A cluster of comet fragments believed to have hit Earth nearly 13,000 years ago may have shaped the origins of human civilisation, research suggests. Possibly the most devastating cosmic impact since the extinction of the dinosaurs, it appears to coincide with major shifts in how human societies organised themselves, researchers say. Their analysis backs up claims that an impact occurred prior to start of the Neolithic period in the so-called Fertile Crescent of southwest Asia. During that time, humans in the region - which spans parts of modern-day countries such as Egypt, Iraq and Lebanon - switched from hunter-gatherer lifestyles to ones centred on agriculture and the creation of permanent settlements. It is thought that the comet strike ...

The Third Pole centered on the Tibetan Plateau is home to the headwaters of multiple rivers in Asia. Despite the importance of these rivers, scientists have not known exactly how much water flows out of the mountains of the Third Pole as river runoff. Now, however, researchers from the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research (ITP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences have quantified the total river runoff of 13 major rivers in the region. The study was published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society and was based on data from an observational network of "water meters" at mountain outlets in the Third Pole. The network generates comprehensive discharge data for 13 major Third Pole ...

In a new study published in Circulation Research, Chen-Yu Zhang and Xiaohong Jiang's group from Nanjing University and Dongjin Wang's group from Nanjing Drum Tower Hospital reported a critical role of PGC1α in maintaining the contractile phenotype of vascular smooth muscle cells (VSMCs) and highlighted the therapeutic potential of PGC1α for atherosclerosis. The traditional view holds that aberrant proliferation of VSMCs promotes plaque formation after vessel injury and inflammation, whereas the presence of VSMCs in the fibrous cap of the plaque is beneficial. Although it has long been assumed that these seemingly contradictory functions of VSMCs during atherosclerosis arise from their remarkable ...

Somnambulism - otherwise known as sleepwalking - is a phenomenon which has fascinated the public and neurologists for decades, but a lot of what causes it remains a mystery. Affecting up to 4% of adults, sleepwalking is a non-rapid-eye movement (NREM) sleep parasomnia that not only gives someone a poor night's sleep, but also puts them at serious risk of injury and, in some cases, lead to unintended violence against others. The following day can also prove challenging as the sleepwalker will feel unrested and a strong desire to fall asleep (somnolence). Unfortunately ...

Pioneering research, led by a team from Trinity College Dublin and the Marine Research Institute of the Spanish Research Council (IIM-CSIC) in Vigo (Galicia, Spain), suggests "subterranean estuaries" may be critical in managing sustainable fishing and aquaculture - two growing industries of global importance. Subterranean estuaries are analogous to surface water estuaries, where freshwater flowing out to sea mixes with seawater, but are instead located underground, invisible to the naked eye. Yet the newly published research shows these hidden features are very important in the ecology of coastal systems and in filtering pollutants - some of which ...

The cultivated planet is withstanding record-breaking pressure to ensure food security. To meet the rising demand of food, energy, and fiber, a 70%-100% increase in crop commodities will be needed globally by 2050. However, rapid urbanization and industrialization have caused dramatic loss of high-quality cropland and hence threatened food security. To stabilize cropland area, cropland expansion to marginal lands has become a widespread phenomenon worldwide. This study developed a systems framework to represent the trade-off among crop yield, production, and environmental cost, according to the competitive relationship of production, settlement, and ecological space and the link of "land - food - environment - policy". Using China as a case study, the authors ...

The rarity of these syndromes, caused by damage to a gene named HUWE1, means very few children are affected. Of course, the low absolute numbers are little consolation for children who are born with a severe intellectual disability as a result of gene mutation. Many affected children have distinctive facial features, some struggle to learn to walk, and many never learn to speak. Some have an abnormally small head and have stunted growth. There is no cure. Parents mainly focus on learning enough about how to cope to make everyday life workable. A lot ...

A study from the Centre for Nutraceuticals at the University of Westminster found that plant-based protein shakes may be potential viable alternatives to milk-based whey protein shakes, particularly in people with need of careful monitoring of glucose levels. The study, published in the journal Nutrients, is the first to show potato and rice proteins can be just as effective at managing your appetite and can help better manage blood glucose levels and reduce spikes in insulin compared to whey protein. During the study the blood metabolic response of participants was measured after ...

New research has uncovered a novel trick employed by the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus to thwart the immune response, raising hopes that a vaccine that prevents deadly MRSA infections is a little closer on the horizon. Immunologists from Trinity College Dublin, working with scientists at GSK - one of the world's largest vaccine manufacturers - discovered the new trick of the troublesome Staphylococcus aureus, which is the causative agent of the infamous "superbug" MRSA. They found that the bacterium interferes with the host immune response by causing toxic effects on white blood cells, which prevents them from engaging in their infection-fighting jobs. Importantly, the study also showed in a pre-clinical ...

Scientists using computer modelling to study SARS-CoV-2, the virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic, have discovered the virus is most ideally adapted to infect human cells - rather than bat or pangolin cells, again raising questions of its origin. In a paper published in the Nature journal Scientific Reports, Australian scientists describe how they used high-performance computer modelling of the form of the SARS-CoV-2 virus at the beginning of the pandemic to predict its ability to infect humans and a range of 12 domestic and exotic animals. Their work aimed to help identify any intermediate animal vector that ...

Although IAT is commonly performed, there is variation in how, why, and where it is done. EULAR aimed to help standardise the way IAT is delivered, and explain to people what they can expect from the treatment. A EULAR taskforce was set up to develop a set of new recommendations to give guidance and advice on best practice for IAT. The taskforce included doctors, nurses, surgeons, and other health professionals, as well as patients. The taskforce looked at the evidence on IAT. Because there is little published evidence, the taskforce also conducted two surveys ...

Russia is the world's largest forest country. Being home to more than a fifth of forests globally, the country's forests and forestry have enormous potential to contribute to making a global impact in terms of climate mitigation. A new study by IIASA researchers, Russian experts, and other international colleagues have produced new estimates of biomass contained in Russian forests, confirming a substantial increase over the last few decades. Since the dissolution of the USSR, Russia has been reporting almost no changes in its forests, while data obtained ...

In the animal kingdom, specific growth factors control body axis development. These signalling molecules are produced by a small group of cells at one end of the embryo to be distributed in a graded fashion toward the opposite pole. Through this process, discrete spatial patterns arise that determine the correct formation of the head-foot axis. A research team at the Centre for Organismal Studies (COS) at Heidelberg University recently discovered an enzyme in the freshwater polyp Hydra that critically shapes this process by limiting the activity of certain growth factors. In particular, the proteins of the so-called Wnt signalling pathway play an important role in the pattern formation of the primary ...

MINNEAPOLIS/ST. PAUL (06/24/2021) -- A study led by researchers at the University of Minnesota Medical School sheds new light on boys' weapon-carrying behaviors at U.S. high schools. The results indicate that weapon-carrying is not tied to students' race or ethnicity but rather their schools' social climates. The study was published in the journal Pediatrics and led by Patricia Jewett, PhD, a researcher in the Department of Medicine at the U of M Medical School. "Narratives of violence in the U.S. have been distorted by racist stereotyping, portraying male individuals of color as more dangerous than white males," Jewett said. "Instead, our study suggests that school climates may be linked to an increase in weapon-carrying at schools." The ...

Researchers at UCSF have found that extreme caloric restriction diets alter the microbiome in ways that could help with weight loss but might also result in an increased population of Clostridiodes difficile, a pathogenic bacterium that can lead to severe diarrhea and colitis. Such diets, which allow people only 800 calories per day in liquid form, are an effective approach to weight loss in people with obesity. The unexpected results of this study raise the question of how much the microbiome influences weight loss and which bacteria are significant in that process. The study appears in the June 23, 2021, issue of Nature. "Our results underscore that the role of calories in weight ...

Using only a pen and paper, a theoretical physicist has proved a decades-old claim that a strong force called Quantum Chromo Dynamics (QCD) leads to light-weight pions, reports a new study published on June 23 in Physical Review Letters. The strong force is responsible for many things in our Universe, from making the Sun shine, to keeping quarks inside protons. This is important because it makes sure that the protons and neutrons bind to form nuclei of every atom that exists. But there is still a lot of mystery surrounding the strong force. Einstein's relation E=mc2 means a strong force leads to more energy, and more energy means a heavier mass. But subatomic particles called pions ...

Recently, a collaboration of researchers from the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science (HFIPS), Universities of Oldenburg (Germany) and Oxford (UK) have been gathering evidence suggesting that a specific light-sensitive protein in the eye named cryptochrome 4 is sensitive to magnetic fields and plays essential roles in magnetic sensing in migratory birds such as European robins. The results have been published in Nature (https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03618-9) on June 23 and selected as the cover paper. For the first time, first author XU Jingjing, a doctoral student in Mouritsen's research group at Oldenburg, with the help of XIE's group, produced cryptochrome 4 in night-migratory ...

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - A bout with flu virus can be hard, but when Streptococcus pneumonia enters the mix, it can turn deadly. Now researchers have found a further reason for the severity of this dual infection by identifying a new virulence mechanism for a surface protein on the pneumonia-causing bacteria S. pneumoniae. This insight comes more than three decades after discovery of that surface protein, called pneumococcal surface protein A, or PspA. This new mechanism had been missed in the past because it facilitates bacterial adherence only to dead or dying lung epithelial cells, not to living cells. Heretofore, researchers typically used healthy lung ...

Ultrasound can overcome some of the detrimental effects of ageing and dementia without the need to cross the blood-brain barrier, Queensland Brain Institute researchers have found. Professor Jürgen Götz led a multidisciplinary team at QBI's Clem Jones Centre for Ageing Dementia Research who showed low-intensity ultrasound effectively restored cognition without opening the barrier in mice models. The findings provide a potential new avenue for the non-invasive technology and will help clinicians tailor medical treatments that consider an individual's disease progression and cognitive decline. "Historically, ...

Are the traditional practices tied to endangered species at risk of being lost? The answer is yes, according to the authors of an ethnographic study published in the University of Guam peer-reviewed journal Pacific Asia Inquiry. But the authors also say a recovery plan can protect both the species as well as the traditional CHamoru practice of consuming them. Else Demeulenaere, lead author of the study and associate director of the UOG Center for Island Sustainability, presented on their findings during the Marianas Terrestrial Conservation Conference on June 8. Strong ...

In the recent decade, scientists have paid more attention to studying light harvest for producing novel bionic materials or integrating naturally biological components into synthetic systems. Inspiration is the imitation of natural photosynthesis in green plants, algae, and cyanobacteria to convert light energy into chemical energy. Photosystem II (PSII) is a light-intervened protein complex responsible for the light harvest and water splitting to release O2, protons, and electrons. The development of PSII-based biomimetic assembly in vitro is favorable for the investigation of photocatalysis, biological solar cells, and bionic photosynthesis, further help us reveal more secret of photosynthesis. The combination of PSII and artificially synthetic structures is successful for ...

Ishikawa, Japan - Nanostructured metal surface has novel physical and chemical properties, which have sparked scientific interest for heterogeneous catalysis, biosensors, and electrocatalysis. The fabrication process can influence the shapes and sizes of metal nanostructures. Among various fabrication processes, the electrochemical deposition technique is widely used for clean metal nanostructures. Applying the technique, a team of researchers led by Dr. Yuki Nagao, Associate Professor at Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) and Md. Mahmudul Hasan, a PhD student at JAIST, succeeded to construct Pd-based catalysts having unique morphology. In this study, the team has successfully synthesized Christmas-tree-shaped palladium nanostructures on the GCE ...

Toxoplasma gondii, the parasite responsible for toxoplasmosis, is capable of infecting almost all cell types. It is estimated that up to 30% of the world's population is chronically infected, the vast majority asymptomatically. However, infection during pregnancy can result in severe developmental pathology in the unborn child. Like the other members of the large phylum of Apicomplexa, Toxoplasma gondii is an obligate intracellular parasite which, to survive, must absolutely penetrate its host's cells and hijack their functions to its own advantage. Understanding how the parasite manages to enter host cells offers new opportunities to develop more effective prevention and control strategies than those currently available. A team from the University of Geneva (UNIGE), in collaboration ...

An international study led by Helmholtz Zentrum München has revealed the structure of a membrane-remodeling protein that builds and maintains photosynthetic membranes. These fundamental insights lay the groundwork for bioengineering efforts to strengthen plants against environmental stress, helping to sustaining human food supply and fight against climate change. Plants, algae, and cyanobacteria perform photosynthesis, using the energy of sunlight to produce the oxygen and biochemical energy that power most life on Earth. They also adsorb carbon dioxide (CO?) from the atmosphere, counteracting the accumulation of this greenhouse gas. However, climate change ...

Men - more often than women - need passion to succeed at things. At the same time, boys are diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum four times as often as girls. Both statistics may be related to dopamine, one of our body's neurotransmitters. "This is interesting. Research shows a more active dopamine system in most men" than in women, says Hermundur Sigmundsson, a professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology's (NTNU)Department of Psychology. He is behind a new study that addresses gender differences in key motivating factors for what it takes to become good at something. The study uses men's and women's differing activity in the dopamine system as an explanatory model. "We looked at gender differences around passion, self-discipline ...