When we daydream, we must be able to snap back to attention at a moment’s notice. Researchers at Boston Children’s Hospital uncovered how our brains can do things like react to a question when we’re daydreaming: firing activity in part of the brain called the dentate gyrus keeps us focused on what’s happening in our environment. And the team found that the same neural activity also helps with forming memories. The findings were published in Nature on March 13, 2024. “We have found a brain mechanism for breaking up periods of mind wandering and realigning the ‘cognitive ...

The regeneration of forest saplings is pivotal for maintaining biodiversity and ecosystem productivity, necessitating innovative management techniques for continuous forest coverage. Traditional 2-dimensional remote sensing struggles to accurately capture the complex, understory sapling dynamics. To address this, researchers are exploring the use of aerial laser scanning (ALS) for its potential in providing detailed 3-dimensional insights. However, despite progress in using ALS data to estimate tree metrics, accurately identifying and quantifying the phenotypic ...

Woods Hole, Mass. (March 13, 2024) - Emperor penguin populations have been exceedingly difficult to monitor because of their remote locations, and because individuals form breeding colonies on seasonal sea ice fastened to land (known as fast ice) during the dark and cold Antarctic winter. Now, new research that incorporates very high resolution (VHR) satellite imagery with field-based validation surveys and long-term data has provided the first multi-year time series that documents emperor penguin global population trends. Researchers ...

Renowned cardiovascular surgeon Gilbert H. L. Tang has been named Editor-in-Chief of JACC: Case Reports, bringing a wealth of experience and expertise to the helm of one of the top cardiovascular journals published by the American College of Cardiology.  “I am both honored and humbled to be a cardiac surgeon among the Editor-in-Chiefs in the JACC family of journals,” Tang said. “It is going to be an exciting time for JACC: Case Reports to build on a team of multidisciplinary cardiovascular practitioners with diverse backgrounds and experiences, and at different stages of their professional careers, to enhance the journal’s academic and educational impact globally.”  Tang ...

Recent advancements in hyperspectral imaging and machine learning have revolutionized the non-destructive monitoring of crop nutritional status, enabling accurate prediction of plant element concentrations. Despite successes, the single-target regression method, which predicts concentrations individually, faces accuracy limitations for certain elements. Traditional methods offer accuracy but at the cost of being destructive and inefficient for large-scale use. Current research highlights the potential of multi-target ...

Woods Hole, Mass. – A healthy coral reef is noisy, full of the croaks, purrs, and grunts of various fishes and the crackling of snapping shrimp. Research suggests that larval animals use this symphony of sounds to help them determine where they should live and grow. Researchers at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) recently demonstrated that replaying healthy reef sounds could potentially be used to encourage coral larvae to recolonize damaged or degraded reefs. A reef that has been ...

The University of Warwick has been awarded £11m to train PhD students in computational modelling.   The new centre will train 50 PhD students to use computational modelling to tackle pressing global sustainability challenges from accessing clean fusion energy, controlling infectious diseases, to designing energy-efficient devices such as new battery electrolytes.   The Centre for Doctoral Training in Modelling of Heterogeneous Systems (HetSys II), led by Professor James Kermode from the School of Engineering, Dr Livia Bartok-Partay from Chemistry and Professor Nicholas Hine from Physics, will train ...

Researchers have published a simple trick that improves the accuracy of techniques that help us understand how external variables – such as temperature – affect gene activity in plants. “There are really two contributions here,” says Colleen Doherty, corresponding author of a paper on the work and an associate professor of molecular and structural biochemistry at North Carolina State University. “First, we’re raising the visibility of a problem that many of us in the ...

The root system is crucial for plants to absorb water and nutrients, with in situ root research providing insights into root phenotypes and dynamics. While deep-learning-based root segmentation methods have advanced the analysis of root systems, they require extensive manually labeled datasets, which are labor-intensive and time-consuming to produce. Current methods of in situ root observation vary in their effectiveness. Moreover, traditional root image recognition methods face challenges such as subjectivity and ...

About The Study: In this randomized clinical trial of 345 patients with mild-to-moderate COVID-19, viral load rebound and symptom rebound were both common after a standard 5-day course of antiviral treatment with either VV116 or nirmatrelvir-ritonavir. Prolongation of treatment duration might be investigated to reduce COVID-19 rebound.  Authors: Yufang Bi, M.D., and Yiping Xu, M.Sc., of the Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine in Shanghai, China, are the corresponding authors.  To access the embargoed study: Visit our For ...

About The Study: The findings of this study of 4,515 adolescents suggest that in-person schooling and several coping behaviors (caring for one’s body, exercising, and engaging in healthy behaviors) were associated with significantly higher positive affect and lower perceived stress during the COVID-19 pandemic among adolescents with high adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). Adolescents with high ACEs demonstrated especially greater mental health scores when they reported in-person schooling. Future studies should build on these findings to identify clinical and school-based mental health protective ...

Chlorophyll a fluorescence (ChlF) has been a pivotal tool in understanding plant photochemistry, offering insights into the energy transfer processes within chloroplasts and the efficiency of Photosystem II (PSII). Researchers have relied on quantifying ChlF through specific measures such as F0, Fm, and Fv under various lighting conditions to assess photosynthetic activities. Nonetheless, the technique encounters obstacles owing to the intrinsic uncertainties in gauging the absolute magnitude of ChlF and the fluctuation in baseline levels affected by environmental conditions. This complicates the interpretation of ...

Allergic transfusion reactions (ATRs), a potentially life-threatening side effect of blood transfusions with unclear mechanisms, may be linked to food allergies in pediatric patients as per a recent study by scientists from Japan. They found that ATRs may be triggered by the presence of allergens in the donor’s blood, influenced by their pre-donation diet. These findings could pave the way for safer blood transfusions through the development of preventive measures and countermeasures for ATRs. Blood transfusions are often life-saving procedures in various medical settings. They are required not only after severe blood loss ...

Melissa A. Kelly, MS, CGC is the recipient of the 2024 ACMG Foundation Carolyn Mills Lovell Genetic Counselor Award. Ms. Kelly received the Lovell award for her platform presentation at the 2024 ACMG Annual Clinical Genetics Meeting, “Integrating genomic medicine into healthcare: Experience disclosing >5,000 clinically relevant results within the Geisinger MyCode Community Health Initiative.” Ms. Kelly said, “Thank you to the ACMG Foundation. I am humbled and honored to receive the Carolyn Mills Lovell Genetic Counselor Award. Throughout my career, I have seen many ways in which patients and their families interact with and are impacted ...

Rory James Tinker, MD is the recipient of the 2024 Richard King Trainee Award. This award was instituted by the ACMG Foundation for Genetic and Genomic Medicine to encourage American Board of Medical Genetics and Genomics (ABMGG), international equivalents, or genetic counseling trainees in their careers and to foster the publication of the highest quality research in Genetics in Medicine (GIM), an official journal of the ACMG.   Each year the editorial board reviews all articles published in GIM by ...

Meena Sethuraman, BS is the 2024 recipient of the ACMG Foundation/Revvity Travel Award. Ms. Sethuraman was selected to receive the award for her platform presentation, "Characterizing pathogenicity of ACADVL variants in very long-chain acyl-CoA dehydrogenase deficiency.” Meena Sethuraman is a third-year medical student in the Physician Scientist Training Program at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Her research,  being conducted with Dr. Jerry Vockley, FACMG, involves studying genetic variants in fatty acid oxidation disorders. Meena previously received her BS in Neurobiology at the University of Washington. Her undergraduate and post-baccalaureate ...

Each year, the ACMG Foundation for Genetic and Genomic Medicine grants its Next Generation fellowship awards to promising early career professionals in a range of medical genetics and genomics specialties including Clinical Biochemical Genetics Laboratory, Laboratory Genetics and Genomics, Medical Biochemical and Ophthalmic Genetics. Support for this year’s class of Fellows was generously provided by Pfizer, Sanofi, Spark Therapeutics, Bionano and Horizon Therapeutics. The ACMG Foundation depends on corporate ...

Solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF) and the photochemical reflectance index (PRI) have emerged as significant tools in assessing the photosynthetic and carbon sequestration capacities of terrestrial vegetation, particularly for estimating gross primary productivity (GPP). However, the relationship between SIF, PRI, and GPP encounters challenges due to large temporal and spatial variabilities as well as the influence of various observational factors such as canopy structure and physiological state. Despite the potential of multi-angle observations and the Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF) model to mitigate these ...

Corvallis, OR — The Alliance of World Scientists (AWS) is pleased to announce the six recipients of the 2024 Planet Earth Award: Dr. S Faizi, Dr. James Hansen, Dr. Denise Margaret S. Matias, Dr. Kimberly Nicholas, Dr. Jamie Pittock, and Dr. Fernando Valladares. Planet Earth Award The AWS Planet Earth Award acknowledges individuals who champion life on Earth. These individuals demonstrate exceptional creativity or contributions in their work in science-based advocacy with the public, ...

Computers work in digits — 0s and 1s to be exact. Their calculations are digital; their processes are digital; even their memories are digital. All of which requires extraordinary power resources. As we look to the next evolution of computing and developing neuromorphic or “brain like” computing, those power requirements are unfeasible. To advance neuromorphic computing, some researchers are looking at analog improvements. In other words, not just advancing software, but advancing hardware too. Research from the University of California San Diego and UC Riverside shows a promising new way to store and transmit information ...

DALLAS (SMU) – What exactly happens at the tiny scale at which individual atoms exist and interact? SMU chemist Elfi Kraka and her colleagues have been working on developing a computational tool aimed at providing answers to that mystery. Mathematical functions used to calculate the potential energy of a system of atoms are called interatomic potentials. Machine learning interatomic potentials (MLIP)s have become an efficient and less expensive alternative to traditional quantum chemical simulations, which even on today’s high-performance computing often become out of reach for larger ...

Although women have breastfed since the beginning of time, there is very little scientific research on how exercise affects breast milk. Online forums for pregnant women and new mothers are full of questions about this exact issue: Can exercise cause breast milk to go sour? What happens to breast milk if you do high-intensity interval training? Will strenuous exercise affect your milk supply? “There are so many myths about exercise and breast milk. We simply need more knowledge,” says researcher Trine Moholdt at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU). She heads several international research projects ...

The ACMG Foundation for Genetic and Genomic Medicine is proud to present the ACMG Foundation/David L. Rimoin Inspiring Excellence Award to Christiana Wang, BS for her featured platform presentation at the 2024 ACMG Annual Clinical Genetics Meeting, “Antisense oligonucleotide targeting a linked-SNP provides allele-specific and effective knockdown to a dominant negative SPTAN1 pathogenic variant.” Christiana Wang, BS, is a second-year PhD candidate in the Department of Molecular ...

ATLANTA – New data provided by studying the beluga whales at Georgia Aquarium helps close a key information gap about how much food these whales need to thrive. The information will inform important management decisions for their counterparts in Alaska’s Cook Inlet, which are protected under the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA). A new study released in the Journal of Experimental Biology, led by Terrie M. Williams, Director of the Integrative Carnivore EcoPhysiology Lab, with her graduate student Jason John at the University of California-Santa Cruz in partnership ...

Americans already living in housing supported by federal housing assistance programs have significantly lower blood lead levels than counterparts who would later join these programs, according to new research led by environmental health scientists at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health and Tufts Medical Center. The findings appear in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Health Perspectives. “Living in federally-supported housing—especially public housing—limited opportunities for residents’ exposure to lead,” says first author MyDzung Chu, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Institute for ...