Science
press releases.

Science19 Dec 2023

Pushing compressed sensing to real-time edge applications

Recently, a research team led by Prof. Sun Zhong at Peking University reported an analog hardware solution for real-time compressed sensing recovery, which has been published as an article titled "In-memory analog solution of compressed sensing recovery in one step" in Science Advances. In this work, a design based on a resistive memory (also known as memristor) array for performing instantaneous matrix-matrix-vector multiplication (MMVM) is first introduced. Based on this module, then an analog matrix computing circuit that solves compressed sensing (CS) recovery in one step (within few microseconds) is disclosed. CS ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

The science behind snowflakes

Tim Garrett has devoted his scientific career to characterizing snowflakes, the protean particles of ice that form in clouds and dramatically change as they fall to Earth. Now the University of Utah atmospheric scientist is unlocking the mystery of how snowflakes move in response to air turbulence that accompanies snowfall using novel instrumentation developed on campus. And after analyzing more than half a million snowflakes, what his team has discovered has left him astonished. Rather than something incomprehensibly complicated, predicting how snowflakes move proved to be surprisingly ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Would you like to groom me?

Researchers at UNIL’s Department of Ecology and Evolution reveal the existence of social traditions in vervet monkeys. This work was published in iScience on December 19, 2023. British tits have learned from each other how to pierce the lids of milk bottles left on doorsteps. On the island of Koshima, Japanese macaques started washing sweet potatoes to rid them of sand. The animal realm is full of examples of traditions linked to food, tool use or hunting techniques that have spread within specific communities. However, few traditions of social nature, i.e. how individuals interact with each other, have been described. A ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Disparities in preoperative goals of care documentation in veterans

About The Study: In this study of 13,000 patients, few patients undergoing surgical procedures completed preoperative life-sustaining treatment documentation, with disparities in documentation rates based on race, ethnicity, rurality of patient residence, history of mental health disability, and access to high-volume facilities within a Veterans Affairs cohort. Authors: Adela Wu, M.D., of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, in Palo Alto, California is the corresponding author. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi: ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Study uncovers major hidden human-driven bird extinctions

Humans have wiped out around 1,400 bird species – twice as many as previously thought – with major implications for the ongoing biodiversity crisis, a new study has found. Many of the world’s islands were previously untouched paradises, but the arrival of people to places like Hawaii, Tonga and the Azores led, over time, to far-reaching impacts including deforestation, overhunting and the introduction of invasive species. Consequently, bird species were wiped out. While the demise of many birds since the 1500s has been recorded, our knowledge of the fate of species before this relies on fossils, ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Moderation surpasses excess

Kyoto, Japan -- Down syndrome, a congenital disorder stemming from abnormal cell division and differentiation, is most common in newborns fated to neurodevelopmental delays and other health complications. The genetic defect causes the dysfunction of the protein kinase DYRK1A, which is encoded on chromosome 21 and is deeply associated with both Down syndrome and autism spectrum disorder. DYRK1A has attracted attention as a target molecule for treating various diseases, but specific cellular mechanisms regulating ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Why do people age differently?

CLEVELAND—Throughout our lives, changes in our DNA, called genetic mutations, occur in every healthy cell of the human body—mutations which have long been thought to be an important reason why our bodies age. But it’s not known whether some people accumulate mutations at a faster or slower rate with age, and whether those differences might predict how long we live and the risk for aging-related diseases like cancer. With a $3.5 million research project grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Jonathan Shoag, a surgeon-scientist at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and urologic oncologist at ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Ali Khademhosseini named as 2023 National Academy of Inventors Fellow

(LOS ANGELES) – December 18, 2023 - The National Academy of Inventors (NAI) has named Ali Khademhosseini, Ph.D., Director and CEO of the Terasaki Institute for Biomedical Innovation (TIBI), as a 2023 National Academy of Inventors Fellow. This distinctive honor is the highest professional award that is exclusively bestowed upon inventors. The Academy has chosen to honor him for his achievements and contributions to the innovation ecosystem, which vastly influences science, society, and the global economy. Dr. Khademhosseini will be formally recognized at the NAI thirteenth annual meeting on June 18, 2024, where he will be presented with a medal by a senior official from the United States ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Information sharing and cooperation

How is cooperation affected when people can receive secondhand information about what others are contributing? Ashley Harrell and Tom Wolff investigated this question through an online cooperation game. Participants were recruited from a large subject pool of university students and other adults, maintained by the Interdisciplinary Behavioral Research Center at Duke University. Over 200 participants were placed in groups of 6–10; however, each participant was only linked to some of the other participants. In the control condition, players could only see the contributions ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

How big events can disrupt public transit over an entire city

COLUMBUS, Ohio – New technology has allowed scientists to see how a major sporting event can disrupt public transportation in an entire city for hours before and after the event. Researchers conducted a case study in Columbus on days that The Ohio State University had home football games, attracting more than 100,000 fans to Ohio Stadium on the university’s campus. Findings showed that bus service across the entire city was significantly less reliable for more than 7 hours on game days compared to other days, meaning that even bus riders who were not traveling near the university ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Childhood trauma increases risk of chronic pain in adulthood, research to-date highlights

Physical, sexual, or emotional abuse, or neglect, either alone or combined with other types of childhood trauma, increases the risk of chronic pain and related disability in adulthood, according to new research. These new findings underscore the urgency of addressing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) – potentially traumatic events that occur before 18 years of age – and taking steps to mitigate their long-term impact on people’s health. The study ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Lexical simplification via single-word generation

Lexical simplification (LS) aims to simplify a sentence by replacing complex words with simpler words without changing the meaning of the sentence，which can facilitate comprehension of the text for people with non-native speakers and children. Traditional LS methods utilize linguistic databases or word embedding models to extract synonyms or high-similar words for the complex word, and then sort them based on their appropriateness in context. Recently, BERT-based LS methods entirely or partially mask ...

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Science19 Dec 2023

Doctor Who festive specials linked to lower death rates

A new Doctor Who episode shown during the festive period, especially on Christmas Day, is associated with lower death rates in the subsequent year across the UK, finds a study published in the Christmas issue of The BMJ. The findings highlight the positive effect doctors can have when working during the festive period and may prompt the BBC and Disney+ to broadcast new episodes of Doctor Who every festive period, ideally on Christmas Day, says the author. Sixty years ago, the ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Giant bacterium uses unique processes to power itself

Not all bacteria are created equal. Most are single-celled and tiny, a few ten-thousandths of a centimeter long. But bacteria of the Epulopiscium family are large enough to be seen with the naked eye and 1 million times the volume of their better-known cousins, E. coli. In a study published Dec. 18 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from Cornell and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have for the first time described the full genome of one species of the family of giants, which they’ve named Epulopiscium viviparus. “This incredible giant bacterium is unique and interesting ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Quantifying barriers to establishing sequestration wells

Carbon capture and sequestration (CCS), the process of capturing and storing atmospheric carbon dioxide, is one method of reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in efforts to reduce the impacts of climate change. While CCS is an essential tool in decarbonizing the U.S. economy, there are barriers that exist to the development, approval, and implementation of a geologic sequestration site, as it requires an appropriate geologic formation, as well as an approved injection facility. Recent work from the Carnegie Mellon University Department of Engineering and Public Policy (EPP) estimates the time required to develop, approve, and implement ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Firearms and hanging top methods for suicide in US as rates continue to rise

Embargoed for release until 5:00 p.m. ET on Monday 18 December 2023 Annals of Internal Medicine Tip Sheet @Annalsofim Below please find summaries of new articles that will be published in the next issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. The summaries are not intended to substitute for the full articles as a source of information. This information is under strict embargo and by taking it into possession, media representatives are committing to the terms of the embargo not only on their own behalf, but also on behalf of the organization they represent. ---------------------------- 1. ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

New guidelines released for practitioners treating anaphylaxis and atopic dermatitis

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. – (December 18, 2023) — Two new practice parameters from the Joint Task Force for Practice Parameters (JTFPP) offer evidence-based recommendations for the diagnosis and management of anaphylaxis and atopic dermatitis (AD) in pediatric and adult patients. The Joint Task Force is a partnership between the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI) and the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology. “Both anaphylaxis and atopic dermatitis are allergic conditions that affect millions of people – in the United States and around the world,” says allergist Jay Lieberman, MD, co-chair of the JTFPP ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Melatonin and carcinogenesis in mice: The 50th anniversary of relationships

“[...] murine models proved to be valuable and, in some cases, indispensable for advancing melatonin applications in oncology [...].” BUFFALO, NY- December 18, 2023 – A new research perspective was published in Oncotarget's Volume 14 on December 12, 2023, entitled, “Melatonin and carcinogenesis in mice: the 50th anniversary of relationships.” Fifty years ago, in 1973, Vladimir N. Anisimov and coauthors demonstrated for the first time an inhibitory effect of the pineal ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Public opinion polls may not be as straightforward as you think

Public opinion polls are often considered "the will of the people" but a new study on the role of polls in South Korea shows that they may not always be that transparent. "Using polls to gauge what people think about politics is not as simple as it sounds, as there are multiple mediating factors between what people think and how their views may be represented in the media," says co-author Sunmin Kim, an assistant professor of sociology at Dartmouth. "Our research shows more broadly, how in a democracy, measuring what people think or want can be a highly haphazard and unpredictable process based on the ways public opinion poll ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Apes remember friends they haven’t seen for decades

Apes recognize photos of groupmates they haven’t seen for more than 25 years and respond even more enthusiastically to pictures of their friends, a new study finds. The work, which demonstrates the longest-lasting social memory ever documented outside of humans, and underscores how human culture evolved from the common ancestors we share with apes, our closest relatives, was published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. “Chimpanzees and bonobos recognize individuals even though they haven’t seen them for ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Move over dolphins. Chimps and bonobos can recognize long-lost friends and family — for decades

Researchers led by a University of California, Berkeley, comparative psychologist have found that great apes and chimpanzees, our closest living relatives, can recognize groupmates they haven't seen in over two decades — evidence of what’s believed to be the longest-lasting nonhuman memory ever recorded. The findings also bolster the theory that long-term memory in humans, chimpanzees and bonobos likely comes from our shared common ancestor that lived between 6 million and 9 million years ago. The team used infrared eye-tracking cameras to record where bonobos and chimps gazed when they were shown side-by-side images of other bonobos ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

First observation of how water molecules move near a metal electrode

A collaborative team of experimental and computational physical chemists from South Korea and the United States have made an important discovery in the field of electrochemistry, shedding light on the movement of water molecules near metal electrodes. This research holds profound implications for the advancement of next-generation batteries utilizing aqueous electrolytes. In the nanoscale realm, chemists typically utilize laser light to illuminate molecules and measure spectroscopic properties to visualize molecules. However, studying the behavior of ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Exercise-induced Pgc-1α expression inhibits fat accumulation in aged skeletal muscles

Myosteatosis, or aging-related fat accumulation in skeletal muscles, is a leading cause of declines in muscle strength and quality of life in elderly adults. Older adults who are sedentary and develop accumulated fat in the skeletal muscle are often prescribed exercise by their doctors to combat the condition. If scientists were to develop a new therapy, such as medications, to combat myosteatosis, they would need to replicate the mechanism by which exercise might reduce fat accumulation in muscles. Fibro-adipogenic ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Memory research: Breathing in sleep impacts memory processes

How are memories consolidated during sleep? In 2021, researchers led by Dr. Thomas Schreiner, leader of the Emmy Noether junior research group at LMU’s Department of Psychology, had already shown there was a direct relationship between the emergence of certain sleep-related brain activity patterns and the reactivation of memory contents during sleep. However, it was still unclear whether these rhythms are orchestrated by a central pacemaker. So the researchers joined up with scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin and the University of Oxford to reanalyze the data. Their results have identified ...

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Science18 Dec 2023

Feelings of impatience evolve over time, study says

A new study answers a timely question: What is the hardest part of waiting? Consumers do plenty of it—online, in line, in traffic, or for deliveries. And now we know it’s the final phase that’s most problematic for them. In this season of joyful—and not-so-joyful—anticipation, the research has deep implications for marketers and psychological insights for us all, says Annabelle Roberts, coauthor and assistant professor of marketing at the University of Texas McCombs School of Business. The paper shows: It’s better for companies to communicate possible delays early in the wait; It’s better for ...

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