Continents are part of what makes Earth uniquely habitable for life among the planets of the solar system, yet surprisingly little is understood about what gave rise to these huge pieces of the planet’s crust and their special properties. New research from Elizabeth Cottrell, research geologist and curator of rocks at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History, and lead study author Megan Holycross, formerly a Peter Buck Fellow and National Science Foundation Fellow at the museum and now an assistant professor at Cornell University, deepens the understanding of Earth’s crust by testing ...

The North Pacific “Garbage Patch” is home to an abundance of floating sea creatures, as well as the plastic waste it has become famous for, according to a study by Rebecca Helm from Georgetown University, US, and colleagues, publishing April 27th in the open access journal PLOS Biology. There are five main oceanic gyres — vortexes of water where multiple ocean currents meet — of which the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre (NPSG) is the largest. It is also known as the North Pacific “Garbage Patch”, because converging ocean currents have concentrated large amounts ...

Cholesterol and phytosterol are sterols, fatty compounds essential for many biological processes such as the functioning of cell membranes. Up to now, it has been assumed that phytosterols are characteristic for plants, and cholesterol for animals, and that only plants can make phytosterols, while animals typically make cholesterol. Dolma Michellod, Nicole Dubilier and Manuel Liebeke from the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen, Germany, were therefore surprised when they discovered that a small marine worm called Olavius ...

CORVALLIS, Ore. – New research led by an Oregon State University scientist begins to unravel the role dust plays in nourishing global ocean ecosystems while helping regulate atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. Researchers have long known that phytoplankton – plantlike organisms that live in the upper part of the ocean and are the foundation of the marine food web – rely on dust from land-based sources for key nutrients. But the extent and magnitude of the impact of the dust – ...

Huge swarms of migratory locusts take on the proportions of natural disasters and threaten the food supply of millions of people, especially in Africa and Asia.  As the eighth of the ten biblical plagues, the Book of Moses in the Old Testament already describes how swarms of locusts darkened the sky and ate up everything that grew in the fields and on the trees.  Scientists suspect that cannibalism among locusts contributes to their swarming behavior, and swarms therefore constantly move ...

Swarming migratory locusts – which threaten food security across the globe – avoid being eaten by other locusts by producing a smelly pheromone called phenylacetonitrile (PAN), according to a new study. The discovery of an anticannibalistic signaling pathway in locusts could provide a target for locust management strategies since cannibalistic interactions among locusts have been implicated in creation of swarms, which are highly destructive. A wide range of species practice cannibalism, mostly to supplement nutrition. This has led to the evolution of ...

A randomized controlled experiment featuring more than 26,000 students across 22 4-year U.S. universities shows that the effects of a low-cost, brief online intervention focused on social belonging can promote success and equity for college students. This finding was particularly apparent among those from groups that have historically achieved at lower rates. The likelihood of earning a university degree in the U.S. is highly unequal across racial-ethnic and socioeconomic groups. In most cases, programs designed to help, by promoting college persistence, work differently for different people. Understanding these heterogenous effects ...

Streams of intergalactic gas, enriched with elements heavier than helium, encircle and spiral into a massive galaxy observed at redshift 2.3, researchers report. The findings provide evidence of enriched gas recycling during galaxy formation in the early Universe. Galaxies form through the accretion of gas from the circumgalactic medium (CGM) and intergalactic medium (IGM), which subsequently condenses into stars. Simulations and observations have shown that cold stream accretion – the accumulation of pristine intergalactic gas that contains almost no elements heavier ...

Reconstructing the bacterial genomes recovered from the calcified plaque of human and Neanderthal remains has offered new insights into previously undescribed Pleistocene bacterial metabolites, researchers report. The approach expands researchers ability to study microbial natural products, which has otherwise been mostly limited to studying living bacteria. Bioactive small molecules produced by microbes, often called natural products, have been an important source of diverse functional compounds for industry and medicine, including many antimicrobials. Characterizing the natural products encoded in biosynthetic gene clusters ...

A major challenge in human genetics is understanding which parts of the genome drive specific traits or contribute to disease risk. This challenge is even greater for genetic variants found in the 98% of the genome that does not encode proteins.   A new approach developed by researchers at New York University and the New York Genome Center combines genetic association studies, gene editing, and single-cell sequencing to address these challenges and discover causal variants and genetic mechanisms for ...

USC President Carol L. Folt on Thursday announced a $1 billion-plus initiative for computing research and education across disciplines, with a focus on AI, machine learning and data science, augmented and virtual reality, robotics, gaming and block chain. “I want every student who comes through our programs, whether they are in science, business, the humanities or the arts, to have a solid grounding in technology and the ethics of the work that they do,” Folt said. “We will integrate digital literacy across disciplines to create responsible leaders for the workforce of the future.” Seeded with a $260 million gift from the ...

A method using augmented reality to create accurate visual representations of ionizing radiation, developed at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has been licensed by Teletrix, a firm that creates advanced simulation tools to train the nation’s radiation control workforce. Ionizing radiation — which is linked to cancer and other health problems — has enough energy to knock electrons off of atoms or molecules, creating ions. Occupational exposure is a common occurrence for many radiological workers, so any method of decreasing exposure helps ...

The National Institutes of Health has renewed a 5-year biomedical sciences research pipeline grant to LSU Health New Orleans. With the $1.4 million Postbaccalaureate Research Education Program (PREP) grant awarded by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, LSU Health New Orleans will enhance the diversity of the biomedical sciences research workforce.             During a comprehensive one-year research education program, LSU Health New Orleans faculty will prepare individuals from backgrounds underrepresented in the biomedical sciences ...

EL PASO, Texas (May 4, 2023) – Researchers at The University of Texas at El Paso will help build a robotic device for welding in space, prepare astronauts for a mission to the Moon and more, thanks to a slew of new grants from NASA. The burst of grants awarded to faculty across various departments and colleges highlight UTEP’s strong partnership with NASA and the critical scientific and engineering contributions made by the University for space exploration. “These joint initiatives between UTEP and NASA strengthen UTEP’s reputation as a premier research institution,” said Stephen Aley, Ph.D., ...

NORMAN, OKLA. – Justin Metcalf, Ph.D., assistant professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Gallogly College of Engineering, and an affiliate faculty in the Advanced Radar Research Center at the University of Oklahoma, has received the 2023 Fred Nathanson Memorial Radar Award from the Aerospace and Electronic Systems Society of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers for his contributions to radar embedded communications, spectrum sharing, and cognitive radar. The competitive international award recognizes “individual contributions to the radar community ...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Jillian McKoy, jpmckoy@bu.edu Michael Saunders, msaunder@bu.edu ## Although national COVID mortality disparities declined in 2021, this decrease was largely explained by increases in mortality among White individuals and the shifting geography of the pandemic from urban to rural areas rather than decreases in mortality among non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic individuals.  The racial disparities in COVID-19 deaths became a defining part of the first year of the pandemic in the United States, prompting national efforts to reduce this disproportionate toll among Black and Hispanic communities through vaccination drives and other outreach when ...

Hugging and swaddling opioid-exposed newborns can reduce their hospital stays by almost a week, compared to older, drug-based methods, according to new research published by University of New Mexico researchers. For years, clinicians have known that babies exposed to opioids in the womb were at risk of developing neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome (NOWS), distressing them to the point of excessive crying, tremors and, in severe cases, even seizures. Hospitals have used widely different approaches to care and, until now, the understanding of long-term consequences of administering opioid-withdrawal medications to infants has been limited. “These findings will be ...

Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago is the first in Illinois to receive designation as a NORD Rare Disease Center of Excellence, becoming one of 40 U.S. academic medical centers selected to be a part of the first-of-it-kind national network of U.S. medical institutions dedicated to diagnosing, treating, and researching all rare diseases. The network is led by the National Organization for Rare Disorders (NORD) and is designed to foster knowledge sharing between rare disease experts across the country to help meet the unmet needs of more than 25 million ...

WASHINGTON — For the first time, researchers have demonstrated a prototype lidar system that uses quantum detection technology to acquire 3D images while submerged underwater. The high sensitivity of this system could allow it to capture detailed information even in extremely low-light conditions found underwater. “This technology could be useful for a wide range of applications,” said research team member Aurora Maccarone, a Royal Academy of Engineering research fellow from Heriot-Watt University in the United Kingdom. “For example, it could be used to inspect underwater installations, such as underwater wind farm cables and the submerged ...

New York (May 3, 2022) — Donna M. Fick, PhD, GCNS-BC, AGSF, FGSA, FAAN will step into the role of President of the American Geriatrics Society (AGS) at the 2023 AGS Annual Scientific meeting which is taking place May 4-6, 2023 (pre-conference day is May 3). An AGS member since 1999 and a member of its Board since 2015, Dr. Fick is committed to working with AGS leaders and members to improve the health, independence, and quality of life of all older people. “I have always appreciated AGS’ focus, support and advancement of an interprofessional team approach that puts older adults and caregivers at the center, embraces the best evidence ...

May 4, 2023, TORONTO – Ontario research teams investigating new ways to treat cancer are taking the crucial next steps to bring their discoveries to patients thanks to support from the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research (OICR). OICR announced it is funding five Ontario-based drug discovery projects between $150,000 and $300,000 per project through its Cancer Therapeutics Innovation Pipeline (CTIP) initiative. CTIP supports research into promising molecules that could become the next generation of cancer therapeutics. This year’s cohort of CTIP projects aims to develop treatments for some of the most devastating cancers, including pancreatic cancer, ovarian cancer, breast cancer ...

As Philadelphia strives to meet greenhouse gas emissions goals established in its 2050 Plan, a better understanding of how zoning can play a role in managing building energy use could set the city up for success. Researchers in Drexel University’s College of Engineering are hoping a machine learning model they’ve developed can support these efforts by helping to predict how energy consumption will change as neighborhoods evolve. In 2017, the city set a goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050, led in large part by a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions from building energy use – which ...

Researchers at the University of Toronto have developed an artificial intelligence system that can create proteins not found in nature using generative diffusion, the same technology behind popular image-creation platforms such as DALL-E and Midjourney. The system will help advance the field of generative biology, which promises to speed drug development by making the design and testing of entirely new therapeutic proteins more efficient and flexible. “Our model learns from image representations to generate fully new proteins, at a very high rate,” says Philip ...

(MEMPHIS, Tenn. – May 04, 2023) Despite the astounding advances made in understanding the biologic underpinnings of cancer, many cancers are missing obvious genetic drivers. When scientists can’t pinpoint the factors that drive cancer, treating it can be much more difficult. Scientists at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital hope to solve that problem with an updated way to analyze multi-omic (primarily transcriptomics and proteomics) data. The researchers created a next-generation computational tool to gain new insights from biological data ...

Cells have a fascinating feature to neatly organize their interior by using tiny protein machines called molecular motors that generate directed movements. Most of them use a common type of fuel, a kind of chemical energy, called ATP to operate. Now researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG), the Cluster of Excellence Physics of Life (PoL) and the Biotechnology Center (BIOTEC) of the TU Dresden in Dresden, Germany, and the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) in Bangalore, India, discovered a novel molecular system that uses an alternative chemical energy and employs a novel mechanism ...