than from smoking," says Professor Robert West, senior author of the study published in Addiction.