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Embryos of many species use sound to prepare for the outside world

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
It's well known that reptiles depend on temperature cues while in the egg to determine a hatchling's sex. Now, researchers writing in the journal Trends in Ecology & Evolution on May 26 say that embryos of many different animal species also rely on acoustic signals in important ways. They call this phenomenon "acoustic developmental programming."
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Electric fish -- and humans -- pause before communicating key points

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Electric fish pause before sharing something particularly meaningful. Pauses also prime the sensory systems to receive new and important information, according to research from Washington University in St. Louis. The study reveals an underlying mechanism for how pauses allow neurons in the midbrain to recover from stimulation.
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Proteomics reveals how exercise increases the efficiency of muscle energy production

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
By applying mass spectrometry, scientists at the University of Copenhagen provide some of the most detailed data on how mitochondrial proteins cluster into supercomplexes - a process that makes mitochondria more efficient at producing energy. The findings, which were published in Cell Reports, is a precious resource for the scientific community, especially those tackling mitochondrial adaptations to exercise training or mitochondrial diseases.
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Researchers examine record-shattering 2020 trans-Atlantic dust storm

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Researchers from the University of Kansas published a study in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society parsing the mechanism that in June 2020 transported a massive dust plume from Saharan Africa to the Caribbean and U.S. Gulf Coast.
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Scent trails could boost elephant conservation

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Travelling elephants pay close attention to scent trails of dung and urine left by other elephants, new research shows.
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Large amounts of mercury released under southwest Greenland ice sheet

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
About ten percent of the global riverine export of this toxic substance to oceans originates from this region - with potentially significant impacts on Arctic organisms
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Similar states of activity identified in supermassive and stellar mass black holes

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
The researchers Juan A. Fernández-Ontiveros, of the Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF) in Rome and Teo Muñoz-Darias, of the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC), have written an article in which they describe the different states of activity of a large sample of supermassive black holes in the centres of galaxies.
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Dive bombing killer flies are so fast they lose steering control

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Killer flies can reach accelerations of over 3g when aerial diving to catch their prey - but at such high speeds they often miss because they can't correct their course.
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Scientists find a way to detect the spectral signals of amyloid fibrils

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Researchers from St Petersburg University have created a new theory of diffusion NMR experiments to study amyloid fibrils. Fibrils are one of the key factors behind various forms of dementia, including Alzheimer's disease. The researchers showed that using a diffusion filter it is possible to separate the spectral signals of fibrils and other components of the amyloidogenic sample and obtain their individual spectra, which has been considered impossible for a long time.
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Glioblastoma study discovers protective role of metabolic enzyme, revealing a novel therapeutic target

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
MD Anderson researchers have discovered a new role for the metabolic enzyme, MCAD, in glioblastoma. The enzyme prevents toxic fatty acid accumulation, in addition to its normal role in energy production, and targeting MCAD led to irreversible damage and cell death specifically in cancer cells.
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New research deepens mystery about evolution of bees' social behavior

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
A new study has mounted perhaps the most intricate, detailed look ever at the diversity in structure and form of bees, offering new insights in a long-standing debate over how complex social behaviors arose in certain branches of bees' evolutionary tree. The report offers strong evidence that complex social behavior developed just once in pollen-carrying bees, rather than twice or more, separately, in different evolutionary branches--but researchers say the case is far from closed.
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What causes the deep Earth's most mysterious earthquakes?

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
The cause of Earth's deepest earthquakes has been a mystery to science for more than a century, but a team of Carnegie scientists may have cracked the case. New research published in AGU Advances provides evidence that fluids play a key role in deep-focus earthquakes--which occur between 300 and 700 kilometers below the planet's surface.
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Additional genetic risk variants behind bipolar disorder have emerged

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Researchers from the Danish psychiatry research-project iPSYCH have contributed to identify 33 new genetic variants which, as it turns out, play a role in bipolar disorder. To achieve this, they have examined DNA profiles from 413,000 people.
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Wireless broadband connectivity enhanced by a new communication design

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Current wireless networks such as Wi-Fi, LTE-Advanced, etc., work in the lower radio spectrum, below 6 GHz. Experts warn that soon this band will become congested due to mushrooming data traffic. It is calculated that by 2024, 17,722 million devices will be connected.
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Better understanding membranes

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
A new class of membranes promises highly interesting applications in material separation, whether in biotechnology or water purification. The theoretical understanding of these polymer membranes is, however, still incomplete. Two researchers from Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon and the University of Göttingen now present a study, published in the renowned science journal Chemical Reviews, that identifies these gaps in knowledge and shows promising approaches toward solving them.
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Finnish biodiversity information management inspires globally

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
The Finnish solution to include all types of biodiversity data and the whole data life cycle, from collection to use, in the same data infrastructure is unique. It is also rare for one infrastructure to be able to serve cutting-edge research, public administration, business and the civil society simultaneously. This solution, the Finnish Biodiversity Information Facility "FinBIF" is described as a best-practice model in biodiversity informatics in a recent paper in the Nature Portfolio journal Scientific Data.
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Non-parents expand 'facial dexterity' in caring for infants among primates

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Non-parents expand the range of their facial expressions in caring for infants among primates. The study shows the ability, among non-relatives, to both decipher facial expressions and to be attuned to others' emotional states, revealing the evolutionary nature of communication.
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Can racial identity protect black teens from racism-related stress? It's complicated

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
A recent study finds that the vast majority of Black adolescents have experienced racism, that they experience anticipatory stress about experiencing racism again, and that their racial identity can influence that stress in a variety of ways.
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Infrared imaging to detect lymphatic filariasis

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Researchers from LSTM's Centre for Neglected Tropical Diseases (CNTD) have been using an infrared thermal imaging camera to detect subclinical cases and predict the progression of lymphatic filariasis in Bangladesh.
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Warm ice may fracture differently than cold ice

Eurekalert - May 26 2021 - 00:05
Researchers at Aalto University in Finland have found strong evidence that warm ice - that is, ice very close in temperature to zero degrees Celsius - may fracture differently than the kinds of ice typically studied in laboratories or nature. A new study published in The Cryosphere takes a closer look at the phenomenon, studied at the world's largest indoor ice tank on Aalto's campus.
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