Culture
Scientists investigating the genetics of chilli pepper species have discovered a whole host of new chilli hybrids that can be grown by crossing domesticated peppers with their wild cousins. This will allow plant breeders to create new varieties that have better disease resistance and could increase productivity.
Despite their huge world-wide culinary appeal, chillies are relatively difficult to cultivate, being prone to disease and sensitive to growing conditions.
Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) among those who have recently given birth is more common than previously thought, and much of this can be attributed to thoughts of harm related to the baby, new UBC research has found.
The researchers also learned that OCD can go undetected when new parents aren't asked specifically about infant-related harm.
OCD is an anxiety-related condition characterized by the recurrence of unwanted, intrusive and distressing thoughts. If left untreated, it can interfere with parenting, relationships and daily living.
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) President and CEO Bruce Stillman has been dissecting DNA replication, a critical step in cell division, since the 1980s. His lab studies how Origin Recognition Complexes--ORCs--coordinate DNA duplication. They discovered how our cells assemble and disassemble ORCs during the cell division cycle. One ORC protein is sequestered into small liquid droplets, keeping it apart until the right time to recruit other proteins and initiate DNA replication.
Philadelphia, March 23, 2021 - During the COVID-19 pandemic, Joseph S.
Domestication has a consistent effect on the gut microbiota of animals and is similar to the effects of industrialisation in human populations, with ecological differences such as diet having a strong influence.
These findings, published today in eLife, highlight how the flexibility of the gut microbiota can help animals respond to ecological change and could help identify ways of manipulating gut microbial communities in the service of health.
"Several countries, including the United Kingdom and Canada have stated that they will delay second doses of COVID-19 vaccines in response to supply shortages, but also in an attempt to rapidly increase the number of people immunized," explains Chadi Saad-Roy, a graduate student in the Departments of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology (EEB) and Quantitative and Computational Biology in the Lewis-Sigler Institute at Princeton and the lead author of the study.
Featured on the cover of the Soil Science Society of America Journal, researchers at the University of Maryland (UMD) and the Spanish National Research Council partnered to create a new camera allowing for the imaging of wetland soil activity in real time. This camera gives the classic IRIS (indicator of reduction in soils) technology a big upgrade. IRIS is used universally by researchers and soil assessors to determine if soils are behaving like wetland soils and should therefore be classified as such.
In a letter to The New England Journal of Medicine, published online March 23, 2021, a group of investigators from University of California San Diego School of Medicine and the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA report COVID-19 infection rates for a cohort of health care workers previously vaccinated for the novel coronavirus.
Over the past decades, the increased use of chemicals in many areas led to environmental pollution - of water, soil and also wildlife. In addition to plant protection substances and human and veterinary medical drugs, rodenticides have had toxic effects on wildlife. A new scientific investigation from scientists of the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW), the Julius Kühn Institute (JKI) and the German Environment Agency (Umweltbundesamt - UBA) demonstrate that these substances are widely found in liver tissues of birds of prey from Germany.
ITHACA, N.Y. - New research from Mildred Warner, professor of city and regional planning at Cornell University, shows that state laws designed to hinder union activity and indulge corporate entities do not enhance economic productivity.
California's restrictions on vehicle emissions have been so effective that in at least one urban area, Los Angeles, the most concerning source of dangerous aerosol pollution may well be trees and other green plants, according to a new study by University of California, Berkeley, chemists.
Aerosols -- particles of hydrocarbons referred to as PM2.5 because they are smaller than 2.5 microns in diameter and easily lodge in the lungs -- are proven to cause cardiovascular and respiratory problems.
When the human immunodeficiency virus infects cells, it can either exploit the cells to start making more copies of itself or remain dormant--a phenomenon called latency. Keeping these reservoirs latent is a challenge. A new paper, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, has found a way to look for chemicals that can keep the virus suppressed into its dormant state.
Boston - Wearing masks and physical distancing - two key infection prevention strategies implemented to stop the spread of COVID-19 - may have led to the dramatic decrease in rates of common respiratory viral infections, such as influenza. A study led by researchers at Boston Medical Center (BMC) showed an approximately 80 percent reduction in cases of influenza and other common viral respiratory infections when compared to similar time periods in previous years, before wearing masks, physical distancing, and school closures were implemented to help stop the spread of COVID-19.
While COVID-19 cases may be on the decline, the virus is still prevalent nationwide, and higher education institutions need to prepare for a successful 2021 academic year. New research from Clemson University in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, one of the world's premier peer-reviewed general medical journals, indicates how surveillance-based informative testing (SBIT) mitigates the spread of COVID-19 on campus, paving the way for other institutions, even those without the infrastructure or funding for mass-scale testing.
Amsterdam, NL, March 22, 2021 - The COVID-19 pandemic has had a profound impact on our world, with disequilibrium, uncertainty, and human suffering making it difficult to envision a human, societal and individual future. Milan Zeleny, PhD, Professor Emeritus of Management Systems, Fordham University, New York, NY, USA, and world-recognized authority on decision making, productivity, knowledge management, and more recently the corporation as a living organism, says that "COVID-19 is rapidly changing from a cause to one of the symptoms of an increasingly unhinged world."