In what is considered the most comprehensive post-pandemic survey of trust in scientists, researchers have found a majority of people around the world carry widespread trust in scientists — believing them to be honest, competent, qualified and concerned with public well-being. Researchers surveyed more than 72,000 individuals across 68 countries on perceptions of scientists’ trustworthiness, competence, openness and research priorities. The results, published in the journal Nature Human Behavior, also showed the general public’s desire ...

According to the study published in Nature Food, China’s current trajectory is misaligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The researchers assessed potential pathways for achieving the SDGs in China by transforming its food system, focusing on dietary changes, climate change mitigation, ecological conservation, and socio-economic development. “Action across all areas of the food system is required to achieve a sustainable food system and efficiently address the wide range of social and environmental ...

UK oncology researchers have come together to write the first ever national thought leadership strategy report into cancer vaccine advances and the opportunities these present for those affected by cancer. The strategy report has been published in Cambridge University Press journal Cambridge Prisms: Precision Medicine.  Cancer vaccines hold the potential to revolutionise cancer treatment. These vaccines leverage neoantigens to activate the immune system against tumours, offering a personalised approach to combat cancer. This transformative potential is particularly significant in light of recent advancements in oncology, including ...

The Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Agency have awarded $326 million to three Colorado State University research projects that aim to improve U.S. oil and gas operations and reduce methane emissions nationwide. The EPA’s Methane Emissions Reduction Program is providing the funding to the CSU Energy Institute and faculty working across multiple departments in the Walter Scott, Jr. College of Engineering, with the goal of helping oil and gas operators improve operational efficiency and manage emissions. The efforts will also support activity to build an inventory of methane emissions, ...

Infertility is a problem that affects between 8% and 12% of couples of reproductive age worldwide – for some of them, the problem interrupts a life project, which is the desire to have children and build a family. Advances in technology and medicine have made assisted reproductive treatments possible, but they can be physically and psychologically draining for the couples involved, especially because of expectations of results that may not be achieved. The emotional impact of treatment is well documented in the scientific literature. ...

A recent study from Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai, India has revealed new details about how our cells clean up and recycle waste. This process, known as autophagy, is like a self-cleaning mechanism for cells, helping the cells stay healthy by getting rid of damaged parts and recycling useful components. The process involves formation of a vesicle called autophagosome, which encapsulates the cellular waste. The autophagosome then fuses with another type of vesicle called lysosome. ...

Non-persistent human papillomavirus (HPV) infections are characterized by a sharp increase in viral load followed by a long plateau, according to a study published January 21st in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Samuel Alizon of the National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), France, and colleagues. Chronic HPV infection is responsible for more than 600,000 new cancers each year, including nearly all cervical cancers. Infection among young women is common, impacting nearly 20% of women 25 years of age. Fortunately, the vast majority of these infections ...

In your coverage, please use this URL to provide access to the freely available paper in PLOS Biology: http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.3002952 Article title: Chloramphenicol and gentamicin reduce the evolution of resistance to phage ΦX174 by suppressing a subset of E. coli LPS mutants Author countries: Germany Funding: This work was generously supported by funds from the Max Planck Society (L.P.-F.B.). L.P. was supported by the International Max Planck Research ...

Do speakers of different languages build sentence structure in the same way? In a neuroimaging study published in PLOS Biology, scientists from the Max Planck institute for Psycholinguistics, Donders Institute and Radboud University in Nijmegen recorded the brain activity of participants listening to Dutch stories. In contrast to English, sentence processing in Dutch was based on a strategy for predicting what comes next rather than a ‘wait-and-see’ approach, showing that strategies may differ across languages. While listening to spoken language, people need to link ‘abstract’ knowledge of grammar to ...

While manganese is an essential mineral involved in many bodily functions, both deficiency and excessive exposure can cause health issues. Maintaining a balanced diet typically provides sufficient manganese for most individuals; however, high levels of exposure can be toxic, particularly to the central nervous system. Chronic manganese exposure may result in a condition known as manganism, characterized by symptoms resembling Parkinson's disease, including tremors, muscle stiffness, and cognitive disturbances. New research published in Science Signaling employs model systems and human nerve cells to show the mechanisms by which manganese inflicts damage ...

When children with obesity undergo weight-loss treatment, the effects have repercussions later in life and the risk of serious health problems and premature death is lower as they reach young adulthood. However, this is not the case for depression and anxiety, a study from Karolinska Institutet published in JAMA Pediatrics reports.  The study shows that children and adolescents who respond well to obesity treatment are less likely to develop obesity-related diseases, such as type 2 diabetes, hypertension and dyslipidaemia (abnormally high levels of fat in the blood) as young adults.   The treatment studied ...

A spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta) has been found in South Eastern Egypt: the first recorded instance of the creature in this region for thousands of years. The lone individual was caught and killed by people around 30km from the border with Sudan, a paper in De Gruyter’s Mammalia reports. “My first reaction was disbelief until I checked the photos and videos of the remains,” said the study’s lead author, Dr. Adbullah Nagy from Al-Azhar University, Egypt. “Seeing the evidence, I was completely taken aback. It was beyond anything we had expected to find in Egypt.” The sighting took place some 500km north of the known range of spotted ...

  A large-language model (LLM) built to meet the needs of the Deaf community, translating between signed and spoken language, is the aim of a new project led by the University of Surrey.   SignGPT: Building Generative Predictive Transformers for Sign Language has been awarded £8.45m from the UK Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council. The five-year project will build tools to allow spoken language to be automatically translated into photo-realistic sign language and video of sign language to be translated into spoken language – a complex translation problem that is yet to be solved.  Surrey ...

Urbanisation is rapidly transforming landscapes worldwide, becoming a key driver of global biodiversity loss. It often impacts biodiversity negatively by creating selective environments that limit species diversity in urban compared to natural habitats. Amidst this challenge, understanding and enhancing urban blue-green infrastructure is critical. Garden ponds are small yet significant water features that are increasingly common in urban areas. They offer numerous ecosystem services, like aesthetic purposes, microclimate regulation, and habitats for ornamental species. However, their role in supporting ...

“Our study contributes to the development of a DNAm biomarker that integrates conventional BC risk factors to better reflect the risk for BC subtypes, promoting epigenetically targeted preventive interventions tailored to aged individuals with high risk.” BUFFALO, NY- January 21, 2025 – A new research paper was published in Aging (listed by MEDLINE/PubMed as "Aging (Albany NY)" and "Aging-US" by Web of Science) on December 5, 2024, Volume 16, ...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 21, 2025 – If you’ve ever tossed a generous pinch of salt into your pasta pan’s water for flavor or as an attempt to make it boil faster, you’ve likely ended up with a whitish ring of deposits inside the pan. A group of scientists from the University of Twente in the Netherlands and the French National Institute for Agriculture, Food, and Environment (INRAE), inspired by this observation during an evening of board games and pasta dinner, wondered what it ...

For the first time, astronomers have traced a fast radio burst (FRB) to the outskirts of an ancient, dead, elliptical galaxy — an unprecedented home for a phenomenon previously associated with much younger galaxies. Detailed in two complementary studies led by Northwestern University and McGill University, the discovery shatters assumptions that FRBs solely emanate from regions of active star formation. The new observational evidence, instead, hints that the origins of these mysterious cosmic events might be more diverse than ...

Instead of relying on energy-hungry reactors to generate high temperatures and pressure, researchers are looking underground at Earth’s natural heat and forces to cook up ammonia for fertilizer. In a proof-of-concept study, published January 21 in the Cell Press journal Joule, researchers generated ammonia by mixing nitrogen-laced water with iron-rich rocks—without any energy input or CO2 emission. This new recipe may lead to a more sustainable alternative to current methods, theoretically churning out enough ammonia for 2.42 million years.  The idea stems from an unusual geological phenomenon observed in the 1980s in Mali, West Africa. Locals discovered a well ...

What's Behind Preterm Birth? Scientists Just Found a Big Clue   UCSF researchers discovered a molecular timer that gets activated in the first days of pregnancy and influences when mice give birth.   A typical human pregnancy lasts 40 weeks, but most parents know this number is only a rough estimate.   Babies are born on a seemingly unpredictable timeline, with a normal pregnancy ranging from 38 to 42 weeks. And 10 percent of all births are preterm, meaning they occur before 37 weeks of gestation, which puts babies at risk of a host of complications.  Now, UC San Francisco researchers have discovered a molecular timer in mice that plays a role in controlling ...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 21, 2025 – Greenhouses and open farms that welcome visitors to purchase locally grown produce and meat have become increasingly important to food productivity. Not only are farmers looking for ways to monitor conditions to help improve greenhouse crop growth and yield, but keeping harvested food fresh in storage conditions is also a major concern. Smart sensor technology, monitoring and controlling temperature and humidity, plays an essential role in producing enough food to meet the ever-increasing demand ...

A collision happens. Someone is hurt, a head injury, a concussion. Just as the first responders arrive to help the person, inside the brain, another “crew” of responders is busy clearing debris and repairing injured tissue. This crew is called the microglia - the immune cells of the central nervous system. Microglia are imperative to maintaining neuronal function by clearing toxins in the brain and central nervous system. But if they are overactive, they can damage neurons instead and, in some cases, have been found to promote the progression of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. During ...

About The Study: This cohort study demonstrated that good response to pediatric obesity treatment was associated with reduced long-term morbidity, such as type 2 diabetes, dyslipidemia, and hypertension. Additionally, a link between pediatric obesity treatment effectiveness and lower incidences of mortality in young adulthood was observed; however, effective pediatric obesity treatment was not associated with adult depression or anxiety, highlighting their distinct nature despite frequent coexistence. Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Emilia Hagman, PhD, email emilia.hagman@ki.se To access the embargoed study: Visit our ...

About The Study: This cohort study found that key sociodemographic, health care, and clinical factors are associated with receipt of semaglutide, a novel glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonist medication, in those without diabetes. These findings suggest that insurance plan type and structure may be a crucial intervention point for improving equity in obesity treatment access.  Corresponding Author: To contact the corresponding author, Andrew C. Stokes, PhD, email acstokes@bu.edu. To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ (doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2024.55222) Editor’s ...

EMBO announces that ten life scientists have been selected to receive EMBO Installation Grants. These grants support group leaders, who are in the early stages of setting up their laboratories, to strengthen the life sciences in countries participating in the scheme. Two new installation grantees will establish laboratories in Croatia, one in Czechia, one in Estonia, two in Greece, three in Poland and one in Portugal. “EMBO Installation Grants offer flexible funding, extensive networking opportunities and practical support for life scientists pursuing ambitious research projects,” says EMBO Director Fiona Watt. ”We ...

INDIANAPOLIS -- With medical advances, more than 169,000 people in the United States are living with metastatic breast cancer. Addressing debilitating symptoms has become increasingly crucial. Fatigue remains a significant challenge, affecting up to 63 percent of patients and severely impacting daily functioning. A study demonstrates the effectiveness of telephone-delivered acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) in reducing fatigue’s interference with functioning and improving the quality of life for survivors of metastatic breast cancer. ACT is a behavioral intervention that has shown promise in pilot studies in advanced cancer. ...