Earth

Harsh prison sentences for juvenile crimes do not reduce the probability of conviction for violent crimes as an adult, and actually increase the propensity for conviction of drug-related crimes, finds a new study by economists at UC Riverside and the University of Louisiana. Harsh juvenile sentences do reduce the likelihood of conviction for property crimes as an adult. But the increase in drug-related crimes cancels out any benefit harsh sentences might offer, researchers found.

Since it was first introduced in 2016, transparent wood has been developed by researchers at KTH Royal Institute of Technology as an innovative structural material for building construction. It lets natural light through and can even store thermal energy.

The key to making wood into a transparent composite material is to strip out its lignin, the major light-absorbing component in wood. But the empty pores left behind by the absence of lignin need to be filled with something that restores the wood's strength and allows light to permeate.

Cancer has been recently shown to be affected by protein clusters, particularly by the aggregation of mutant variants of the tumor suppressor protein p53, which are present in more than half of malignant tumors. However, how the aggregates are formed is not yet fully understood. The understanding of this process is expected to provide new therapeutic tools able to prevent proteins to clump and cancer progression.

A team of University of Alberta researchers has discovered a way to use 3-D bioprinting technology to create custom-shaped cartilage for use in surgical procedures. The work aims to make it easier for surgeons to safely restore the features of skin cancer patients living with nasal cartilage defects after surgery.

Metallacages prepared via coordination-driven self-assembly have received extensive attention because of their three-dimensional layout and cavity-cored nature. The construction of light-emitting materials employing metallacages as a platform has also gained significant interest due to their good modularity in photophysical properties, which bring emerging applications in fields as diverse as sensing, biomedicine, and catalysis.

Spinning or rotating objects are commonplace, from toy tops, fidget spinners, and figure skaters to water circling a drain, tornadoes, and hurricanes.

In physics, there are two kinds of rotational motion: spin and orbital. Earth's motion in our solar system illustrates these; the daily 360-degree rotation of Earth around its own axis is spin rotation, while Earth's yearly trip around the sun is orbital rotation.

When investigators in the UK recorded the calls of migratory birds called thrushes at night, they found that call rates were up to five times higher over the brightest urban areas compared with darker villages.

The findings, which are published in Ibis, provide support to previous and ongoing research indicating that artificial light at night affects migratory birds.

BATON ROUGE, Louisiana - Stress levels of moms with preschoolers soared during the pandemic, with twice as many of the mothers reporting they lost sleep during the COVID-19 outbreak than before it.

DAVIS, CA, May 4, 2021 - In a randomized, controlled study* published online in the journal, Nutrients, researchers found that including mixed tree nuts in a weight management program resulted in significant weight loss and improved satiety.

Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University improved HIV care by gamifying it with a mobile gaming application.

Gaming features -- like those used to drive airline loyalty and track daily steps -- helped young men living with HIV achieve viral suppression and doubled their chances for reaching near perfect adherence to medication plans, according to a study in AIDS and Behavior.

Almost half of the parents who have children together with a parent with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder, are themselves burdened by psychological issues. This can affect family life and the children. This is shown in the research result from the major Danish psychiatry project iPSYCH.

Even under the most optimistic scenarios, most of the coral reef ecosystems on our planet - whether in Australia, the Maldives or the Caribbean - will have disappeared or be in very bad shape by the end of this century. That's because global warming is pushing ocean temperatures above the limit that single-cell algae, which are corals' main allies, can withstand. These algae live inside coral tissue for protection and, in exchange, provide corals with essential nutrients produced through photosynthesis.

What The Study Did: This study of registry patients evaluates whether any changes in the in-hospital COVID-19 mortality rates during the first nine months of the pandemic were associated with individual characteristics of patients with COVID-19.

Authors: Gregory A. Roth, M.D., M.P.H., of the University of Washington in Seattle, is the corresponding author.

To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/

What The Study Did: Households and not schools were the major route of transmission among children and youths with COVID-19 in Hong Kong, these study results suggest.

Authors: Mike Yat Wah Kwan, M.Sc., M.R.C.P.C.H., of the Princess Margaret in Hong Kong, and Patrick Ip, M.P.H., of the University of Hong Kong, are the corresponding authors.

To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/

(doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2021.8824)

What The Study Did: Changes in adolescents' use of e-cigarettes, cannabis and alcohol and in physical activity behaviors following the COVID-19 stay-at-home order in California are examined in this study.

Authors: Benjamin W. Chaffee, D.D.S., M.P.H., Ph.D., of the University of California, San Francisco, is the corresponding author.

To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/

(doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2021.0541)