Science
press releases.

Science14 Sep 2023

Rivers are rapidly warming, losing oxygen; aquatic life at risk, study finds

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Rivers are warming and losing oxygen faster than oceans, according to a Penn State-led study published today (Sept. 14) in the journal Nature Climate Change. The study shows that of nearly 800 rivers, warming occurred in 87% and oxygen loss occurred in 70%. The study also projects that within the next 70 years, river systems, especially in the American South, are likely to experience periods with such low levels of oxygen that the rivers could “induce acute death” for certain species of fish and threaten aquatic diversity at large. “This is a wake-up call,” ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

London has the fastest increase in cooling demand in the world, shows new model

A model to map energy demand down to street level shows cooling demand in the capital grew by 5% per year between 1980 and 2022 as summers heat up. The Demand.ninja model, created by researchers at Imperial College London and TU Delft, was designed to show how the weather influences hourly energy consumption in buildings. It can also account for changes in demand as the climate changes, including the increase in cooling demand in the summer as heatwaves become more common and more intense. Countries ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

Many don’t know key facts about US Constitution, Annenberg study finds

PHILADELPHIA – Many Americans do not know what rights are protected under the First Amendment and a substantial number cannot name all three branches of government, according to the 2023 Annenberg Constitution Day Civics Survey. The Annenberg Public Policy Center’s annual, nationally representative survey finds that when U.S. adults are asked to name the specific rights guaranteed by the First Amendment to the Constitution, only one right is recalled by most of the respondents: Freedom of speech, ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

All work and no play will really make a dull life - new research reveals

The study across three countries led by the Department of Psychology’s Dr Paul Hanel discovered people who prioritised achievement over enjoyment were less happy on the next day. Whereas those who aimed for freedom said they had a 13% increase in well-being, recording better sleep quality and life satisfaction. And participants who tried to relax and follow their hobbies recorded an average well-being boost of 8% and a 10% drop in stress and anxiety. Dr Hanel worked with colleagues at the University of Bath on the Journal of Personality-published study. For the first ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

New poll shows 77% of Massachusetts residents support $600 child & family tax credit

Boston, MA – New polling data released late last week shows 77% of surveyed Massachusetts residents support a $600 state Child and Family Tax Credit. This polling confirms the popularity of the more generous Child and Family Tax Credit included in the House tax package, which is under consideration alongside the Senate tax bill by a bicameral conference committee. “The overwhelming support for a $600 tax credit per child matches up with the stories I have heard from families across my district, and the experiences of working Massachusetts families that they need more financial ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

New camera offers ultrafast imaging at a fraction of the normal cost

WASHINGTON — Capturing blur-free images of fast movements like falling water droplets or molecular interactions requires expensive ultrafast cameras that acquire millions of images per second. In a new paper, researchers report a camera that could offer a much less expensive way to achieve ultrafast imaging for a wide range of applications such as real-time monitoring of drug delivery or high-speed lidar systems for autonomous driving. “Our camera uses a completely new method to achieve high-speed imaging,” said Jinyang Liang from the Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS) ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

Take the money now or later? Financial scarcity doesn’t lead to poor decision making

When people feel that their resources are scarce – that they don’t have enough money or time to meet their needs – they often make decisions that favor short-term gains over long-term benefits. Because of that, researchers have argued that scarcity pushes people to make myopic, impulsive decisions. But a study published by the American Psychological Association provides support for a different, less widely held view: People experiencing scarcity make reasonable decisions based on their circumstances, and only ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

New foresight report identifies urgent policy actions needed to put SDGs back on track

Ahead of the UN’s SDG Summit (18-19 September), Earth4All, an international team of economists and scientists, and the Foundation for European Progressive Studies (FEPS), unveil groundbreaking research showing that policymakers can ensure the implementation of SDGs by 2050. The report ‘SDGs for All: Strategic scenarios’ equips policymakers with practical solutions designed to accelerate SDG implementation and to respond to the planetary emergency. It concludes that policymakers can step up the implementation of the SDGs by 2030 and beyond ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

The fourth wave of the US overdose crisis: fentanyl and stimulants

New research published in the scientific journal Addiction has found that the proportion of US overdose deaths involving both fentanyl and stimulants has increased more than 50-fold since 2010, from 0.6% (235 deaths) in 2010 to 32.3% (34,429 deaths) in 2021. By 2021, stimulants (such as cocaine and methamphetamine) had become the most common drug class found in fentanyl-involved overdoses in every US state. This rise in fentanyl/stimulant fatalities constitutes the ‘fourth wave’ in the US’s ...

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Science14 Sep 2023

Overdose deaths from fentanyl laced stimulants have risen 50-fold since 2010

New UCLA-led research has found that the proportion of US overdose deaths involving both fentanyl and stimulants has increased more than 50-fold since 2010, from 0.6% (235 deaths) in 2010 to 32.3% (34,429 deaths) in 2021. By 2021, stimulants such as cocaine and methamphetamine had become the most common drug class found in fentanyl-involved overdoses in every US state. This rise in fentanyl/stimulant fatalities constitutes the ‘fourth wave’ in the US’s long-running opioid overdose crisis –the death toll of which continues to rise precipitously. “We’re now seeing ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Stone age artists carved detailed human and animal tracks in rock art in Namibia

During the Later Stone Age in what is now Namibia, rock artists imbued so much detail into their engravings of human and animal prints that current-day Indigenous trackers could identify which animals’ prints they were depicting, as well as the animals’ general age and sex. Andreas Pastoors of Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany, and colleagues report these findings in a new study published September 13 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE. Engravings of animal tracks and human footprints appear in numerous ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

High rates of depression and anxiety in people who use both tobacco and cannabis

People who use both tobacco and cannabis are more likely to report anxiety and depression than those who used tobacco only or those who used neither substance, according to a new study published this week in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Nhung Nguyen of the University of California, San Francisco, USA, and colleagues. Tobacco and cannabis are among the most commonly used substances worldwide, and their co-use has been on the rise amid the expanding legalization of cannabis. In the new study, the researchers analyzed data on the substance use and mental health of 53,843 US adults who participated in online surveys as part of the COVID-19 Citizens Health Study, which ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Europeans may be more willing to help Ukrainian refugees than those from Syria or Somalia in part because they consider Ukrainians less threatening

Europeans may be more willing to help Ukrainian refugees than those from Syria or Somalia in part because they consider Ukrainians less threatening ### Article URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0290335 Article Title: Emotions, perceived threat, prejudice, and attitudes towards helping Ukrainian, Syrian, and Somali asylum seekers Author Countries: UK Funding: The author received no specific funding for this work. END ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Wikipedia charts the history of science, per study analyzing evolution of CRISPR-related articles

Wikipedia charts the history of science, per study analyzing evolution of CRISPR-related articles ### Article URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0290827 Article Title: Wikipedia as a tool for contemporary history of science: A case study on CRISPR Author Countries: France, Israel Funding: Thanks to the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation long term partnership, this work was partly supported by the LPI Research Fellowship, Université de Paris, INSERM U1284, to RAv and OB. RAv’s work was supported in part at the Technion by a fellowship of "The Israel Academy of Science and Humanities”. In either ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Jail admissions even for minor court debt are common, per analysis of US county-level data from Texas, Wisconsin and Oklahoma

Jail admissions even for minor court debt are common, per analysis of US county-level data from Texas, Wisconsin and Oklahoma ### Article URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0290397 Article Title: Forgotten but not gone: A multi-state analysis of modern-day debt imprisonment Author Countries: USA Funding: This study was supported by a grant from Arnold Ventures (https://www.arnoldventures.org). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Wolves and dogs appear to remember where people hid food

In a study involving several wolves and dogs, both animals performed better at finding hidden food if they had observed the food being hidden by a person—suggesting that they remembered where the food was, and did not rely solely on scent to find it. Sebastian Vetter of the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, Austria, and colleagues present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on September 13. Many species transmit important information through social learning, where one individual learns by observing ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

A trained detection dog found sea turtle nests in Florida more accurately and efficiently than humans, indicating potential for dog-assisted nest monitoring

A trained detection dog found sea turtle nests in Florida more accurately and efficiently than humans, indicating potential for dog-assisted nest monitoring ### Article URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0290740 Article Title: Use of a scent-detection dog for sea turtle nest monitoring of three sea turtle species in Florida Author Countries: USA Funding: The authors received no specific funding for this work. END ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Natural compound found in plants inhibits deadly fungi

A new study finds that a natural compound found in many plants inhibits the growth of drug-resistant Candida fungi — including its most virulent species, Candida auris, an emerging global health threat. The journal ACS Infectious Diseases published the discovery led by scientists at Emory University. Laboratory-dish experiments showed that the natural compound, a water-soluble tannin known as PGG, blocks 90% of the growth in four different species of Candida fungi. The researchers also discovered how PGG inhibits the growth: It grabs up iron molecules, essentially starving the fungi of an essential nutrient. By starving the fungi rather than attacking ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Scientists find good places to grow long-spined sea urchins, a starting point to restore ‘the lawn mowers of the reefs’

Scientists call long-spined sea urchins “the lawn mowers of the reefs” because they eat algae that could otherwise smother reef ecosystems and kill corals. That’s why researchers affiliated with the University of Florida Tropical Aquaculture Lab (TAL), who work at the Florida Aquarium’s Conservation Campus in Apollo Beach, are trying to raise as many urchins as possible. Aaron Pilnick, a post-doctoral researcher at TAL, led newly published research that identifies substrates that help long-spined sea urchins – scientifically known as Diadema -- ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Cleaning products emit hundreds of hazardous chemicals, new study finds

WASHINGTON – A peer-reviewed study by Environmental Working Group scientists has found unsettling details about the potential health risks of common household cleaning products. The study, published today in Chemosphere, analyzed 30 cleaning products, including multipurpose and glass cleaners, air fresheners and more. The study revealed that these everyday products may release hundreds of hazardous volatile organic compounds, known as VOCs. Researchers tested both conventional products and “green” cleaning products and detected a total of 530 unique VOCs in the 30 products. Of these, 193 VOCs were hazardous – identified ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Majority rule in complex mixtures

The very first life on earth is thought to have developed from “protocells” – liquid mixtures of many different types of molecules. Researchers from the University of Göttingen have now shown that in such mixtures, small imbalances in the number of molecules of different types can have an unexpected effect. A surprising interplay with the complex pattern of interactions strongly amplifies such imbalances – meaning that a type of molecule that is only slightly in the majority can almost entirely separate out from the others. ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

Researchers identify lesser-known factors associated with firearm violence

Key takeaways Social determinants of at-risk neighborhoods: Higher proportions of poverty and low per-capita income were most associated with higher rates of shooting incidents. High levels of social stressors: The study found that fatal and non-fatal firearm assaults were clustered in neighborhoods with high levels of social stressors measured with the 2018 version of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Social Vulnerability Index (SVI). A potential tool for directing anti-violence initiatives: The CDC’s SVI can help policymakers target neighborhoods at ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

B-GOOD invites participants to its closing conference in Slovenia this October

The EU Horizon 2020 project B-GOOD, aiming at improving honey bee health and beekeeping sustainability, invites participants to the project’s closing conference in Bled, Slovenia this October. The upcoming scientific event will feature oral presentations, poster sessions, and information market stands to provide a comprehensive overview of the results and technologies developed during the project. The attendees will also be able to meet the consortium members of the project, ask questions and exchange ideas. The event will take place on the 2nd of October 2023 immediately before the COLOSS ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

UTSA study: More Texas owls are testing positive for rat poisons

New research suggests that owls in Texas have high rates of anticoagulant rodenticides (AR)—blood thinning rat poisons—in their systems. Jennifer Smith, a professor of integrative biology in the UTSA College of Sciences, co-authored a research article published recently in PLOS ONE, the world’s first multidisciplinary open access journal. Eres Gomez, M.S. ’22, a UTSA graduate who had conducted research in the Smith Wildlife Lab as a student, was the article’s lead author. Heather Prestridge, a curator ...

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Science13 Sep 2023

A novel method to obtain acetone more simply, safely and cheaply

Acetone is an essential chemical industry input and is used in the manufacturing of a wide array of products, such as adhesives, antibiotics, electronic components, solvents and removers, inks and vitamins, among others. Its production is complex and hazardous. To simplify the process and make it safer and cheaper, researchers in Brazil and Germany have developed an innovative method that uses only light and photoactive iron chloride (FeCl3), an inexpensive chemical compound. An article on the research, which was funded by FAPESP, is published in the ...

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