Science
press releases.

Science22 Jan 2025

Life satisfaction measurement tool provides robust information across nations, genders, ages, languages

Data on almost 57,000 people from 65 countries suggests that the Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS)—a widely used research tool—generally holds up well when applied across diverse groups of people, underscoring its potential value in research and policymaking. Viren Swami of Anglia Ruskin University, U.K., and colleagues present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS One on January 22, 2025. Life satisfaction is linked to a broad range of life areas, such as physical health, employment, and mortality. The SWLS is a questionnaire that measures an individual’s life ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Adult children of divorced parents at higher risk of stroke

TORONTO, ON – A recent study by researchers from the University of Toronto, Tyndale University and the University of Texas at Arlington found that older adults are at greater risk of having a stroke if they experienced their parents divorcing during childhood. Among Americans aged 65 and older, one in nine whose parents had divorced reported that they had been diagnosed with a stroke, compared to one in 15 of those whose parents had not divorced during their childhood. “Our study indicates that ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Severe weather and major power outages increasingly coincide across the US

An understanding of the relationship between severe weather and power outages in our changing climate will be critical for hazard response plans, according to a study published January 22, 2025 in the open-access journal PLOS Climate by Vivian Do of Columbia University, New York and colleagues. Throughout the United States, large-scale power outages commonly occur alongside severe weather events. These combined events can be associated with major economic costs and health risks, as loss of power can disrupt medical equipment, heating or air conditioning, and other important systems. As severe weather ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Float like a jellyfish: New coral mobility mechanisms uncovered

When it comes time to migrate, QUT research has found how a free-living coral ignores the classic advice and goes straight towards the light. The research – led by Dr Brett Lewis from the QUT School of Atmospheric and Earth Sciences and Reef Restoration and Adaptation Program, and published in PLOS One – investigated how the free-living mushroom coral Cycloseris cyclolites moves, navigates and responds to light in its natural environments. “Not all corals are attached to the substrate; some are solitary and free-living, allowing them to migrate into preferred habitats,” ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Severe weather and major power outages increasingly coincide across the U.S.

An understanding of the relationship between severe weather and power outages in our changing climate will be critical for hazard response plans, according to a study led by a researcher at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. The study is published in the open-access journal PLOS Climate. Throughout the U.S., large-scale power outages commonly occur alongside severe weather events. These combined events can be associated with major economic costs and health risks, as loss of power can disrupt medical equipment, heating or air conditioning, and other important systems. As severe weather events increase in severity and frequency ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

MD Anderson Research Highlights for January 22, 2025

HOUSTON ― The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center’s Research Highlights showcases the latest breakthroughs in cancer care, research and prevention. These advances are made possible through seamless collaboration between MD Anderson’s world-leading clinicians and scientists, bringing discoveries from the lab to the clinic and back. Novel allogeneic NK cell therapy from induced pluripotent stem cells shows encouraging efficacy in relapsed or refractory B-cell lymphoma patients Patients ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Scholastica announces integration with Crossmark by Crossref to expand its research integrity support

CHICAGO, IL (January 22, 2025) — Scholastica, a leading software solutions provider for academic journals, has released a new integration with Crossmark by Crossref, the industry standard mechanism for reporting updates to published research. The Crossmark integration is now available to journals subscribed to the Scholastica Open Access Publishing Platform that are published by a Crossref member organization participating in the Crossmark service. “Clearly communicating article updates and retractions is critical to maintaining the integrity of the scholarly record, and with this ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Subterranean ‘islands’: strongholds in a potentially less turbulent world

Deeply hidden in Earth’s mantle there are two huge ‘islands’ with the size of a continent. New research from Utrecht University shows that these regions are not only hotter than the surrounding graveyard of cold sunken tectonic plates, but also that they must be ancient: at least half a billion years old, perhaps even older. These observations contradict the idea of a well-mixed and fast flowing Earth’s mantle, a theory that is becoming more and more questioned. “There is less flow in Earth’s ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Spanish scientists discover how the gut modulates the development of inflammatory conditions

A study led by David Sancho at the Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares (CNIC) in Madrid reveals how an increase in intestinal permeability allows the natural gut bacteria to cross the intestinal barrier and reach the bone marrow, where they induce epigenetic changes—modifications that alter gene activity without affecting DNA sequence—in the stem cells that give rise to immune cells. The epigenetic changes induced by the translocated gut bacteria generate “trained” immune cells primed to respond more efficiently to future infections. However, this same ability to amplify the immune response can also aggravate the inflammatory conditions such as ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

SIDS discovery could ID babies at risk of sudden death

New University of Virginia School of Medicine research revealing the fingerprints of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome within blood samples could open the door to simple tests to identify babies at risk. The findings also represent an important step forward in unraveling the causes of SIDS, an unexplained condition that is the No. 1 killer of babies between amonth and a year old. The UVA researchers analyzed blood serum samples collected from infants who died ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Ozone exposure linked to hypoxia and arterial stiffness

Ozone (O3) exposure may reduce the availability of oxygen in the body, resulting in arterial stiffening due to the body’s natural response to create more red blood cells and hemoglobin, according to a study published today in JACC, the flagship journal of the American College of Cardiology. “Researchers found that even brief exposure to elevated ozone levels reduced blood oxygen saturation, triggered hypoxia-related biomarkers, and increased arterial stiffness, highlighting the novel connection between ozone exposure and arterial stiffness, demonstrated through comprehensive biomarker analysis in a high-altitude ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

WSU study shows travelers are dreaming forward, not looking back

PULLMAN, Wash. – When it comes to getting people to want to go places, the future is ever more lovely than the past, according to a new Washington State University-led study in the Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research. Led by Ruiying Cai, an assistant professor in the Carson College of Business, the study found that forestalgia-focused destination ads—those that emphasize an idealized future—are more effective at enticing travelers to click the purchase button for a vacation than ads based on fond recollections. The research also revealed that forestalgia advertising is particularly effective for getting people to book near-term trips, as imagining ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Many Roads Lead to… the embryo

Is there only one optimal configuration an organism can reach during evolution? Is there a single formula that describes the trajectory towards the optimum? And can we ‘derive’ it in a purely theoretical fashion? A team of researchers, including from the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA), has answers. Their mathematical model forecasts the ideal body plan of a fruit fly’s early embryo, suggesting that evolution might had many optimal options at its disposal. It is hypothesized that optimization is the secret sauce for many of nature’s fascinating ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Dining out with San Francisco’s coyotes

As their traditional dining options dwindle and natural areas give way to restaurants, homes and sidewalks, the coyotes of San Francisco are shifting what they eat. Scientists from the University of California, Davis, wanted to understand what San Francisco’s coyotes are eating, and how their diet is changed and shaped by the city’s landscape, which can vary from block to block. Their study, published in the journal Ecosphere, found that the number of restaurants and amount of pavement or “impervious surfaces” within the city heavily influenced what the coyotes ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Exposure to stress during early pregnancy affects offspring into adulthood

Maternal stress hormone levels during early pregnancy can have a lasting effect on the stress system of the offspring. The results of a long-term study on wild Assamese macaques in Thailand indicate that maternal stress in the first half of pregnancy is particularly relevant. Elevated stress hormones later during pregnancy or after birth did not have the same effects. The long-term study conducted by the University of Göttingen and the German Primate Center – Leibniz Institute for Primate Research provides important insights into the ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

New frontiers in organic chemistry: Synthesis of a promising mushroom-derived compound

Natural compounds from plants and animals have long been used in drug development, but mushrooms remain underexplored despite their rich chemical potential. Now, researchers from Japan have successfully developed the first method to synthesize inaoside A, a compound derived from the edible mushroom Laetiporus cremeiporus. This achievement will help better understand more of its bioactive properties and pave the way for similar mushroom-derived compounds in pharmaceuticals and functional foods. Natural compounds derived from plants and animals have long been a source of inspiration when developing drugs and dietary supplements. Many well-established medical ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Dolphins use a 'fat taste' system to get their mother’s milk

Juvenile dolphins were found to have specialized receptors for fatty acids on their tongues, offering new insights into their growth and feeding habits. Scientists have discovered that juvenile bottlenose dolphins have specialized receptors for detecting the fatty acids in their mother’s milk. These findings, published in the journal Marine Mammal Science, offer important insights into how these marine mammals grow, feed, and communicate. The new findings challenge previous assumptions about cetacean sensory systems. Unlike land mammals, dolphins and other marine mammals have limited olfactory capabilities – their sense of smell is largely ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Here’s what’s causing the Great Salt Lake to shrink, according to PSU study

The Great Salt Lake, the largest saltwater lake in the Western Hemisphere, reached historic low levels in 2022, raising economic, ecological and public health concerns for Utah. New research from Portland State is believed to be the first peer-reviewed study that quantifies the contributing factors to the record low water volume levels, which the researchers say is important for anticipating and managing future lake changes. “The lake has a lot of social and economic relevance for the region and Utah,” said Siiri Bigalke, the lead author and a Ph.D. candidate in PSU’s Earth, ...

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Science22 Jan 2025

Wild baboons not capable of visual self-awareness when viewing their own reflection

Published today in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, the study found that while the baboons noticed and responded to a laser mark shone on their arms, legs and hands, they did not react when they saw, via their mirror reflection, the laser on their faces and ears. It was the first time a controlled laser mark test has been done on these animals in a wild setting and strengthens the evidence from other studies that monkeys don’t recognise their own reflection. The researchers observed 120 Chacma ...

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Science21 Jan 2025

Illuminating an asymmetric gap in a topological antiferromagnet

Topological insulators (TIs) are among the hottest topics in condensed matter physics today. They’re a bit strange: their surfaces conduct electricity, yet their interiors do not, instead acting as insulators. Physicists consider TIs the materials of the future because they host fascinating new quantum phases of matter and have promising technological applications in electronics and quantum computing. Scientists are just now beginning to uncover connections between TIs and magnetism that could unlock new uses for these exotic materials. A ...

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Science21 Jan 2025

A global majority trusts scientists, wants them to have greater role in policymaking, study finds

In what is considered the most comprehensive post-pandemic survey of trust in scientists, researchers have found a majority of people around the world carry widespread trust in scientists — believing them to be honest, competent, qualified and concerned with public well-being. Researchers surveyed more than 72,000 individuals across 68 countries on perceptions of scientists’ trustworthiness, competence, openness and research priorities. The results, published in the journal Nature Human Behavior, also showed the general public’s desire ...

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Science21 Jan 2025

Spotted hyena found in Egypt for the first time in 5,000 years

A spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta) has been found in South Eastern Egypt: the first recorded instance of the creature in this region for thousands of years. The lone individual was caught and killed by people around 30km from the border with Sudan, a paper in De Gruyter’s Mammalia reports. “My first reaction was disbelief until I checked the photos and videos of the remains,” said the study’s lead author, Dr. Adbullah Nagy from Al-Azhar University, Egypt. “Seeing the evidence, I was completely taken aback. It was beyond anything we had expected to find in Egypt.” The sighting took place some 500km north of the known range of spotted ...

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Science21 Jan 2025

Salt deposit ring inside your pasta pan?

WASHINGTON, Jan. 21, 2025 – If you’ve ever tossed a generous pinch of salt into your pasta pan’s water for flavor or as an attempt to make it boil faster, you’ve likely ended up with a whitish ring of deposits inside the pan. A group of scientists from the University of Twente in the Netherlands and the French National Institute for Agriculture, Food, and Environment (INRAE), inspired by this observation during an evening of board games and pasta dinner, wondered what it ...

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Science21 Jan 2025

We can make fertilizer more efficiently under the surface of the Earth

Instead of relying on energy-hungry reactors to generate high temperatures and pressure, researchers are looking underground at Earth’s natural heat and forces to cook up ammonia for fertilizer. In a proof-of-concept study, published January 21 in the Cell Press journal Joule, researchers generated ammonia by mixing nitrogen-laced water with iron-rich rocks—without any energy input or CO2 emission. This new recipe may lead to a more sustainable alternative to current methods, theoretically churning out enough ammonia for 2.42 million years. The idea stems from an unusual geological phenomenon observed in the 1980s in Mali, West Africa. Locals discovered a well ...

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Science21 Jan 2025

What's behind preterm birth? Scientists just found a big clue

What's Behind Preterm Birth? Scientists Just Found a Big Clue UCSF researchers discovered a molecular timer that gets activated in the first days of pregnancy and influences when mice give birth. A typical human pregnancy lasts 40 weeks, but most parents know this number is only a rough estimate. Babies are born on a seemingly unpredictable timeline, with a normal pregnancy ranging from 38 to 42 weeks. And 10 percent of all births are preterm, meaning they occur before 37 weeks of gestation, which puts babies at risk of a host of complications. Now, UC San Francisco researchers have discovered a molecular timer in mice that plays a role in controlling ...

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