Brain
Forests in the eastern United States that are structurally complex - meaning the arrangement of vegetation is highly varied - sequester more carbon, according to a new study led by researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University.
The study demonstrates for the first time that a forest's structural complexity is a better predictor of carbon sequestration potential than tree species diversity. The discovery may hold implications for the mitigation of climate change.
A new paper published in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health co-authored by a University of Warwick researcher provides standardised scores for The Parent Report of Children's Abilities Revised (PARCA-R) questionnaire. The PARCA-R is recommended for routine use in the UK to screen for cognitive and language developmental delay in children born preterm and can be completed by parents in 10 to 15 minutes.
CHICAGO -- People generally think of stress and anxiety as negative concepts, but while both stress and anxiety can reach unhealthy levels, psychologists have long known that both are unavoidable -- and that they often play a helpful, not harmful, role in our daily lives, according to a presentation at the annual convention of the American Psychological Association.
Do only potassium ions pass through the selectivity filter of a potassium channel, or are there water molecules between the ions? This question has been a source of controversy for years. Researchers led by Prof. Adam Lange from the Leibniz-Forschungsinstitut für Molekulare Pharmakologie (FMP) in Berlin have now been able to show that water molecules do not co-migrate through the potassium channel. Since the experiments were carried out on cell membranes under natural conditions for the first time, the researchers have strong proof in their hands.
The ability to learn new motor skills is a lifelong prerequisite for mastering everyday tasks independently and flexibly. There are many skills that we do automatically every day without thinking, such as operating a smartphone, typing on a keyboard, or riding a bicycle. But these had to initially be acquired, through repeated practice. The learning of new motor skills takes place both during the active practice of new processes and during breaks between learning sessions, even though one is not practicing. The pauses after practice are particularly important for motor learning.
Silicon dominates solar energy products -- it is stable, cheap, and efficient at turning sunlight into electricity. Any new material taking on silicon must compete, and win, on those grounds. As a result of an international research collaboration, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), and the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University (OIST) have found a stable material that efficiently creates electricity -- which could challenge silicon hegemony.
Extensive wildfires in the Pacific Northwest in the summer of 2017 unleashed a vast plume of smoke that ascended high into the stratosphere, persisted for more than eight months and provided researchers a rare opportunity to evaluate current models of smoke ascent. Their study reveals gaps in the way smoke plume rise and duration is modeled now, they say. Powerful firestorms will occasionally cause pyrocumulonibus clouds (pyroCbs) to erupt violently into the atmosphere.
Barcelona, August 8, 2019-.Encapsulating two drugs with different properties into nanovesicles surrounded by antibodies can greatly improve their delivery and efficacy, according to a study led by Xavier Fernández Busquets, director of the joint Nanomalaria unit at the Institute for Bionengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) and the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), an institution supported by "la Caixa".
Light microscopy is the only way in which we can look inside a living cell, or living tissues, in three dimensions. An electron microscope only gives a two-dimensional view, and the organic sample would quickly burn up due to the extreme heat of the electron beam, and therefore cannot be observed alive. Moreover, by marking the biomolecules of the structure we are interested in with a specially designed fluorescent molecule, we can distinguish it from the surroundings: this is fluorescence microscopy.
Researchers have, for the first time, identified the sufficient and necessary conditions that the low-energy limit of quantum gravity theories must satisfy to preserve the main features of the Unruh effect.
In a new study, led by researchers from SISSA (Scuola Internazionale Superiore di Studi Avanzati, the Complutense University of Madrid and the University of Waterloo, a solid theoretical framework is provided to discuss modifications to the Unruh effect caused by the microstructure of space-time.
Groundwater maintains vital ecosystems and strongly influences water and energy budgets. Although at least 400 million people in sub-Saharan Africa depend on this valuable resource for their domestic water needs, the processes that sustain it and their sensitivity to climatic variability, are poorly understood. IIASA contributed to a study that looked into climate impacts on groundwater in light of changing climatic patterns in Africa.
Quantum mechanics is an extraordinarily successful way of understanding the physical world at extremely small scales. Through it, a handful of rules can be used to explain the majority of experimentally observable phenomena. Occasionally, however, we come across a problem in classical mechanics that poses particular difficulties for translation into the quantum world. A new study published in EPJ D has provided some insights into one of them: momentum.
Spin-torque oscillators (STOs) are nanoscale devices that generate microwaves using changes in magnetic field direction, but those produced by any individual device are too weak for practical applications. Physicists have attempted - and, to date, consistently failed - to produce reliable microwave fields by coupling large ensembles. Michael Zaks from Humboldt University of Berlin and Arkady Pikovsky from the University of Potsdam in Germany have now shown why connecting these devices in series cannot succeed, and, at the same time, suggested other paths to explore.
CAMDEN - For decades, biomedical researchers have used mouse behavior to study pain, but some researchers have questioned the accuracy of the interpretations of how mice experience pain.
Now, Rutgers University-Camden neuroscientist Nathan Fried and colleagues from the University of Pennsylvania have developed a method that can more accurately gauge pain in mice, which could lead researchers to discover new ways to treat pain in human patients.
Exposure to C. difficile in infancy produces an immune response that might protect against this gastrointestinal infection later in childhood, according to a study published in Clinical Infectious Diseases journal. Researchers found that infants who were naturally exposed to C. difficile in the environment and became colonized with the bacteria had antibodies in their blood. Analyses using a state-of-the-art assay revealed that these antibodies neutralized toxins that cause C.