The secret life of bee signals can communicate colony health

Recording the electrostatic energy of honeybee hives offers a 'canary in the coalmine' look into ecosystem threats and environmental conditions

2021-05-04

(Press-News.org) Honeybees have a complex communication system. Between buzzes and body movements, they can direct hive mates to food sources, signal danger, and prepare for swarming - all indicators of colony health. And now, researchers are listening in.

Scientists based in Germany - with collaborators in China and Norway - have developed a way to monitor the electrostatic signals that bees give off. Basically, their wax-covered bodies charge up with electrostatic energy due to friction when flying, similar to how rubbing your hair can make it stand on end. That energy then gets emitted during communications. "We were thrilled by the potential of directly accessing the social communication of bees with our method," says Dr. Randolf Menzel, of the Free University of Berlin. "For the first time we can ask the bees themselves whether their colony is in a healthy condition or whether they suffer from unfavorable environmental conditions including those caused by humans."

The paper, recently published in the open access journal END

[Attachments] See images for this press release:

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Fertility apps with hundreds of millions of users collect and share excessive information

2021-05-04

The majority of top-rated fertility apps collect and even share intimate data without the users' knowledge or permission, a collaborative study by Newcastle University and Umea University has found. Researchers are now calling for a tightening of the categorisation of these apps by platforms to protect women from intimate and deeply personal information being exploited and sold. For hundreds of millions of women fertility tracking applications offer an affordable solution when trying to conceive or manage their pregnancy. But as this technology grows in popularity, experts have revealed that most of the top-rated fertility apps collect and share sensitive ...

Using personalized medicine to avoid resistance to leukemia treatment

2021-05-04

T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL) is a very aggressive type of blood cancer. It is relatively rare but still draws a lot of attention as it mostly develops in children under the age of 20. The standard treatment for T-ALL involves heavy chemotherapy procedures, which result in favorable outcomes with an overall survival of 75% after 5 years. However, some patients do not respond to this treatment, or they only respond for a short period, after which the disease grows back. These patients therefore need alternative therapies. Researchers from the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, have now identified a combination treatment, which could potentially benefit patients ...

Insights from color-blind octopus help fight human sight loss

2021-05-04

University of Bristol research into octopus vision has led to a quick and easy test that helps optometrists identify people who are at greater risk of macular degeneration, the leading cause of incurable sight loss. The basis for this breakthrough was published in the latest issue of the Journal of Experimental Biology and describes new technology developed by lead researcher, Professor Shelby Temple, to measure how well octopus- which are colour-blind - could detect polarized light, an aspect of light that humans can't readily see. Using this novel technology, the research team showed that octopus have the most sensitive polarization vision system of any animal tested to date. Subsequent research ...

People with disabilities faced pandemic triage biases

2021-05-04

When COVID-19 patients began filling up ICUs throughout the country in 2020, health care providers faced difficult decisions. Health care workers had to decide which patients were most likely to recover with care and which were not so resources could be prioritized. But a new paper from the University of Georgia suggests that unconscious biases in the health care system may have influenced how individuals with intellectual disabilities were categorized in emergency triage protocols. The state-level protocols, while crucial for prioritizing care during disasters, frequently ...

People with familial longevity show better cognitive aging

2021-05-04

(Boston)--If you come from a family where people routinely live well into old age, you will likely have better cognitive function (the ability to clearly think, learn and remember) than peers from families where people die younger. Researchers affiliated with the Long Life Family Study (LLFS) recently broadened that finding in a paper published in END ...

A sweet solution to hard brain implants

2021-05-04

Brain implants are used to treat neurological dysfunction, and their use for enhancing cognitive abilities is a promising field of research. Implants can be used to monitor brain activity or stimulate parts of the brain using electrical pulses. In epilepsy, for example, brain implants can determine where in the brain seizures are happening. Over time, implants trigger a foreign body response, creating inflammation and scar tissue around the implant that reduces their effectiveness. The problem is that traditional implants are much more rigid than brain tissue, which has a softness comparable to pudding. Stress between the implant and ...

Confirmation of an auroral phenomenon discovered by Finns

2021-05-04

A new auroral phenomenon discovered by Finnish researchers a year ago is probably caused by areas of increased oxygen atom density occurring in an atmospheric wave channel. The speculative explanation offered by the researchers gained support from a new study. Observations made by University of Helsinki researchers increased the validity of a speculative mechanism according to which a type of aurora borealis named 'dunes' is born. In the new study, photographs of the phenomenon taken by an international group of hobbyists in Finland, Norway and Scotland were compared to concurrent satellite data. The rare type of aurora borealis was seen in the sky on 20 January 2016 and recorded in photos taken by ...

New look at a bright stellar nursery

2021-05-04

This overlay shows radio (orange) and infrared images of a giant molecular cloud called W49A, where new stars are being formed. A team of astronomers led by Chris DePree of Agnes Scott College used the National Science Foundation's Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA) to make new, high-resolution radio images of this cluster of still-forming, massive stars. W49A, 36,000 light-years from Earth, has been studied for many decades, and the new radio images revealed some tantalizing changes that have occurred since an earlier set of VLA observations in 1994 and 1995. The ...

Scientists have developed a new "key-hole surgery" technique to extract metals from Earth

2021-05-04

Scientists have developed a new "key-hole surgery" technique to extract metals from the earth - which could revolutionise the future of metal mining A team of international researchers, including Dr Rich Crane from the Camborne School of Mines, University of Exeter, have developed a new method to extract metals, such as copper, from their parent ore body. The research team have provided a proof of concept for the application of an electric field to control the movement of an acid within a low permeability copper-bearing ore deposit to selectively dissolve and recover the metal in situ. This is in contrast to the conventional approach for the mining of such deposits ...

Nanoplastics and other harmful pollutants found in disposable face masks -- Regulation and research urgently needed, say experts

2021-05-04

Swansea University scientists have uncovered potentially dangerous chemical pollutants that are released from disposable face masks when submerged in water. The research reveals high levels of pollutants, including lead, antimony, and copper, within the silicon-based and plastic fibres of common disposable face masks. The work is supported by the Institute for Innovative Materials, Processing and Numerical Technologies (IMPACT) and the SPECIFIC Innovation & Knowledge Centre Project lead Dr Sarper Sarp of Swansea University College of Engineering said: "All of us need to keep wearing masks as they are essential in ending the pandemic. But we also urgently need more research and regulation on mask production, so we can reduce any risks to the environment and ...

The secret life of bee signals can communicate colony health

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES: