Culture
A new study exposes the fallacy of relying on pronunciation as a measure of linguistic proficiency. The study, 'Revisiting phonetic integration in bilingual borrowing', by Shana Poplack, Suzanne Robillard, Nathalie Dion (all from the University of Ottawa), and John. C. Paolillo (University of Indiana Bloomington) will be published in March 2020 issue of the scholarly journal Language.
New research shows that experiencing chronic job insecurity can change your personality for the worse.
The study, published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, found those exposed to job insecurity over more than four years became less emotionally stable, less agreeable, and less conscientious.
Report co-author Dr Lena Wang from RMIT University's School of Management said the study built on a growing evidence base about the negative consequences of job insecurity.
The latest image published February 20, 2020 from the international Gemini Observatory showcases the striking planetary nebula CVMP 1. This object is the result of the death throes of a giant star and is a glorious but relatively short-lived astronomical spectacle. As the progenitor star of this planetary nebula slowly cools, this celestial hourglass will run out of time and will slowly fade from view over many thousands of years.
University of Maryland School of Medicine's (UMSOM) Institute for Genome Sciences (IGS) researchers have created the first catalog of genes that comprise the community of microbes, which inhabit the human vagina. The catalog, called human vaginal non-redundant gene catalog (VIRGO), was recently released as a public resource that can be used by researchers to facilitate a more in-depth understanding of the role of vaginal microorganisms in women's health and to potentially develop future treatments for certain gynecologic conditions.
Paul Szyszka, Lecturer in the University of Otago's Department of Zoology, says "as alpha oscillations are associated with brain functions such as; attention, memory, and consciousness, bee brains may provide new avenues to understanding how our own brains work."
New Curtin University-led research has found that the smallest type of killer whale has 28 different complex calls, comprising a combination of burst-pulse sounds and whistles, which they use to communicate with family members about the changing landscape and habitat.
The research, published in Royal Society Open Science, analysed data collected in 2012 and 2013 to better understand the call repertoire of Ross Sea killer whales, also known as Type C, which are found in the McMurdo Sound in Antarctica.
Planetary scientists at Curtin University have shed some light on the tumultuous early days of the largely preserved protoplanet Asteroid 4 Vesta, the second largest asteroid in our Solar System.
Research lead Professor Fred Jourdan, from Curtin University's school of Earth and Planetary Sciences, said Vesta is of tremendous interest to scientists trying to understand more about what planets are made of, and how they evolved.
The size of neutrons cannot be measured directly: it can only be determined from experiments involving other particles. While such calculations have so far been made in a very indirect way using old measurements with heavy atoms, a team at the Institute of Theoretical Physics at Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) has taken a different approach. By combining their very accurate calculations with recent measurements on light nuclei, the researchers have arrived at a more direct methodology.
Quantum physics describes the inner world of individual atoms, a world very different from our everyday experience. One of the many strange yet fundamental aspects of quantum mechanics is the role of the observer - measuring the state of a quantum system causes it to change. Despite the importance of the measurement process within the theory, it still holds unanswered questions: Does a quantum state collapse instantly during a measurement? If not, how much time does the measurement process take and what is the quantum state of the system at any intermediate step?
Functional metrics in ecology -indicators based on the biological features of the organisms, in this case, water invertebrates- could help researchers to detect the impacts of human origins in temporary rivers, according to a new study carried out by experts from the Research Group Freshwater Ecology, Hydrology and Management (FEHM) of the Department of Evolutionary Biology, Ecology and Environmental Sciences of the Faculty of Biology of the University of Barcelona and the Biodiversity Research Institute (IRBio).
Imperial College London researchers have invented a new health tracking sensor for pets and people that monitors vital signs through fur or clothing.
The new type of sensor, which can detect vital signs like heart and breathing rates through fur and up to four layers of clothing, could help make everyday wearables for pets and livestock a reality.
They could help owners keep track of their pets' health, and help vets monitor animals during surgery without the need for shaving.
Dr. Won-chul Cho of Hydrogen Research Department of the Korea Institute of Energy Research (President Jong-nam Kim) has developed a separator membrane that significantly reduces gas crossover while exhibiting high performance comparable to the commercial separator for alkaline water electrolyzer. The research has been published in the International Journal of Energy Research, the world's leading authority on nuclear power energy.
A research team has described five new cases of a rare disease -known as KAT6A syndrome- of which there are only eighty dominant cases worldwide. This neurological and developmental disorder, caused by alterations in the lysine acetyltransferase 6A gene (KAT6A), involves intellectual disability, language impairment, low muscle tone, cardiovascular malformation and eye defects, among other affectations.
PDT does not always kill cells deep within a cancerous tumour, allowing tumours to grow back again.
The new compound uses penetrating infrared light to damage cells directly and potentially improve the success rate of PDT
Researchers at the University of Sheffield have synthesized a new compound which could improve the success rate of photodynamic therapy when treating cancer.
The group of Dr. Hana Cahová of the Institute of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry of the CAS, in collaboration with scientists from the Institute of Microbiology of the CAS, has discovered an entirely new class of dinucleoside polyphosphate 5'RNA caps in bacteria and described the function of alarmones and their mechanism of function. The discovery was recently published in the journal Nature Communications.