The origins of writing in Mesopotamia lie in the images imprinted by ancient cylinder seals on clay tablets and other artifacts. A research group from the University of Bologna has identified a series of correlations between the designs engraved on these cylinders, dating back around six thousand years, and some of the signs in the proto-cuneiform script that emerged in the city of Uruk, located in what is now southern Iraq, around 3000 BCE. The study—published in Antiquity—opens new perspectives on ...

Science can be difficult to explain to the public. In fact, any subfield of science can be difficult to explain to another scientist who studies in a different area. Explaining a theoretical science concept to high school students requires a new way of thinking altogether. This is precisely what researchers at the University of California San Diego did when they orchestrated a dance with high school students at Orange Glen High School in Escondido as a way to explain topological insulators. The experiment, led by former graduate student Matthew Du and UC San Diego Associate Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry Joel Yuen-Zhou, was published in Science Advances. “I ...

Tucson, Arizona, 5 November 2024 – Brain Medicine has launched an ambitious Festschrift series with the first of more than ten planned articles celebrating Dr. Seymour Reichlin's centennial year and his transformative impact on neuroendocrinology. The opening editorial, chronicling his revolutionary insights into brain-hormone interactions, inaugurates what promises to be one of the most comprehensive tributes in the field's history. “One could be both a physician caring for patients and a scientific investigator,” reflects Dr. Reichlin, whose work spanning nearly 80 years has fundamentally reshaped our understanding of how ...

In the 1960s, Japanese books became immensely popular in South Korea. Interestingly, Korean newspapers often wrote about this trend as if mainly women were interested in learning Japanese. Osaka Metropolitan University Associate Professor Jinsuk Yang examined South Korean newspaper articles and other historical documents from the 1960s and 1970s to understand why Japanese language learning was often described as something women did, even though men were also learning Japanese. Additionally, Professor Yang studied how women’s ability to speak Japanese affected ...

As buildings age, the demand for effective monitoring of their structural integrity has grown significantly. A breakthrough in nano-optical sensor technology now enables precise, real-time measurement of structural deformation and stability. This innovation promises to reshape the field of structural diagnostics, offering a cost-effective, time-efficient solution that reduces the need for specialized expertise traditionally required in this area. Led by Dr. Jae Sung Yoon, Principal Researcher at the Nano-lithography & Manufacturing Research Center within the Nano-convergence ...

Bio-based materials may pose a greater health risk to some of the planet’s most important species than the conventional plastics they are designed to replace, a new study has shown. Such materials are increasingly being advocated as environmentally friendly alternatives to plastics, and used in textiles and products including clothing, wet wipes and period products. However, microfibres of the materials are emitted into the environment through the laundry cycle, the application of sewage sludge as fertilisers, or the simple wear and tear of textile products. Despite increasing quantities of bio-based products being produced and sold all over the world, there has been ...

Mosquito larvae grow faster if they’re exposed to particular bacteria, according to a new study that could help global health programmes. Aedes aegypti mosquitoes spread illnesses including dengue, yellow fever and Zika. Anti-disease programmes breed and release non-biting male mosquitoes that are either sterile or prevent transmission of diseases. These mass release programmes can be substantially more effective than the widespread spraying of insecticides, as these insects have developed resistance to many commonly employed chemicals. The new study, by ...

The U.S. National Science Foundation and Simons Foundation have selected a group of institutions, including Argonne, to receive funding to establish an AI and astronomy institute called the NSF-Simons AI Institute for the Sky (SkAI). Part of a groundbreaking effort to harness artificial intelligence (AI) to unlock the mysteries of the cosmos, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory is a key collaborator in the newly launched NSF-Simons AI Institute ...

For generations, the federal government has largely refrained from paying for mental health and substance use treatment in large residential facilities. That changed in 2015 when, in response to increasing overdose deaths nationwide from illicit drugs, the federal government allowed states to waive a longstanding prohibition against using federal Medicaid funding for services in so-called institutions of mental diseases. In turn, states were required to improve their addiction care with an emphasis on increasing treatment with medications. Yet a new study by researchers at Oregon Health & Science University finds no overall ...

A University of Virginia School of Engineering and Applied Science researcher is partnering on a historic and foundational National Institutes of Health study to help the nation discuss, and better address, the concept of structural ableism and where it may result in healthcare disparities. Rupa Valdez, a professor of systems and information engineering who also holds an appointment as a professor of public health sciences in the UVA School of Medicine, is co-leading the five-year, $2.9 million investigation — the first of its kind. Currently, the field relies on non-standardized ...

With recent box office hits like Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, The Little Mermaid and Everything Everywhere All at Once, the average viewer might assume that the casts of Hollywood films are more diverse now than they were 10 or 20 years ago. But verifying these perceptions can be tricky. Even before the #OscarsSoWhite social media campaign in 2015 brought much-needed attention to the lack of diversity in Academy-nominated films, film scholars had begun documenting the lack of representation of women and actors of color in Hollywood. Doing so requires that they watch ...

Embargoed for release until 5:00 p.m. ET on Monday 4 November 2024     @Annalsofim          Below please find summaries of new articles that will be published in the next issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. The summaries are not intended to substitute for the full articles as a source of information. This information is under strict embargo and by taking it into possession, media representatives are committing to the terms of the embargo not only on their own behalf, but also on behalf of the organization they represent.          ----------------------------          1. ...

Key points: Approximately one in five of the veterans enrolled in a high-veteran Medicare Advantage (MA) plan did not incur any Medicare services paid by MA within a given year and instead received their health care through the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). In 2020, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) paid more $1 billion to MA plans for enrolling VA-enrollees who did not utilize Medicare services, with nearly 20% of that funding directed disproportionately to high-veteran MA plans. The ...

A multidisciplinary team of experts in lung cancer screening and implementation science from the UCLA Health Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health was awarded a $2.5 million grant from the Bristol Myers Squibb Foundation, an independent charitable organization, to spearhead a new initiative aimed at reducing disparities in lung cancer screening across Los Angeles County.  The award supports a new program called ...

American Geophysical Union  4 November 2024 AGU Release No. 24-35 For Immediate Release   This press release is available online at: https://news.agu.org/press-release/new-trigger-tonga-eruption/ New trigger proposed for record-smashing 2022 Tonga eruption Previously unstudied data from a seismic wave, detected 750 kilometers from the seamount, may bolster tsunami early-warning systems. AGU press contact:   Liza Lester, +1 (202) 777-7494, news@agu.org (UTC-5 hours)  Contact information for the researchers:  Mie Ichihara, University of Tokyo, ichihara@eri.u-tokyo.ac.jp, (UTC+9 hours) WASHINGTON — Fifteen minutes before the ...

Lupus Research Alliance Announces Lupus Research Highlights at ACR Convergence 2024 Sixteen presentations of preclinical studies funded by the Lupus Research Alliance (LRA) to advance understanding of lupus and potential treatment pathways, including four oral presentations Two reports by Lupus Therapeutics, the clinical affiliate of the LRA, and the Lupus Clinical Investigators Network (LuCIN) on promoting equity in lupus clinical trials, and identifying trial barriers and solutions Fifteen industry-sponsored clinical research studies supported by Lupus Therapeutics and LuCIN, including positive results from the late-breaking Phase 3 dapirolizumab pegol trial ...

Sea-level rise caused by climate change poses a serious and often unpredictable threat to coastal forests, and new tools are needed to help mitigate damage and allocate conservation resources.   A new study from North Carolina State University and the United States Geological Survey (USGS) details how satellite imagery may help identify forested areas that are being transformed into marshes and open water by sea-level rise, a process known as regime change. Marcelo Ardón, associate professor at NC State and co-author of a paper on the study, ...

EMBARGOED UNTIL MONDAY NOVEMBER 4 AT 3:00 P.M. ET The unique properties of baseball’s famed “magic” mud have never been scientifically quantified — until now. In a new paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science (Penn Engineering) and School of Arts & Sciences (SAS) reveal what makes the magic mud so special. “It spreads like a skin cream and grips like sandpaper,” says Shravan Pradeep, the paper’s first author and a postdoctoral researcher in the labs of Douglas J. ...

Children too young to know words like “impossible” and “improbable” nonetheless understand how possibility works, finds new work with two- and three-year-olds. The findings, the first to demonstrate that young children distinguish between improbable and impossible events, and learn significantly better after impossible occurrences, is newly published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. “Even young toddlers already think about the world in terms of possibilities,” said co-author Lisa Feigenson, co-director of the Johns Hopkins University Laboratory for Child Development. “Adults do this all the time and here we wanted ...

Scientists and environmental activists have consistently called for drastic reductions in meat production as a way to reduce emissions and, in doing so, combat climate change. However, a new analysis concludes that a smaller reduction, borne by wealthier nations, could remove 125 billion tons of carbon dioxide—exceeding the total number of global fossil fuel emissions over the past three years—from the atmosphere.  Small cutbacks in higher-income countries—approximately 13% of total production—would reduce the amount of land needed for cattle grazing, the researchers note, allowing forests to naturally ...

**EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE UNTIL NOV. 4 AT 3:00 P.M. EST** A new study from researchers at Wilmer Eye Institute, Johns Hopkins Medicine explains not only why some patients with wet age-related macular degeneration (or “wet” AMD) fail to have vision improvement with treatment, but also how an experimental drug could be used with existing wet AMD treatments to save vision. Wet AMD, one of two kinds of AMD, is a progressive eye condition caused by an overgrowth of blood vessels in the retina, the light-sensing tissue in ...

Between about 120 million and 130 million years ago, during the age of dinosaurs, temperate forests and lakes hosted a lively ecosystem in what is now northeast China. Diverse fossils from that time remained pretty much undisturbed until the 1980s, when villagers started finding exceptionally preserved creatures, which fetched high prices from collectors and museums. This started a fossil gold rush. Both locals and scientists have now dug so much, their work can be seen from space―perhaps the most extensive paleontological excavations anywhere. By the 1990s, it was clear that the so-called Yixian ...

If left unchecked, insect pests can devastate crops. To minimize damage and reduce the need for insecticide sprays, crops have been genetically engineered to produce bacterial proteins that kill key pests but are not harmful to people or wildlife. However, widespread planting of such transgenic crops has led to rapid adaptation by some pests. A new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reveals a novel genetic basis of resistance to transgenic crops in one of the most important crop pests in the United States. Researchers from the University of Arizona Department of Entomology in the College of Agriculture, Life and Environmental Sciences used genomics to investigate the ...

Jill Tarter to Receive Inaugural Tarter Award for Innovation in the Search for Life Beyond Earth November 4, 2024, Mountain View, CA – Renowned astronomer, Dr. Jill Tarter, SETI Institute co-founder and pioneering SETI researcher, will be honored with the inaugural Tarter Award for Innovation in the Search for Life Beyond Earth at the SETI Institute’s 40th Anniversary celebration on November 20, 2024, in Menlo Park, CA. This new award recognizes individuals whose projects or ideas significantly advance humanity’s search for extraterrestrial life and intelligence. The Tarter Award honors contributions ...

November 4, 2024 — The supply of healthcare professionals available to provide HIV care continues to decline, even as the need for HIV care and prevention is expected to increase, reports a survey study in the November/December issue of The Journal of the Association of Nurses in AIDS Care (JANAC). The official journal of the Association of Nurses in AIDS Care, JANAC is published in the Lippincott portfolio by Wolters Kluwer. "Our study provides new insights into the numbers and characteristics of clinicians who will be available to provide HIV care in the coming years. This information ...