Person-to-person communication is one of the most persuasive ways people deliver and receive information. Until recently, this communication was impossible to collect and study. Now, social media networks, such as Twitter, allow researchers to systematically witness public communication about health, including cardiovascular disease. Twitter is used by more than 300 million people who have generated several billion Tweets, yet little work has focused on the potential applications of these data for studying public attitudes and behaviors associated with cardiovascular health.

Gamers playing the popular online puzzle game Foldit beat scientists, college students and computer algorithms in a contest to see who could identify a particular protein's shape. The study findings have implications for video game enthusiasts and classroom instruction, and showcase the positive impact citizen science can have on research.

Among overweight or obese young adults, the addition of a wearable technology device (that provided feedback on physical activity) to a standard behavioral intervention resulted in less weight loss over 24 months, according to a study appearing in the September 20 issue of JAMA. Effective long-term treatments are needed to address the obesity epidemic. There is wide availability of commercial technologies for physical activity and diet.

As you relax and let your mind drift aimlessly, you might remember a pleasant vacation, an angry confrontation in traffic or maybe the loss of a loved one. And now a team of researchers at Duke University say they can see those various emotional states flickering across the human brain.

Motorists, passengers and pedestrians beware. A new report published online by JAMA Internal Medicine suggests the wildly popular augmented reality game Pokémon GO is distracting. John W. Ayers, Ph.D., M.A., of San Diego State University, California, and coauthors hunted through social media posts on Twitter and news stories in Google News to report on drivers distracted by the game and crashes potentially caused by players trying to collect Pokémon in real-world locations.

A significant part of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act was the $25 billion invested in health information technology (IT) to improve quality, safety, efficiency in health care while also reducing health disparities. However, nursing homes did not receive the same level of investment in technology as hospitals, leading to little understanding of how IT sophistication is impacting patient care in nursing homes.

It is now possible for machines to learn how natural or artificial systems work by simply observing them, without being told what to look for, according to researchers at the University of Sheffield. This could mean advances in the world of technology with machines able to predict, among other things, human behaviour.