Automation of technology has reshaped both the way in which we work and how we tackle problems. Thanks to the progress made in robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) over the last few years, it is now possible to leave several tasks in the hands to machines and algorithms. To highlight these advances, in the July 2021 issue, IEEE/CAA Journal of Automatica Sinica features six articles covering innovative applications of AI that can make our lives easier. The first article, authored by researchers from Virginia Tech Mechanical Engineering Department ASIM Lab, USA, delves into an interesting mixture of topics: intelligent cars, machine learning, and electroencephalography (EEG). Self-driving cars have ...

The concept of topological phases have not only revolutionized our understanding of physics or materials, but also brought about new possibilities for applications. Recent advances in higher-order topological insulators show that multiple forms of topological states can exist at boundaries of different dimensions, which greatly enriched the potentials for diverse applications. Interesting, the topological phases can also be implemented in artificial structures in photonics, electromagnetism, and acoustics. A recent work co-led by Dr. Guancong Ma from Hong Kong Baptist University and Dr. Ying Wu from King Abdullah University of Science and Technology explored the controlling sound propagation with topological modes at different dimensions. They designed and built ...

One in ten school-aged children in Australia have a current diagnosis of asthma. Every year, there are around 40,000 asthma hospitalisations and over 40 per cent of these are in children aged younger than 14 years old. Approximately 80 per cent of these asthma-related hospital presentations are potentially avoidable through a standardised comprehensive care pathway for children with asthma. These preventative measures include the use of evidence-based clinical guidelines, ensuring that there is an asthma action plan in place; regular follow-up with GP; provision of asthma education to parents/carers; and establishing ...

A research group has produced fresh insights about the release of oxygen in lithium-ion batteries, paving the way for more robust and safer high-energy-density batteries. Next-generation batteries that store more energy are critical if society is to achieve the UN's Sustainable Development Goals and realize carbon neutrality. However, the higher the energy density, the higher the likelihood of thermal runaway - the overheating of batteries that can sometimes result in a battery exploding. Oxygen released from cathode active material is a trigger for thermal runaway, yet our knowledge of this process is insufficient. Researchers from Tohoku University ...

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is the most common liver disorder worldwide and is present in approximately 25 percent of the world's population. Over 90 percent of obese, 60 percent of diabetic, and up to 20 percent of normal-weight people develop it. A key feature of the condition is the accumulation of fat in the liver. A liver can remain fatty without disturbing normal function; however, fat accumulations may progress into a so-called non-alcoholic steatohepatitis - an aggressive form of the non-alcoholic fatty liver disease combined with inflammation and sometimes fibrosis. Non-alcoholic steatohepatitis can lead to further complications such as liver cirrhosis, primary liver ...

Every year, thousands of dogs end up in a shelter in the Netherlands. Experts expect an increase in this number in the upcoming period, when people go back to the office after working from home during the corona crisis. Despite the good care of staff and volunteers, the shelter can be a turbulent experience for dogs. Researchers at Utrecht University investigated if dogs can adapt to their new environment based on their nocturnal activity. Janneke van der Laan and fellow researchers from Utrecht University's Faculty of Veterinary Medicine compared the nocturnal activity of 29 shelter dogs and 29 pet dogs in their own homes - similar in breed, age and sex - with the help of night cameras and a small activity tracker on ...

A KAIST research team and collaborators revealed a newly developed hydrogel-based flexible brain-machine interface. To study the structure of the brain or to identify and treat neurological diseases, it is crucial to develop an interface that can stimulate the brain and detect its signals in real time. However, existing neural interfaces are mechanically and chemically different from real brain tissue. This causes foreign body response and forms an insulating layer (glial scar) around the interface, which shortens its lifespan. To solve this problem, ...

Ishikawa, Japan - Sometimes, a material's property, such as magnetism and catalysis, can change drastically owing to nothing more than minute changes in the separation between its atoms, commonly referred to as "local strains" in the parlance of materials science. A precise measurement of such local strains is, therefore, important to materials scientists. One powerful technique employed for this purpose is "high-angle annular dark-field imaging" (HAADF), an approach within scanning transmission electron microscopy (a technique for mapping the position of atoms ...

Museum specimens held in natural history collections around the world represent a wealth of underutilized genetic information due to the poor state of preservation of the DNA, which often makes it difficult to sequence. An international team, led by researchers from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) and the Museum of Natural History of the City of Geneva (MHN), has optimized a method developed for analyzing ancient DNA to identify the relationships between species on a deep evolutionary scale. This work is published in the journal Genome Biology and ...

Australian reptiles face serious conservation threats from illegal poaching fueled by international demand and the exotic pet trade. In a new study in Animal Conservation, researchers from the University of Adelaide and the Monitor Conservation Research Society (Monitor) investigated the extent of illegal trade in a well-known Australian lizard: the shingleback, also known as the bobtail or sleepy lizard. Using government records, media reports, and online advertisements, the researchers found clear evidence that many shinglebacks have been illegally poached from the wild and are smuggled overseas to be traded as pets. Author and PhD Candidate Adam Toomes from the University of Adelaide says: ...

Low-income neighborhoods and communities with higher Black, Hispanic and Asian populations experience significantly more urban heat than wealthier and predominantly white neighborhoods within a vast majority of populous U.S. counties, according new research from the University of California San Diego's School of Global Policy and Strategy. The analysis of remotely-sensed land surface temperature measurements of 1,056 U.S. counties, which have ten or more census districts, was recently published in the journal END ...

As a minimally invasive method for cancer therapy at precise locations, NIR-induced photothermal therapy (PTT) has drawn extensively attention. The therapeutic mechanism is the use of photothermal agents (PTAs) in the treatment of tumors,and its therapeutic effect happens only at the tumor site where both light-absorbent and localized laser radiation coexist. The development of PTAs with NIR-II absorbance, ranging from 1000nm to 1700 nm, can efficiently improve their penetrating ability and therapeutic effects because of their high penetration depth in the body. Howerever, several disadvantages are associated with these NIR-II responsive PTAs for their ...

Over the past years, graphene oxide membranes have been mainly studied for water desalination and dye separation. However, membranes have a wide range of applications such as the food industry. A research group led by Aaron Morelos-Gomez of Shinshu University's Global Aqua Innovation Center investigated the application of graphene oxide membranes for milk which typically creates dense foulant layers on polymeric membranes. Graphene oxide membranes have the advantage to create a porous foulant layer, therefore, their filtration performance can be maintained better than commercial polymeric membranes. The unique chemical and ...

Clinician well-being is imperative to providing high-quality patient care, yet clinician burnout continues to increase, especially over the last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Four leading cardiovascular organizations - the American College of Cardiology, the American Heart Association, the European Society of Cardiology and the World Heart Federation - are calling for global action to improve clinician well-being in a joint opinion paper published today. "Over the last several decades, there have been significant changes in health care with the expansion of technology, regulatory burden and clerical task loads. These developments have come at a cost to the ...

A new population-based study looking at nearly 30 years of billing data demonstrates that sex-based differences in Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP) payments exists for Canadian ophthalmologists. A team led by researchers and clinicians from the Donald K. Johnson Eye Institute, part of the Krembil Research Institute at University Health Network (UHN), studied 22,389 Ontario physicians across three decades and found a significant payment gap between female and male ophthalmologists even after accounting for age, and some practice differences. This disparity was more pronounced among ophthalmologists when compared to other surgical, medical procedural and medical non-procedural specialty groups. "This is real and robust ...

DALLAS, July 13, 2021 -- Sharing the results of genetic testing for cardiomyopathy in adolescents ages 13-18 does not appear to cause emotional harm to families or adversely impact family function or dynamics, according to new research published today in Circulation: Genomic and Precision Medicine, an American Heart Association journal. Genetic testing for cardiomyopathy in symptomatic children has the potential to confirm a diagnosis, clarify prognosis, determine eligibility for disease-specific cardiomyopathy therapies and even inform risk for other family members. Genetic testing for asymptomatic adults and children also occurs after one of their family members receives positive cardiomyopathy genetic ...

Philadelphia, July 13, 2021--Adding to the growing body of literature demonstrating the feasibility of correcting lethal genetic diseases before birth, researchers at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) have used DNA base editing in a prenatal mouse model to correct a lysosomal storage disease known as Hurler syndrome. Using an adenine base editor delivered in an adeno-associated viral vector, the researchers corrected the single base mutation responsible for the condition, which begins before birth and affects multiple organs, with the potential to cause death in childhood if untreated. The findings were published ...

Hair dye, perfume, jewellery. Beautifying to most, but for some they are equivalent to rashes, irritation and reduced quality of life. Together with hay fever and food allergies, allergic contact dermatitis due to exposure to e.g. nickel and perfume ingredients represents the majority of allergic reactions seen among Danes. Traditionally, researchers have distinguished between immediate and delayed allergic reactions, depending on which parts of the immune system that is responsible for the reaction. E.g., hay fever and food allergies are 'immediate' forms that cause immediate symptoms, whereas it can take days before the skin reacts to things like nickel and perfume. But now a new study ...

A new paper in The Economic Journal, published by by Oxford University Press, indicates that the presence of adult entertainment establishments may decrease sex crimes, significantly. The role of entertainment establishments (strip clubs, escort services, adult bookstores, and adult movie theaters) in communities is controversial. Citizens often view them as centers of vice. While some have suggested that these clubs and services may improve behavior if people use them instead of committing sex crimes, such establishments may reinforce the view of women as objects, leading to more violence against them. This paper exploits a unique data set of high frequency precinct level crime information from New York City, due to its controversial stop-and-frisk policing policy. The researchers ...

BINGHAMTON, N.Y. -- New research from Binghamton University, State University of New York suggests that the demographic collapse at the core of the Easter Island myth didn't really happen. You probably know this story, or a version of it: On Easter Island, the people cut down every tree, perhaps to make fields for agriculture or to erect giant statues to honor their clans. This foolish decision led to a catastrophic collapse, with only a few thousand remaining to witness the first European boats landing on their remote shores in 1722. But did the demographic collapse at the core of the Easter Island myth really happen? The answer, according to new research by Binghamton ...

Combining chemotherapy and BRAF oncogene inhibitors is a very effective strategy for fighting metastatic melanoma, the leading cause of death from skin cancer in the world. This has been demonstrated in a study by researchers from the Hospital del Mar Medical Research Institute (IMIM), Hospital del Mar, and CIBER Cancer (CIBERONC), in collaboration with the Bellvitge Medical Research Institute (ICO-IDIBELL), which has just been published in the journal Oncogene. The study, which involved the IMIM's Stem Cells and Cancer Research Group and doctors from the Dermatology and Pathology Departments at Hospital del Mar, analysed what effect ...

Researchers from University of Bath, University of Melbourne, and King's College London published a new paper in the Journal of Marketing that explains a four-stage process that can help firms create pleasurable social atmospheres for consumers. The study, forthcoming in the Journal of Marketing, is titled "Social Atmospheres: How Interaction Ritual Chains Create Effervescent Experiences of Place" and is authored by Tim Hill, Robin Canniford, and Giana Eckhardt. Across the globe, restrictions on live events have affected the experience economy and entertainment industries. Simultaneously, the empty seats and eerie silence in sports ...

Rapid filling of a giant dam at the headwaters of the Nile River -- the world's biggest waterway that supports millions of people -- could reduce water supplies to downstream Egypt by more than one-third, new USC research shows. A water deficit of that magnitude, if unmitigated, could potentially destabilize a politically volatile part of the world by reducing arable land in Egypt by up to 72%. The study projects that economic losses to agriculture would reach $51 billion. The gross domestic product loss would push unemployment to 24%, displacing lots of people and disrupting economies. "Our study forecasts dire water supply impacts downstream, causing what would be the largest ...

The findings of the study, funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) and led by Professor Kristian Pollock from the University of Nottingham, are published in Palliative Medicine. When somebody is seriously ill and dying at home, managing their medications can be a difficult and complex task. This is made more difficult given that the care often needs to be given when patients and their families are tired and emotional. Family members are often assumed to be willing and able to support patients with their medication. However, little is known about what ...

Athletes may have more than twice the risk of irregular heart rhythm Younger athletes are at greater risk of atrial fibrillation than older athletes, say researchers Athletes appear to be almost two and half times more likely than non-athletes to experience irregular heart rhythms (atrial fibrillation), suggests new research published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. In addition, those athletes involved in mixed sports such as football, rugby or netball appear to have the highest risk when compared with athletes taking part in endurance sports such as Nordic skiing, orienteering or rowing. Previous ...