Culture
How hot is the Universe today? How hot was it before? A new study by an international team of researchers, including members of the Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe (Kavli IPMU), suggests that the mean temperature of gas in large structures of the Universe has increased about 3 times in the last 8 billion years, to reach about two million Kelvin today.
Researchers from the University of Helsinki, Finland, examined 48 Staffordshire Bull Terriers, of which eight dogs - four healthy and four atopic - were selected for RNA sequencing where their skin gene expression was compared between both atopic and healthy dogs as well as between dogs that ate dry food or raw food.
The diet appears to make a great difference in skin gene expression.
Algorithms have shown that the compositional structure of Western landscape paintings changed "suspiciously" smoothly between 1500 and 2000 AD, potentially indicating a selection bias by art curators or in art historical literature, physicists from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) and colleagues report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
An international team led by the University of Geneva (UNIGE) has studied which types of forest, in terms of biodiversity, are the most effective in storing carbon. Inventory data from natural forests on five continents show that species diversity is optimal for equatorial and tropical rainforests, and that, conversely, in forests located in cold or dry regions, it is the abundance of trees and not their diversity that favours the recapture of CO2.
Kyoto, Japan -- Scanning lasers -- from barcode scanners at the supermarket to cameras on newer smartphones -- are an indispensable part of our daily lives, relying on lasers and detectors for pinpoint precision.
Distance and object recognition using LiDAR -- a portmanteau of light and radar -- is becoming increasingly common: reflected laser beams record the surrounding environment, providing crucial data for autonomous cars, agricultural machines, and factory robots.
New Rochelle, NY, November 12, 2020--Future human missions to Mars depend on field research in an environment similar to that of Mars. It will enable the evaluation of operational concepts and optimization of strategies. The goals and results of the AMADEE-18 Mars analog mission are detailed in a special collection of articles in the peer-reviewed journal Astrobiology. Click here to read the articles now.
Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia. Still incurable, it directly affects nearly one million people in Europe, and indirectly millions of family members as well as society as a whole. In recent years, the scientific community has suspected that the gut microbiota plays a role in the development of the disease.
A team of immunology experts from research organisations in Belgium and the UK have come together to apply their pioneering research methods to put individuals' COVID-19 response under the microscope. Published today in the journal Clinical and Translational Immunology, their research adds to the developing picture of the immune system response and our understanding of the immunological features associated with the development of severe and life-threatening disease following COVID-19.
New Rochelle, NY, November 11, 2020--New data highlight safety concerns for the replication of recombinant adeno-associated viral (rAAV) vectors commonly used in gene therapy. These findings, which emphasize the need for mobilization resistant AAV vectors, are reported in the peer-reviewed journal Human Gene Therapy. Click here to read the full-text article free through December 11, 2020.
The risk of rAAV mobilization has been underappreciated in the AAV research community.
According to the Centers for Disease Research, 1 in 54 children is diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) each year, and the number has been rising. The disease causes perplexing, lifelong developmental disabilities, which usually arise during early childhood and affect social skills, communication, personal relationships, and self-control.
In new research appearing in the journal mSphere, Rosa Krajmalnik-Brown, James Adams and their colleagues highlight the crucial importance of bacterial microbes in the human gut for the diagnosis and treatment of ASD.
WASHINGTON (Nov. 13, 2020) -- Researchers at Georgetown University Medical Center have successfully used molecules comprised of small strands of RNA to shut down the production of destructive proteins generated by the COVID-19 virus. Additionally, the researchers are working to aerosolize the RNA molecules so that they could be incorporated in an inhalable drug that would mitigate viral chaos.
While COVID-19 infected patients should be treated with standard anticoagulation therapies, such as blood thinning medication, a new study by researchers at the George Washington University (GW) shows that anticoagulating patients at higher doses, without traditional medical indications to do so, may be ineffective and even harmful. The study was published in the journal Thrombosis Research.
A new saliva-based test developed by a team at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health has been found to accurately detect the presence of antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, from small samples of saliva, according to a study led by Bloomberg School researchers. Such tests, the results of which can be obtained in a matter of hours, are seen as potential alternatives to blood-sample antibody tests for research and clinical use.
Two independent clinical studies – one by researchers at the Center for Cell-Based Therapy (CTC) in Ribeirão Preto, state of São Paulo (Brazil), on the monoclonal antibody eculizumab, and the other by scientists at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia (USA) on an experimental drug called AMY-101 – observed a significant anti-inflammatory effect that contributed to a faster recovery by severe COVID-19 patients.
New Rochelle, NY, November 13, 2020--Patients are seeking plastic surgery in record numbers, citing their appearance on Zoom as a cause. Of particular concern are noses and wrinkles, according to Facial Plastic Surgery & Aesthetic Medicine. Click here to read the article now.