The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound effect on higher education -- shifting classes online, canceling events, and putting financial strain on institutions. One area of academia that has actually shown positive increases, however, is the submission of research papers. A study conducted by Michelle Bell, Mary E. Pinchot Professor of Environmental Health at the Yale School of the Environment (YSE), and postdoctoral associate Kelvin C. Fong found the rate of manuscript submission to a major peer-reviewed journal (American Journal of Public Health) were higher during the pandemic -- but also revealed ...

In the wake of repeated school shootings across the United States, today's youth have been called the mass shooting generation. A new study examined public support for arming school employees. The study found consensus for arming school resource officers, but division over whether to arm teachers and nonteaching staff. The research has clear implications for policy, including the possibility that support for arming school staff may diminish over time as young people (who are less supportive) make up a larger share of voters. The study was conducted ...

The properties of human mind affect the quality of scientific knowledge through the insertion of unconscious cognitive biases. Scientists from the University of Turku, Finland, have found that the current level of awareness about research biases is generally low among ecology scientists. Underestimation of the risks associated with unconscious cognitive biases prevents avoiding these risks in a scientist's own research. Due to unconscious origin of biases, it is impossible to combat them without external intervention. When scientists use some device in their research, they always account for characteristics of this device, such as accuracy and precision. The human mind is the ...

The findings of a new study examining the behaviours of alligator and caiman hatchlings have enhanced our understanding of how we can conserve, and increase, the population of endangered crocodilian species. At adult size, there are key differences between the American alligator and the closely related spectacled caiman. However, at the time of hatching both species are tiny and might be expected to show similar behaviours in order to avoid being eaten by almost any carnivore around. Now, researchers at the Universities of Lincoln and Vienna have conducted comparative studies between the hatchlings of these crocodilian creatures and found that the alligators are more active and likely to explore their surroundings. The research, conducted at 'Crocodiles of the World', the only zoo ...

Dr. Mikhail V. Blagosklonny, M.D., Ph.D., Editor-in-Chief of Oncotarget, and Professor, at Roswell Park Cancer Institute, published "The goal of geroscience is life extension" which was selected as the Featured Cover Paper for Volume 12 Issue 3 and reported that although numerous drugs seemingly extend healthspan in mice, only a few extend lifespan in mice and only one does it consistently. Some of them, alone or in combination, can be used in humans, without further clinical trials. Dr. Mikhail V. Blagosklonny from The Roswell Park Cancer Institute said, "Although we do not know everything about aging, we now know enough to start its pharmacologic suppression using ...

Massive galaxies with extra-large extended "puffy" disks produced stars for longer than their more compact cousins, new modelling reveals. In a paper published in the Astrophysical Journal, researchers led by Dr Anshu Gupta and Associate Professor Kim-Vy Tran from Australia's ARC Centre of Excellence in All Sky Astrophysics in 3 Dimensions (ASTRO 3D), show that the sheer size of a galaxy influences when it stops making new stars. "There's a period in the life of the Universe known as the 'cosmic noon', which occurred about 10 billion years ago," said Dr Gupta. "That was when star formation in massive galaxies was at ...

New research suggests that the rate of rainfall within a storm system is linked to the structure and form of the precipitation area as seen on radar. This discovery relies heavily on the "morphology" of radar signatures, including shape (big, small), and size (high, short or plump, thin). Compared to buying diamonds, morphological characteristics are an important reference factor for pricing. Fascinated by "popcorn-shaped" clouds over the Tibetan Plateau, atmospheric scientists have been inspired to study the relationship between cloud shape, precipitation intensity, and the morphology ...

Hokkaido University scientists show that under laboratory conditions, ultraviolet light reacts with nitrophenol to produce smog-generating nitrous acid. An advanced laser technique has allowed researchers to observe, in real-time, the decomposition of a pollutant into atmospheric nitrous acid, which plays a key role in the formation of ozone and photochemical smog. The technique, described by Hokkaido University researchers in The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters, could be used in a wide range of applications. Nitrophenols are a type of fine particulate matter found in the atmosphere that form as a result of fossil fuel combustion and from forest fires. It is hypothesised that light interacts with nitrophenols and breaks them down into nitrous acid; atmospheric nitrous ...

Social interaction may help reverse food and cigarette cravings triggered by being in social isolation, a UNSW study in rats has found. The study, published in Scientific Reports, used an animal model of drug addiction to show that a return to social interaction gives the same result as living in a rich, stimulating environment in reducing cravings for both sugar and nicotine rewards. "This was an animal study, but we can probably all relate to the mental health benefits of being able to go for a coffee with our friends and having a chat," lead author Dr Kelly Clemens from UNSW Sydney's School of Psychology ...

The SARS-CoV-2, the new coronavirus behind the current pandemic, infects humans by binding its surface-exposed spike proteins to ACE2 receptors exposed on the cell membranes. Upon a vaccination or a real infection, it takes several weeks before the immunity develops antibodies that can selectively bind to these spike proteins. Such antibody-labeled viruses are neutralized by the natural killer and T cells operated by the human immunity. An alternative approach to train the immunity response is offered by researchers at the University of Illinois Chicago and California State University at Sacramento who have developed a novel strategy that redirects antibodies for other diseases existing in humans to the spike proteins ...

A higher diversity of flowering plants increases the breeding success of wild bees and may help compensate for the negative effects of insecticides. This is what researchers from the Universities of Göttingen and Hohenheim, as well as the Julius Kühn Institute, have found in a large-scale experimental study. The results have been published in the scientific journal Ecology Letters. In their experiment, the researchers investigated how successfully the wild bee Osmia bicornis (red mason bee) reproduced. Red mason bees are important for both ecological and economic ...

Researchers in Costa Rica have found that some bacteria on the skin of amphibians prevent growth of the fungus responsible for what has been dubbed 'the amphibian apocalypse'. Published in the journal Microbiology, the research identified a number of bacteria which could growth of the fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd). One particularly dangerous strain of the fungus, called BdGPL-2, is responsible for mass amphibian die-offs around the world. The fungus infects the skin of amphibians, breaking down the cells. As amphibians breathe and regulate water through their skin, infection is often deadly. It is believed that almost 700 species of amphibian are vulnerable to the ...

A group of scientists led by Drs Toshinori Kinoshita and Maoxing Zhang (Institute of Transformative Bio-Molecules,Nagoya University, Japan) and Dr Yiyong Zhu (Jiangsu Collaborative Innovation Center for Solid Organic Waste Utilization, Nanjing Agricultural University, China) have developed a method which, by increasing the number of a plasma membrane proton pump gene in rice, simultaneously increases nutrient uptake through the roots and stomatal opening, thus increasing the yield of paddy field grown rice by over 30%. In their previous research, the group had found that the plasma membrane proton pump played an important role in influencing stomatal opening. When they created a variant of rice with an overexpression of a particular plasma membrane proton pump gene, they found ...

Modern-day robots are often required to interact with humans intelligently and efficiently, which can be enabled by providing them the ability to perceive touch. However, previous attempts at mimicking human skin have involved bulky and complex electronics, wiring, and a risk of damage. In a recent study, researchers from Japan sidestep these difficulties by constructing a 3D vision-guided artificial skin that enables tactile sensing with high performance, opening doors to innumerable applications in medicine, healthcare, and industry. Robots have come a long way since their original inception for high-speed automation. Today, robots can be found in a wide variety of roles in medicine, rehabilitation, agriculture, and marine navigation. Since a ...

Modern immunotherapeutic anti-cancer drugs support a natural mechanism of the immune system to inhibit the growth of cancer cells. They dock onto a specific receptor of the killer cell and prevent it from being switched off by the cancer cells. This is a complex molecular process, which is known but has not yet been fully understood. In a molecular dynamics study conducted by the group led by medical information scientist Wolfgang Schreiner and gynaecologists Heinz Kölbl and Georg Pfeiler from MedUni Vienna, working with biosimulation expert Chris Oostenbrink ...

What are the reasons for such a contrast in outcomes? A scientist team led by the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW) has now analysed the humoral innate immune defence of European greater mouse-eared bats to the fungus. In contrast to North American bats, European bats have sufficient baseline levels of key immune parameters and thus tolerate a certain level of infection throughout hibernation. The results are published in the journal "Developmental and Comparative Immunology". During infections caused by Pseudogymnoascus destructans (Pd), North American bats arouse frequently from ...

To date, research in the field of combinatorial catalysts has relied on serendipitous discoveries of catalyst combinations. Now, scientists from Japan have streamlined a protocol that combines random sampling, high-throughput experimentation, and data science to identify synergistic combinations of catalysts. With this breakthrough, the researchers hope to remove the limits placed on research by relying on chance discoveries and have their new protocol used more often in catalyst informatics. Catalysts, or their combinations, are compounds that significantly lower the energy required to drive chemical reactions to completion. In the field of "combinatorial catalyst design," the requirement of synergy--where one component ...

Life changes influence the amount of physical activity in a person, according to a recent study by the University of Jyväskylä. The birth of children and a change of residence, marital status and place of work all influence the number of steps of men and women in different ways. For women, having children, getting a job and moving from town to the countryside reduce everyday exercise. A study conducted by the Faculty of Sports & Health Sciences found that the birth of the first child significantly reduces the number of everyday steps in women. As children grow, women's aerobic steps, in turn, increase. Although the birth of children did not have a statistically significant effect on the number of steps in men, changes were also observed ...

Use of waste heat contributes largely to sustainable energy supply. Scientists of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and T?hoku University in Japan have now come much closer to their goal of converting waste heat into electrical power at small temperature differences. As reported in Joule, electrical power per footprint of thermomagnetic generators based on Heusler alloy films has been increased by a factor of 3.4. (DOI: 10.1016/j.joule.2020.10.019) Many technical processes only use part of the energy consumed. The remaining fraction leaves the system ...

In the race to stop the spread of COVID-19, a three-layer cloth mask that fits well can effectively filter COVID particles, says a group of UBC researchers. After testing several different mask styles and 41 types of fabrics, they found that a mask consisting of two layers of low-thread-count quilting cotton plus a three-ply dried baby wipe filter was as effective as a commercial non-surgical mask at stopping particles--and almost as breathable. The cloth masks filtered out up to 80 per cent of 3-micron particles, and more than 90 per cent of 10-micron particles. "We focused on particles larger than one micron because these are likely most important to COVID-19 transmission," explains researcher Dr. Steven Rogak, a professor of mechanical engineering who ...

The genus Ficus (figs) and their agaonid pollinating fig wasps are a classic example of coevolution. It represents perhaps the most extreme and ancient (about 75 million years) obligate pollination mutualism known. Previous studies have suggested that pollinator host-switching and hybridization existed in some fig taxa with genetic evidence based on relatively few genes. However, those cases were mainly treated as rare exceptions, and strict-sense coevolution was still treated as the dominate coevolution model for the codiversification of this "extreme" obligate pollination system with high species richness. Together with colleagues from 11 institutions from home and abroad, researchers from the Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical ...

Scientists at Scripps Research have clarified the workings of a mysterious protein called Gαo, which is one of the most abundant proteins in the brain and, when mutated, causes severe movement disorders. The findings, which appear in Cell Reports, are an advance in the basic understanding of how the brain controls muscles and could lead to treatments for children born with Gαo-mutation movement disorders. Such conditions--known as GNAO1-related neurodevelopmental disorders--were discovered only in the past decade, and are thought to affect at least hundreds of children around the world. Children with the disease suffer from severe developmental ...

World-first 3D printed oesophageal stents developed by the University of South Australia could revolutionise the delivery of chemotherapy drugs to provide more accurate, effective and personalised treatment for patients with oesophageal cancer. Fabricated from polyurethane filament and incorporating the chemotherapy drug 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), the new oesophageal stents are the first to contain active pharmaceutical ingredients within their matrix . Their unique composition allows them to deliver up to 110 days of a sustained anti-cancer medication directly to the cancer site, restricting further tumour growth. Importantly, the capabilities of 3D printing enabling rapid creation of individually tailored stents with patient-specific geometries and drug dosages. PhD ...

The COVID-19 pandemic is a great example of the importance of access to the Internet and to digital health information. Unfortunately, historical disparities in health care appear to be reflected in computer ownership, access to the Internet and use of digital health information. However, few studies have qualitatively explored reasons for digital health information disparity, especially in older adults. A study led by Florida Atlantic University's Christine E. Lynn College of Nursing in collaboration with the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the University of Massachusetts Medical ...

A 30-year high in East African rainfall during 2018 and 2019 resulted in rising water levels and widespread flooding. The new study shows that emissions of methane - the second most important greenhouse gas - from flooded East African wetlands were substantially larger following these extreme rainfall events. The study, led by Dr Mark Lunt from the University of Edinburgh's School of GeoSciences, used data from two different satellites in combination with an atmospheric model to evaluate methane emissions from East Africa. This included data from the European TROPOMI satellite instrument, launched in 2017, which provides information about atmospheric methane at ...