The Ecological Society of America (ESA) will present its 17th annual Regional Policy Award to Heather Dyer, Chief Executive Officer of the San Bernardino Valley Municipal Water District, Sunday, Aug. 4, 5:00 p.m. PDT, during the ESA Annual Meeting Opening Plenary. The ESA annual award recognizes an elected or appointed local policymaker whose record reflects the use of ecological science to inform policy decisions. “ESA is honored to recognize Dyer,” said ESA President Shahid Naeem. “It’s rare for a biologist with ecosystems expertise to transition from technical science work to executive ...

New research from a collaborative team featuring Texas A&M University atmospheric scientist Dr. Andrew Dessler is exploring the climate impact of the 2022 Hunga Tonga volcano eruption and challenging existing assumptions about its effects in the process. The remarkable two-day event, which occurred in mid-January 2022, injected vast amounts of volcanic aerosols and water vapor into the atmosphere. Historically, large volcanic eruptions like Tambora in 1815 and Mt. Pinatubo in 1991 have led to significant cooling effects on the global climate by blocking sunlight with their aerosols. ...

While human activity has had a massive effect on the natural world, a new study from North Carolina State University finds that climate is still the most influential factor in determining where mammals can thrive. The work sheds light on how climate change will affect wildlife populations. Roland Kays, lead author of a paper on the work, said the study’s goal was to compare the importance of climate versus human factors in where mammals chose to live. To do so, researchers collected data on 25 mammal species from 6,645 locations across the United States. The study is one of the largest camera trap data analyses ever done. The data came ...

A new study of over 175,000 people in 25 countries revealed that individuals in low- and middle-income countries face greater challenges with daily activities and are less likely to use assistive devices compared to those in high-income countries. These findings raise concerns about the global burden of disability, particularly in low-income countries. Despite decreases in death and cardiovascular disease rates and increases in life expectancy worldwide, people in low- and middle-income countries still ...

Researchers at UCLA Health uncovered new information about the role inflammation plays in mitigating liver fibrosis, which is associated with metabolic-associated fatty liver disease (MAFLD), one of the most common diseases in the world affecting up to 40 percent of U.S. adults. While inflammation in the liver has long been considered a prerequisite to developing liver fibrosis, the scarring and thickening of tissue that can impair the liver’s ability to function, this new research suggests ...

From July 30-31, Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, founder and co-CEO of clinical stage artificial intelligence (AI)-driven drug discovery company Insilico Medicine will be attending SCRI Clinical Trials Symposium 2024 at Raffles City Convention Centre, and Brainstorm AI 2024: The New Race for AI at The Ritz-Carlton, Millenia Singapore, sharing strategic insights with global leaders across the technology and healthcare industries. On 2:00 p.m, July 31, Alex Zhavoronkov PhD will be speaking at the session named “Methodologies and Considerations for ...

Writing research papers is critical for disseminating scientific findings, but it does come with efficiency burdens, particularly for early-career researchers and non-native English speakers. A survey published in Nature in 2018 indicated that approximately 37% of respondents reported that they spend more than 20 hours a week on writing and revising scientific papers. Recent progress in Natural Language Processing (NLP) technology, particularly with the rise of Generative Pre-trained Transformers (GPT) and other Large Language Models (LLMs), has equipped researchers with a powerful set of tools for processing extensive amounts of literature ...

As 5G technologies continue to evolve, scientists and engineers are already exploring new ways to turn things up a notch for 6G. One of the biggest challenges to address in both 5G and 6G is the many detrimental effects that operating at extremely high frequencies has on wireless communications. At frequencies nearing the terahertz range, problems such as signal attenuation and interference are more prominent, and maintaining signal integrity becomes much harder. Some of these issues can be greatly mitigated by using insulating materials with exceptional dielectric properties. Glass- and ceramic-based insulating materials ...

At first glance, the plan sounds compelling: invent and develop future electrolysers capable of producing hydrogen directly from unpurified seawater. But a closer look reveals that such direct seawater electrolysers would require years of high-end research. And what is more: DSE electrolyzers are not even necessary - a simple desalination process is sufficient to prepare seawater for conventional electrolyzers. In a commentary in Joule, international experts compare the costs and benefits of the different approaches and come to a clear recommendation. Fresh water is a limited ...

New research has found that 4,642 species of vertebrate are threatened by mineral extraction around the world through mining and quarrying, and drilling for oil and gas. Mining activity coincides with the world's most valuable biodiversity hotspots, which contain a hyper-diversity of species and unique habitats found nowhere else on Earth. The biggest risk to species comes from mining for materials fundamental to our transition to clean energy, such as lithium and cobalt – both essential components of solar ...

About The Study: U.S. health care workers are more likely than other workers to carry medical and educational debt, collectively owing more than $150 billion. This study found that medical debt was more prevalent among women, home health and nursing home personnel, uninsured individuals, and those with recent hospitalization. Educational debts disproportionately burdened Black workers and younger workers and those with higher education. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Kathryn E.W. Himmelstein, M.D., M.S.Ed., email khimmelstein@mgb.org. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this ...

About The Study: This cross-sectional study indicates that stringent COVID-19 restrictions, as a group, were associated with substantial decreases in pandemic mortality, with behavior changes plausibly serving as an important explanatory mechanism. These findings do not support the views that COVID-19 restrictions were ineffective. However, not all restrictions were equally effective; some, such as school closings, likely provided minimal benefit while imposing substantial cost.  Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Christopher J. Ruhm, Ph.D., email ruhm@virginia.edu. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website ...

About The Study: In this survey study of 5,991 participants, presumptive posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was quite prevalent long after the mass violence incident (MVI) among adults in communities that have experienced an MVI, suggesting that MVIs have persistent and pervasive public health impacts on communities, particularly among those with prior exposure to physical or sexual assault and other potentially traumatic events. Focusing exclusively on direct exposure to MVIs is not sufficient. Incorporating these findings into ...

RENO, Nevada — Why do flies buzz around in circles when the air is still? And why does it matter? In a paper published online July 26, 2024 by the scientific journal Current Biology, University of Nevada, Reno Assistant Professor Floris van Breugel and Postdoctoral Researcher S. David Stupski respond to this up-until-now unanswered question. And that answer could hold a key to public safety — specifically, how to better train robotic systems to track chemical leaks. “We don’t currently have robotic systems to track odor or chemical plumes,” van Breugel said. “We don’t know how to efficiently find the ...

Researchers from Tokyo Medical and Dental University (TMDU) explore the safety and effectiveness of alemtuzumab in an Asian cohort Tokyo, Japan – Allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) is a commonly used curative therapy for individuals with inborn errors of immunity (IEI). HCT involves introducing stem cells from a compatible donor with the aim of replacing the affected cells in the recipient’s body. Reduced-toxicity conditioning (RTC) is an approach for reducing drug-related toxicities post HCT in patients with IEIs. Alemtuzumab is a humanized anti-CD52 monoclonal antibody that strongly ...

The central principle of the proposed MAC determination method is to connect the batteries within an RBS in parallel to the maximum possible extent, thereby maximizing the output current. To achieve this universally and automatically, the overall process is divided into the 4 steps shown in Fig. 1. First, a directed graph model is established for the subsequent computations. The nodes in the directed graph correspond to the connection points of components in the actual RBS. The edges in the directed graph correspond to the batteries, switches, and external electrical loads in the actual ...

Highlights -Developed a 21-language, fast and high-fidelity neural text-to-speech technology -The developed model can synthesize one second of speech at high speed in only 0.1 seconds using a single CPU core, which is about eight times faster than the conventional methods -The developed model can realize fast synthesis with a latency of 0.5 seconds on a smartphone without network connection -The technology is expected to be introduced into speech applications, such as multilingual speech translation and car navigation Abstract The Universal Communication Research Institute of the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT, President: TOKUDA Hideyuki, ...

East Hanover, NJ – July 26, 2024 – Children with special health care needs (CSHCN) often face significant disruptions in their education due to extended hospitalizations. A recent study published online in Disability and Rehabilitation on July 1, 2024, by a multidisciplinary team of Kessler Foundation and Children Specialized Hospital researchers, highlights critical areas needing attention to ensure smoother school re-entries for CSHCN, ensuring they receive the necessary educational support post-hospitalization. Involving parents, former patients, and rehabilitation ...

Doctors and others who take care of hospitalized patients may want to sit down for this piece of news. A new study suggests that getting at a patient’s eye level when talking with them about their diagnosis or care can really make a difference. Sitting or crouching at a hospitalized patient’s bedside was associated with more trust, satisfaction and even better clinical outcomes than standing, according to the new review of evidence. The study’s authors, from the University of Michigan and VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System, note that most of the studies on this topic varied with their interventions and outcomes, and were found to have high risk of bias. Their ...

More and more studies show that men face risks of cancer from BRCA1 and BRCA2 genetic mutations that are most often associated with breast and ovarian cancers in women.   According to a July 25 JAMA Oncology review article by experts at Fred Hutch Cancer Center and University of Washington, newly developed national screening guidelines offer hope for identifying the cancer risk of BRCA mutations in men through genetic testing and tailored cancer screening. “Not enough men are getting genetic testing to see if they carry a BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene ...

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (07/25/2024) — Engineering researchers at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities have demonstrated a state-of-the-art hardware device that could reduce energy consumption for artificial intelligent (AI) computing applications by a factor of at least 1,000. The research is published in npj Unconventional Computing, a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Nature. The researchers have multiple patents on the technology used in the device.  With the growing demand of AI applications, researchers have been looking ...

Houston, Texas, July 26, 2024 – The Texas Heart Institute (THI), a globally renowned cardiovascular health center, and BiVACOR®, a leading clinical-stage medical device company, are pleased to provide an update on the condition of the first patient to receive the BiVACOR Total Artificial Heart (TAH) implant on July 9, as part of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Early Feasibility Study (EFS). On July 17, eight days following the BiVACOR TAH implant, a donor heart became available and was transplanted into the ...

The color palette of the birds you see out your window depend on where you live. If you’re far from the Equator, most birds tend to have drab colors, but the closer you are to the tropics, you’ll probably see more and more colorful feathers. Scientists have long been puzzled about why there are more brilliantly-colored birds in the tropics than in other places, and they’ve also wondered how those brightly-colored birds got there in the first place: that is, if those colorful feathers evolved in the tropics, or if tropical birds have colorful ancestors that came to the region from somewhere else. In a new study published ...

Tokyo, Japan – Ice is far more complicated than most of us realize, with over 20 different varieties known to science, forming under various combinations of pressure and temperature. The kind we use to chill our drinks is known as ice I, and it’s one of the few forms of ice that  exist naturally on Earth. Researchers from Japan have recently discovered another type of ice: ice 0, an unusual form of ice that can seed the formation of ice crystals in supercooled water. The formation of ice near the surface ...

Lack of persistence of CAR T cells is major limiting step in CAR T-cell therapy Made by fusing an immune-stimulatory molecule to a protein from cancer cells, the therapy selectively targets CAR T cells and enhances their functionality and persistence in the body, extending their attack on cancer. The therapy, called CAR-Enhancer (CAR-E), also causes CAR T cells to retain a memory of the cancer, allowing them to mount another attack if cancer recurs BOSTON – Even as they have revolutionized the treatment of certain forms of cancer, CAR T-cell therapies ...