Culture
Previous analyses of global paleobiodiversity have been coarsely resolved to roughly 10 million years, obscuring the effects of ecological processes and events that operate at shorter timescales. Now, by combining ancient marine fossils with modern machine learning and one of the world's most powerful supercomputers, researchers have composed a new record of Paleozoic biodiversity in which the age of average fossil layers can be resolved to within 26,000 years, the authors say.
Researchers who analyzed well-preserved ocean drilling and global temperature records have added support to the idea that the primary cause of the Cretaceous-Paleogene (K/Pg) mass extinction was an asteroid impact, rather than extreme volcanism. Their new study evaluates the impact of greenhouse outgassing by volcanism in the Deccan Traps on global temperature. According to their results, volcanic gasses may have played an important role in shaping the rise of different species after the extinction, rather than driving the initial event.
PITTSBURGH, Jan. 16, 2020 - Twice as many people as previously believed are dying of sepsis worldwide, according to an analysis published today in The Lancet and announced at the Critical Care Reviews annual meeting in Belfast. Among them are a disproportionately high number of children in poor areas.
The new study, led by scientists from the universities of Bristol and Essex and published today [16 January] in Current Biology, challenge the established view of the origin of plants on land, and reveal that compared to the origin of animals, plants are better at inventing new genes during periods of evolution.
Plants constitute one of the major lineages of life and are the basis of almost all ecosystems, being an important source of food and oxygen. During evolution, all organisms gain new genes, lose old ones, or simply recycle genes.
Genetically engineered mosquitoes are resistant to multiple types of dengue virus (DENV), according to a study published January 16 in the open-access journal PLOS Pathogens by Prasad Paradkar of the Australian Animal Health Laboratory, and Omar Akbari of the University of California, San Diego, and colleagues. As noted by the authors, this is the first engineered approach that targets all types of DENV, which is crucial for effective disease suppression.
Sailors' yarns about the Kraken, a giant sea-monster lurking in the abyss, may have an element of truth.
In 1857, the Danish naturalist Japetus Steenstrup linked the tell tales of ships being dragged to the ocean floor to the existence of the giant squid: A ten-armed invertebrate, that is credibly believed to grow up to 13 meters and weigh over 900 kg.
Now, more than 160 years later, an international team of scientists have sequenced and annotated the genome of a giant squid.
The enzyme Gemin3 was identified as the molecular 'bridge' between genes whose mutation or disruption causes amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), according to a new study in Nature's Scientific Reports from scientists at the University of Malta.
African swine fever (ASF) is one of the most pathogenic viral diseases in pigs caused by African swine fever virus (ASFV). The fatality rate is almost 100%, which brings huge economic losses to the hog industry in countries with epidemics. China was the first Asian country to have an ASF epidemic, and it spread quickly across the country after the first epidemic was reported in August 2018. After that, Mongolia, Vietnam, Cambodia and North Korea also reported on the ASF epidemic in succession.
Infections are a dreaded threat that can have fatal consequences after an operation, in the treatment of wounds, and during tissue engineering. Biomimetic hydrogels with "built-in" antimicrobial properties can significantly decrease this danger. In the journal Angewandte Chemie, scientists have now introduced a gel that is activated by red light to produce reactive oxygen compounds that effectively kill bacteria and fungi.
Whether a sick cell dies, divides, or travels through the body is regulated by a sophisticat-ed interplay of signal molecules and receptors on the cell membrane. One of the most im-portant molecular cues in the immune system is Tumour Necrosis Factor α (TNFα). Now, for the first time, researchers from Goethe University have visualised the molecular organ-isation of individual TNFα receptor molecules and the binding of TNFα to the cell mem-brane in cells using optical microscopy.
Cancer patients responded better to immunotherapy and had a better prognosis if their melanoma tumours contained specific clusters of B cells, according to new research from Lund University in Sweden. The study is published in Nature.
A team of physicists from McMaster University has developed a process to modify red blood cells so they can be used to distribute drugs throughout the body, which could specifically target infections or treat catastrophic diseases such as cancer or Alzheimer's.
The modified red blood cells are designed to circulate in the body for several weeks at a time, seeking out specific targets including bacteria, tumours or organs.
Amsterdam, NL, January 16, 2020 - The International Parkinson Disease Genomics Consortium (IPDGC) has now been in existence for ten years.
January 16, 2020 - A virtual system for in-home physical therapy (PT) provides good outcomes for patients undergoing rehabilitation following total knee arthroplasty (TKA) - with lower costs than traditional in-person PT, reports a study in the January 15, 2020 issue of The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery.
LEXINGTON, Ky. (Jan. 16, 2020) -- Current policies that include restrictions on the sale of menthol flavored tobacco and nicotine products are less likely to reach those that would benefit from them the most, according to new research from the University of Kentucky's College of Medicine published in Health Promotion Practice Jan. 7.