Researchers from MIT and Stanford University have devised a new machine-learning approach that could be used to control a robot, such as a drone or autonomous vehicle, more effectively and efficiently in dynamic environments where conditions can change rapidly.  This technique could help an autonomous vehicle learn to compensate for slippery road conditions to avoid going into a skid, allow a robotic free-flyer to tow different objects in space, or enable a drone to closely follow a downhill skier despite being buffeted by strong winds. The researchers’ approach incorporates certain structure from control theory into the process for learning a model in such a way that leads ...

LAS VEGAS – July 26, 2023 – Black holes are the most mysterious objects in the universe, with features that sound like they come straight from a sci-fi movie.  Stellar-mass black holes with masses of roughly 10 suns, for example, reveal their existence by eating materials from their companion stars. And in some instances, supermassive black holes accumulate at the center of some galaxies to form bright compact regions known as quasars with masses equal to millions to billions of our sun. A subset of accreting stellar-mass black holes that can launch jets of highly magnetized plasma are called microquasars.  An international ...

Increased skin cancer screening in individuals with skin of color is not sufficient to address racial disparities in melanoma survival rates, according to a new JAMA Dermatology study by UPMC and University of Pittsburgh researchers. Melanoma causes the most deaths of any skin cancer, but is usually treatable if caught early. Although the disease is most common in white individuals, survival odds are worse in people with darker skin tones. “In this study, we asked whether screening could address this disparity by helping detect melanoma early,” said senior author Laura Ferris, M.D., Ph.D., dermatologist at UPMC and professor of dermatology at the Pitt School of Medicine. ...

American Geophysical Union 25 July 2023 AGU Release No. 23-29 For Immediate Release This press release and accompanying multimedia are available online at: https://news.agu.org/press-release/petrified-trees-reveal-yellowstone-geysers-ongoing-battle-with-drought/  AGU press contact: Liza Lester, +1 (202) 777-7494, news@agu.org (UTC-4 hours) Contact information for the researchers: Shaul Hurwitz, U.S. Geological Survey, shaulh@usgs.gov (UTC-7 hours)  WASHINGTON — Yellowstone’s Steamboat Geyser has had decades-long dry spells brought on by a history of droughts, a new study finds. With global temperatures on the rise, the American West is projected to become drier. ...

https://www.massgeneral.org/news/research-spotlight/lab-on-chip-technology-red-blood-cellsZiya Isiksacan, PhD, a research fellow in the Center for Engineering in Medicine and Surgery (CEMS) is the lead author, and Osman Berk Usta, PhD, an investigator in the CEMS at Massachusetts General Hospital and an associate professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School, is the senior author of a new study published in PNAS, Assessment of Stored Red Blood Cells Through Lab-on-a-Chip Technologies for Precision Transfusion Medicine. The article is a collaboration between multiple international institutes ...

Scientists have developed a novel method for storing biological materials such as RNA and proteins in a solid-state. The storage in solid-state resembles the form of a pill or a tablet, which dissolves in water for on-demand use.  The innovation provides a new way to overcome current limitations in the storage and handling of products derived from living cells used for a variety of health care and scientific research purposes.  Biological materials that are frequently used in developing new medicines and diagnostic testing tools such as mRNA, enzymes, and antibodies are highly ...

Alessandra Corsi knows that when you shoot for the stars, anything can happen. It’s in that spirit of intellectual curiosity that Corsi, an associate professor in Texas Tech University’s Department of Physics and Astronomy, will peer into some of the farthest recesses of space in search of gravitational waves. “We are at a critical moment in this field,” she said. “We had one event in 2017 that was amazing where everyone in multi-messenger astronomy started caring more about gravitational wave data, but now we need more of those type of events so we can study them and understand them better.” Corsi has received a three-year grant from the ...

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — A Penn State-led team of researchers developed a potentially promising approach to make fuel cells more affordable. The new method reduces the amount of platinum-group metal (PGM) loadings by replicating a process used in computer chip manufacturing.   They published their results this week (July 24) in JACS Au, an open-access journal of the American Chemical Society. According to corresponding author Christopher Arges, an associate professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering and a faculty member in the Institutes ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. -- A new study from the University of Missouri Sinclair School of Nursing found that barriers, including poverty, low health literacy, cultural beliefs, lack of infrastructure and political issues, all work together to hinder diabetes self-management for Haitian migrants working in sugar cane fields in the Dominican Republic.   Rosalia Molina, a nurse who has taken previous medical missionary trips to the Dominican Republic to help impoverished individuals self-manage their diabetes, led the study as part of her doctoral studies at the MU Sinclair School of Nursing. She interviewed health care workers in the Dominican Republic about their challenges providing ...

Key Takeaways Researchers have discovered that the NLRP11 protein plays critical roles in alerting the body to a bacterial infection and initiating an immune response against it NLRP11 is present in humans and other primates but absent in mice The discovery could enable the development of mouse models that are more similar to humans for bacterial infection experiments BOSTON – A team led by researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) has discovered a protein that plays critical roles in alerting the body to a bacterial ...

MINNEAPOLIS – People who carry the gene variant associated with the strongest risk for Alzheimer’s disease may lose their ability to detect odors earlier than people who do not carry the gene variant, which may be an early sign of future memory and thinking problems, according to a study published in the July 26, 2023, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. The gene variant associated with this increased risk of Alzheimer’s is called APOE e4. “Testing a person’s ability to detect odors may be a useful way to predict future problems with cognition,” said study ...

Rochester Institute of Technology’s Joel Kastner, a professor in the Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science and School of Physics and Astronomy, and a team of researchers with the European Southern Observatory (ESO) have discovered new evidence of how planets as massive as Jupiter can form, using images from the ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA). The combination of VLT and ALMA imaging have yielded detections of dusty ...

A new study by Simon Fraser University researchers shows that efforts to reduce methane emissions are needed immediately if we are to meet global climate change goals.  A key element of the 2015 Paris Agreement, a legally binding international treaty on climate change, is the commitment to limit average global temperatures increases to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels, and pursue efforts to limit global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. This requires reaching net-zero CO2 emissions by or around 2050—and deep reductions in methane and other ...

Lizards may miss out on mating opportunities and pick partners more hastily under warming temperatures ### Article URL:  https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0285656 Article Title: Behavioural plasticity in activity and sexual interactions in a social lizard at high environmental temperatures Author Countries: Argentina Funding: N.R. - Student Research Grant 2019 - Animal Behavior Society https://www.animalbehaviorsociety.org/web/index.php. M. C. - Consejo Nacional ...

Fungi which normally decay wood can effectively break down low density polyethylene (LDPE) plastic instead - and do so best in the absence of wood ### Article URL:  https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0288133 Article Title: Wood decay fungi show enhanced biodeterioration of low-density polyethylene in the absence of wood in culture media Author Countries: Sri Lanka Funding: 1. RNA: TWAS research grant 18-020 RG/BIO/AS_I The world academy of science https://twas.org/ 2. RNA, PW, HH: ICGEB research grant CRP/LKA18-03 https://www.icgeb.org/ International Center for genetic engineering and biotechnology 3. RNA, HH: t(NSF/RG/2019/BT/03). http://www.nsf.ac.lk/ ...

What happens inside the carnivorous plant Venus Flytrap when it catches an insect? New technology has led to discoveries about the electrical signalling that causes the trap to snap shut. Bioelectronic technology enables advanced research into how plants react to their surroundings, and to stress. Most people know that the nervous system in humans and other animals sends electric impulses. But do plants also have electrical signals even though they lack a nervous system? Yes, plants have electrical signals that are generated in response to touch and stress factors, such as wounds caused by herbivores and attacks on their roots. As opposed to animals, who can move out of the ...

Many gardeners will tell you that aphids are the bane of their existence. According to a new study from the University of Florida, these tiny pests also pose problems for the iconic monarch butterfly. The study found that when oleander aphids infested tropical milkweed — a nonnative milkweed species commonly used across southern portions of the U.S. stretching from California to Florida — the butterflies laid fewer eggs on the plants, and caterpillars developing on those plants were slower to mature. Monarch butterflies depend on milkweed and its close relatives to complete their life ...

All plants and lichens listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act are sensitive to climate change but there are few plans in place to address this threat directly, according to a new study by Amy Casandra Wrobleski of Pennsylvania State University and colleagues, published July 26, 2023 in the open-access journal PLOS Climate. Climate change is expected to have a major impact on species around the world, especially endangered species, which are already rare. A majority of the organisms listed under the Endangered Species Act are ...

More often, people are turning to consumer wearable devices, such as smartwatches, to monitor their health and physical activity. Using these wearable devices, a study led by Michigan Medicine and the University of Missouri with Saint Luke’s Mid America Heart Institute finds that taking more daily steps is associated improved health, including fewer symptoms and physical limitations, for people with heart failure. The results are published in JACC: Heart Failure. Clinicians are increasingly presented with their patients’ wearable device data, ...

BENTLEY UNIVERSITY A new study from Bentley University’s Center for Integration of Science and Industry demonstrates that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) spent $950 million on basic or applied research associated with patents that provided manufacturers with market exclusivity. This amount represents <1% (0.59%) of the $164 billion in total NIH funding for research contributing to the approval of these products.   The article in PLOS ONE titled “NIH funding for patents that contribute ...

People with heart failure who increase their daily step count also saw improvements in their health status over a 12-week period, according to a study published today in JACC: Heart Failure. The study suggests that physical data from wearable devices, such as step count, can be clinically significant and has the potential to inform future clinical trials and clinical care. Consumer wearable devices to track health status and progress are commonly used and part of a growing trend of mobile health technology. However, how to interpret data from wearable devices, including step count, is at times ...

Who lived at Machu Picchu at its height? A new study, published today in Science Advances, used ancient DNA to find out for the first time where workers buried more than 500 years ago came from within the lost Inca Empire. Researchers, including Jason Nesbitt, associate professor of archaeology at Tulane University School of Liberal Arts, performed genetic testing on individuals buried at Machu Picchu in order to learn more about the people who lived and worked there. Machu Picchu is a UNESCO World Heritage Site located in the Cusco ...

Programmed cell death, a fundamental biological process that facilitates the elimination of old, damaged, infected, and non-functional cells, plays a crucial role in maintaining the balance between health and disease in the human body. Research by the team of Dr Alessandro Annibaldi from the Center for Molecular Medicine Cologne (CMMC) at the University of Cologne has uncovered a novel mechanism of cell death regulation, shedding light on its significance during conditions such as SARS-CoV infection and skin injury. The study ‘Cleavage ...

New Haven, Conn. — A genetic analysis suggests that the servants and retainers who lived, worked, and died at Machu Picchu, the renowned 15th century Inca palace in southern Peru, were a diverse community representing many different ethnic groups from across the Inca empire. The genomic data, described in a new study in Science Advances, is the first investigation of the genomic diversity of individuals buried at Machu Picchu and adjacent places around Cusco, the Inca capital. It builds upon previous archeological and bio-archaeological research, including a 2021 Yale-led study which found that Machu Picchu (AD 1420-1530) is older than was previously believed. “The ...

A new study led by researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center discovered loss of metabolic fitness in chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) natural killer (NK) cells is a critical mechanism of resistance, with infused cells gradually losing the ability to compete with tumor cells for nutrients, leading to tumor relapse. The study, published today in Science Advances, demonstrates that engineering CAR NK cells to express interleukin-15 (IL-15) enhances the cells’ metabolic fitness and provides a longer-lasting ...