Culture

CLEVELAND, Ohio (July 29, 2020)--For menopausal women who have difficulty sleeping, it might be because of chemicals in the environment. A new study based on data from the Midlife Women's Health Study suggests that exposure to various chemicals, such as phthalates, found in hundreds of products used daily, is associated with sleep disruptions in midlife women. Study results are published online today in Menopause, the journal of The North American Menopause Society (NAMS).

Up to 60% of women in the menopause transition experience sleep difficulties. Women who have trouble falling asleep are at greater risk of developing persistent depression that can lead to worse health outcomes, may require more medical care, and increase absenteeism.

Earlier studies have shown that such sleep disruption is the result of decreasing hormone levels. Exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), however, is one largely unexplored area that may help to explain the increased prevalence of sleep difficulties in midlife women. Phthalates are common EDCs that are found in industrial plasticizers and chemical stabilizers. Phthalates increase the performance of everything from food packaging and clothing to cosmetics and children's toys. Personal care products, in particular, represent a major area of exposure.

Although everyone is exposed to phthalates, they appear to concentrate more in women than men. A previous study suggested that increased exposure to phthalates from personal care products significantly increased the risk of hot flashes. Other studies have demonstrated associations between phthalate exposure and the likelihood of waking up at night, as well as the risk of suffering from depression.

Since phthalates are known to modulate the hormones associated with sleep and depression, researchers in this latest study surmised that they may be directly or indirectly associated with sleep in midlife women. This study, based on data gathered from more than 760 premenopausal and perimenopausal women, suggests that the frequency of sleep disruptions is associated with urinary concentrations of phthalates. It is the first known study to document this association. The relationship, however, appears complex, because other variables, such as smoking status, have been shown to influence the effect. More research is warranted to fully understand this association, as well as the underlying mechanisms of how hormones and EDC exposure influence sleep, particularly in midlife women.

Study results appear in the article "Associations of phthalate exposure and endogenous hormones with self-reported sleep disruptions: results from the Midlife Women's Health Study."

"This study raises concerns and additional questions about a possible contribution of phthalates to sleep disturbances in premenopausal and perimenopausal women. Additional research into these endocrine-disrupting chemicals and their interactions with hormones, sleep, and mood in midlife women is needed," says Dr. Stephanie Faubion, NAMS medical director.

Many living creatures live in soil. Though their sizes range from microscopic soil microbes to larger animals like gopher turtles, they all call soil their "home." Included in these ground-dwelling species are bees - vital in the pollination cycle of about 90% of plant life.

Rebecca Lybrand and her team at Oregon State University are studying the interaction between the bees and soil in agricultural settings.

According to the recently-published paper, bees contribute $15 billion to crop value annually. They pollinate about three-quarters of the fruits, vegetables, and nuts within the United States alone. Declines in honeybee colonies are a critical threat to agriculture and the global food supply.

"Growers who are interested in attracting alternative pollinators, such as wild bees, face a major challenge," says Lybrand. "There are not many studies about what habitats are best for these wild bees."

Pollinators are widely affected by human land use. Creating buildings, parking lots and other "anthropogenic changes" disrupt the natural habitats of animals and plants. Agricultural disturbance also affects bee communities. Interestingly, above-ground bee species are nine times more affected by agricultural intensification than ground-dwelling species.

In some cases, growers have been able to build "bee beds" in their farm setting. In the 1950s, they started to design moist, salty soil areas to attract ground-nesting bees that helped increase alfalfa yields in Washington state.

Lybrand's study looked at physical and chemical properties of soils collected from active bee and sand nest wasp sites in the Willamette Valley of western Oregon. They compared soil properties among seven farm sites to identify similarities and differences.

The Willamette Valley has wet winters with warm, hot summers. The team first found agricultural sites that contained ground-nesting bees. They collaborated with farmers who observed ground-nesting bee activity around their fields.

The nests are only identified by rather small holes (only 3-5mm). The team only collected data if they observed bees entering the nest. Nests and holes can remain even after the bees leave. At the study site, they specified the type of bee to the family level (i.e. "bee" versus "genus" and "species".) But they also collected some bees to bring back to the lab for further identification.

The data the team collected in the field included soil temperature, pH, and soil texture. They also collected soil samples to bring back to the lab for analysis.

Findings from the study included that active nesting sites were present in locations with little to no rock cover and low vegetation. Nesting sites were found in areas with low organic matter coverage. The slope of the land didn't seem to have any influence, nor did a north/south-facing aspect.

"One of our observations confirmed that active emergence holes remained open throughout the year," says Lybrand. "They didn't swell shut during the wetter, cooler seasons - despite having clay in the soils that might cause shrinking and swelling."

An interesting finding from the research is that the team found lipids in the soil nest linings. The lipids may provide a type of waterproofing for the nests and their inhabitants.

"Because the large majority of wild bee species nest in the soil, studies about how to best attract them to farms are important," says Lybrand. "Soil scientists and entomologists can partner with growers to identify soil habitats that support and attract more of these pollinators to agricultural lands. Improving our understanding of the connections between agriculture and the soils that bees, crops, and living organisms rely on to survive is important. Our research also provided a framework for studying ground-nesting organisms - an area of soil science that is underrepresented."

Looking to the future, Lybrand says, "future research should also integrate methods that identify bees and/or wasps to the species level. That would allow for interpretations of the results from an ecological point of view. Another question to follow up on could be the nature and purpose of the lipids found in the soil nest linings, to confirm their actual role."

Whether returning to a school building, online learning or a hybrid school environment, it is normal for children and adolescents to have some stress or anxiety about going back to school. This year, fears of getting sick, school safety protocols for COVID-19 or heightened tensions around racism may make the transition even more difficult.

"There are a range of mental health concerns that children can face in school from minor stressors such as nerves about an upcoming tests or dynamics in peer relationships, all the way to some of the common mental health disorders, such as learning disorders, ADHD, anxiety and depression," said Samanta Boddapati, PhD, child clinical psychologist and prevention coordinator at Big Lots Behavioral Health Services at Nationwide Children's Hospital. "A number of factors within the school environment can promote or hinder mental health and might influence how children react. For example, positive student relationships and strong social emotional programming within schools can promote mental health, whereas issues like bullying, or teasing and challenges with peer relationships might hinder mental wellness."

In a recent survey of school-aged parents conducted by Nationwide Children's, 2 out of 5 parents said that they had concerns about their child's social and emotional wellbeing as they head back to school. Concerns about transitioning back to school will be different depending on the age of a child.

Experts say very young children may have separation anxiety or general stress and concerns about being away from family and being in new environments with new people. For younger children who have a hard time saying goodbye, consider making a special goodbye part of your routine that you can do together, such as a special handshake or a statement that you and your child can make to one another, and remind your child when you might see each other again. Some small children also like a transitional object, like a small item that reminds them of a caregiver while they are separated and that they can "keep safe" while apart.

For older children who have been communicating with teachers primarily through online learning or social media, face-to-face communication might feel uncomfortable at first. As kids get older, they have more stress related to social access, bullying, and grades, but also other anxiety related to changes in the structure of their day.

"Maintaining a routine is important, especially for families who are continuing to do online learning full-time. Create a part of your child's day that is structured and a part of their day that has some flexibility," said Parker Huston, PhD, clinical director of On Our Sleeves® and pediatric psychologist for Big Lots Behavioral Health Services at Nationwide Children's.

Experts say no matter the age of your child, the best thing you can do to help your child's mental health as they go back to school this year is to start having conversations early and often. Additional tips for parents and caregivers from the behavioral health experts at Nationwide Children's include:

* Admit to your child there are a lot of unknowns, but that you are there to support them. Remind them of other adults in their life who are there to help them and that they can always talk to you and them.
* Discuss possible scenarios or fears with children, as well as talking through different options and alternatives. This can help increase children's flexibility, thinking and problem-solving abilities. Asking them what they are nervous about does not increase their anxious thinking so long as the conversation is focused on problem-solving.
* Model appropriate coping skills for children, showing kids how to respond to future unknowns and building resilience. For example, reach out to your own social support about your anxieties and use that as an example with your child of how you sought help and how they can do the same.
* Demystify some of the procedures that may be in place in schools such as mask-wearing and temperature checks by talking about them and practicing them at home. For example, wear masks for short times during the day at home while playing or reading to simulate what it will be like in school. Make sure they are compliant with having their temperature taken using an external thermometer as well.
* Reach out to your school to see what resources are available for your child, such as social-emotional programming or school counseling.

More free educational resources about supporting the mental health of your child as they transition back-to-school online or in-person can be found at OnOurSleeves.org. This blog post provides advice for helping kids get used to seeing and wearing masks. This blog post focuses on helping children with special needs during COVID-19.

"A certain amount of stress is normal, but parents, caregivers and educators should look out for drastic changes in functioning or behavior," said Dr. Huston. "Sleep changes, mood changes, inability to engage with social environments or friends, increased anxiety about things that they maybe weren't nervous about in the past are changes you want to talk to your child's pediatrician about."

Mountain gorillas that live in oversized groups may have to limit the number of strong social relationships they form, new research suggests.

Scientists from the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund (Fossey Fund) and University of Exeter identified up to seven categories of relationship between gorillas - ranging from close mother-offspring ties to "weak" associations.

Mountain gorillas usually live in groups of 12 to 20, and the study found the richest range of relationships in groups of this size.

When groups were smaller or larger - sometimes up to 65 gorillas - the scientists found less diversity of social relationships.

"It is often assumed that animals living in larger groups will have more diverse and complex social lives," said Dr Robin Morrison, of the Fossey Fund and Exeter's Centre for Research in Animal Behaviour.

"However, our study suggests that social diversity is lower in very large groups where gorillas must maintain a larger number of relationships - with most relationships falling into the weakest category.

"Strong social relationships still exist in the big groups, but they seem to make up a smaller proportion of the total relationships.

"We cannot say for certain why this is, but it may be that gorillas only have enough time and mental energy to maintain a certain number of relationships at a given strength.

"So they keep their key relationships and simply maintain weak ties with all the other gorillas in the group."

Dr Morrison added: "Living in a social group requires mental effort.

"Indeed, one of the big ideas in social evolution is that humans developed large brains and language to deal with social complexity."

The research team used 12 years of data on 13 gorilla groups monitored by the Fossey Fund in Volcanoes National Park, Rwanda.

Mountain gorilla numbers in the park have risen in recent years, which may explain why unusually large groups have formed.

The gorillas live in stable social groups, moving and feeding together in the day and nesting together at night.

The study used proximity data - how much time individuals spent close together - to measure social relationships.

"In many primates, social interaction can be measured by how much time individuals spend grooming each other," Dr Morrison said.

"However, gorillas spend less time grooming than most other primates.

"Instead, a lot of gorilla society is about who individuals choose to sit next to, and who they move away from."

The relationship categories identified by the scientists relate to different patterns of interaction revealed by the data.

These represent a scale of from close to weak associations, but the categories cannot be simply expressed in human terms such as best friends, close friends, etc.

Lauren Brent, Associate Professor at the University of Exeter, said: "Not only were groups above a certain size not more socially diverse, but individuals living in the same group had variable levels of social complexity - some gorillas had a greater diversity of social relationships than others.

"This adds to a rich body of evidence that shows that, whether you are a human, gorilla or another type of social animal, not everyone experiences their social world in the same way."

The researchers found that the diversity of social relationships experienced by individual gorillas varied by age and sex.

Both males and females experience a diverse range of relationships as youngsters, but this changes as they age.

While females maintain a relatively consistent diversity of relationships through adolescence and adulthood, this declines rapidly in males as they enter adolescence, reaching the lowest levels at around 14.

At this age, males show many characteristics of sexual maturity but are still several years from full sexual maturity.

This is also the period when males are most likely to decide whether to leave the group they were born into - so they may be socially distancing themselves in the lead up to this departure.

If they choose to remain, as roughly half do, they then gradually build up a diverse set of relationships through adulthood as they take on key social roles protecting the group and fathering and caring for offspring.

The research findings could be useful for gorilla conservation, including efforts to limit the spread of disease.

"By better understanding these social relationships, we can better understand how diseases would spread through these social groups," said Dr Tara Stoinski, President and CEO of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund and one of the study co-authors.

"This is really important right now for mountain gorillas because disease is one of the major threats to their conservation.

"They catch many of the same diseases as humans, including Ebola, and it's extremely likely they would also catch COVID-19 if they were exposed to it.

"Long-term monitoring and protection of endangered mountain gorillas is crucial, not only for their conservation but also for what we can learn from this intelligent and highly social species about how complex social behaviour, such as our own, has evolved."

Many reports illustrate that Coagulation factor XIIIa (FXIIIa) has diverse and crucial functions in thrombus for¬mation and stability. However, it is difficult to obtain large amounts of FXIII in the market. Therefore, obtaining large quantities of FXIIIa through genetic engineering technology is important for both clinical treatment and mechanism of protein expression.

The expression, purification and identification of recombinant human coagulation factor XIIIa in Pichia pastoris (a species of methylotrophic yeast) shows that it has biological activity, suggests a study conducted by a team of researchers at the Zhejiang Chinese Medical University led by Xu et al.

Recombinant pPICZαC-FXIIIa was expressed in Pichia pastoris, purified and then tested for biological activity by reacting it with plasma samples.

In this study, FXIIIa fragments in human placenta tissue was taken and inserted in an expression vector under the control of a yeast promoter for AOX1, which was constructed and expressed in Pichia pastoris (Figure 1). The findings suggest that the FXIIIa fragment of 2250 bp was inserted successfully into the pPICZαC vector. The expression and purification products about 83 kDa (the same molecular weight as human FXIIIa) were obtained, which solidified significantly when reacted with human plasma. The work shown that the expression and purification products were successful, with sufficient biological activity, which can be used as a candidate FXIIIa hemostatic agent in genetic engineering.

This study is significant as is reports an efficient expression system for the production of FXIIIa. This will not only facilitate further studies of FXIIIa, but also pave the way for possible large-scale production of biologically active FXIIIa. The researchers note that more work on recombinant FXIIIa production with higher purity and more activity would be investigated, to improve upon current results.

AURORA, Colo. (July 28, 2020) - Researchers at the University of Colorado School of Medicine have discovered a protein in fruit fly embryos, dubbed Marie Kondo, that destroys maternal proteins. Much like namesake, author and clutter consultant Marie Kondo, this gene removes unnecessary molecules, keeping embryos organized.

Fertilized egg cells are loaded with maternal molecules that control the earliest steps of embryonic development. A critical stage of development is when the embryo destroys these inherited molecules and begins to make its own. These molecules include proteins and messenger RNAs (which encode instructions for making proteins). Existing research had identified how messenger RNAs are destroyed, but how maternal proteins are discarded, however, has been unknown.

According to the study, published in the journal eLife, researchers discovered the presence of the Marie Kondo protein by screening ~150 possible enzymes using a trick where destruction of maternal proteins could be seen with fluorescent microscopy. After months of work, they identified the enzyme and gave it the name "Marie Kondo."

"Ordinarily, when we talk about getting rid of maternal gene products, we tend to focus on mRNA, or the coded information for making a protein," says Olivia Rissland, assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular genetics at the University of Colorado School of Medicine and study co-author. "However, we don't often talk about destruction of the proteins themselves. One implication of our study is that, during early stages of development, destruction of maternal proteins might be more tightly controlled than we had thought."

Rissland says this discovery opens the door to more research into embryonic protein destruction. "The reason why we started looking at these proteins is because they control RNA. Now, we want to see what other proteins are destroyed and how protein destruction affects early development, not just in fruit flies, but in other animals too."

RIVERSIDE, Calif. -- A pair of researchers at the University of California, Riverside, has used machine learning to understand what a chemical smells like -- a research breakthrough with potential applications in the food flavor and fragrance industries.

"We now can use artificial intelligence to predict how any chemical is going to smell to humans," said Anandasankar Ray, a professor of molecular, cell and systems biology, and the senior author of the study that appears in iScience. "Chemicals that are toxic or harsh in, say, flavors, cosmetics, or household products can be replaced with natural, softer, and safer chemicals."

Humans sense odors when some of their nearly 400 odorant receptors, or ORs, are activated in the nose. Each OR is activated by a unique set of chemicals; together, the large OR family can detect a vast chemical space. A key question in olfaction is how the receptors contribute to different perceptual qualities or percepts.

"We tried to model human olfactory percepts using chemical informatics and machine learning," Ray said. "The power of machine learning is that it is able to evaluate a large number of chemical features and learn what makes a chemical smell like, say, a lemon or a rose or something else. The machine learning algorithm can eventually predict how a new chemical will smell even though we may initially not know if it smells like a lemon or a rose."

According to Ray, digitizing predictions of how chemicals smell creates a new way of scientifically prioritizing what chemicals can be used in the food, flavor, and fragrance industries.

"It allows us to rapidly find chemicals that have a novel combination of smells," he said. "The technology can help us discover new chemicals that could replace existing ones that are becoming rare, for example, or which are very expensive. It gives us a vast palette of compounds that we can mix and match for any olfactory application. For example, you can now make a mosquito repellent that works on mosquitoes but is pleasant smelling to humans."

The researchers first developed a method for a computer to learn chemical features that activate known human odorant receptors. They then screened roughly half a million compounds for new ligands -- molecules that bind to receptors -- for 34 odorant receptors. Next, they focused on whether the algorithm that could estimate odorant receptor activity could also predict diverse perceptual qualities of odorants.

"Computers might help us better understand human perceptual coding, which appears, in part, to be based on combinations of differently activated ORs," said Joel Kowalewski, a student in the Neuroscience Graduate Program working with Ray and the first author of the research paper. "We used hundreds of chemicals that human volunteers previously evaluated, selected ORs that best predicted percepts on a portion of chemicals, and tested that these ORs were also predictive of new chemicals."

Ray and Kowalewski showed the activity of ORs successfully predicted 146 different percepts of chemicals. To their surprise, few rather than all ORs were needed to predict some of these percepts. Since they could not record activity from sensory neurons in humans, they tested this further in the fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster) and observed a similar result when predicting the fly's attraction or aversion to different odorants.

"If predictions are successful with less information, the task of decoding odor perception would then become easier for a computer," Kowalewski said.

Ray explained that many items available to consumers use volatile chemicals to make themselves appealing. About 80% of what is considered flavor in food actually stems from the odors that affect smell. Fragrances for perfuming cosmetics, cleaning products, and other household goods play an important role in consumer behavior.

"Our digital approach using machine learning could open up many opportunities in the food, flavor, and fragrance industries," he said. "We now have an unprecedented ability to find ligands and new flavors and fragrances. Using our computational approach, we can intelligently design volatile chemicals that smell desirable for use and also predict ligands for the 34 human ORs."

Rates of elevated psychological distress, including depression and anxiety symptoms, were found among Australian adults during the peak of the COVID-19 outbreak in Australia, according to a new study published July 28, 2020 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Jill Newby of the University of New South Wales at the Black Dog Institute, Sydney, Australia, and colleagues.

The acute and long-term mental health impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic are largely unknown. Research into previous pandemics has shown higher rates of illness fears, psychological distress, insomnia and other mental health problems in people with pre-existing mental illness, front-line health care workers, and survivors of the disease. Research into the mental health impacts of COVID-19 is needed to inform policy decisions, prevention efforts, treatment programs, and community support systems.

In the new study, researchers used an online survey, administered March 27 through April 7--now considered to be the peak of the COVID-19 outbreak in Australia--to examine mental health responses to the pandemic among 5070 Australian adults. The online questionnaire asked participants about their fears, behavioral responses to COVID-19, psychological distress, alcohol use, and physical activity. A similar survey had already been carried out among 2,174 Australians in early March, when cases in the country were still low.

The population included in the survey was not representative of the overall population; 70% had pre-existing mental health diagnoses, 86% were female, and 75% were Caucasian. Although few participants had contracted COVID-1019 (0.15%), more than one-quarter (25.9%) were very or extremely worried about contracting the virus and more than half (52.7%) were very or extremely worried about their family and friends. While the questionnaires could not be used to make any diagnoses, most participants reported that their mental health had worsened during the outbreak, with 55% saying it had worsened a little and 23% saying it had worsened a lot. Around half of all participants reported moderate to extreme loneliness and worry about their financial situation. Between 20.3 and 24.1% of people surveyed had been experiencing severe or extremely severe levels of depression, anxiety and stress over the week preceding their survey, and another 18 to 22% had moderate symptoms.

Newby says: "We wanted to provide a snapshot of the mental health of the general community during the COVID-19 outbreak and look into the impact of the enforcement of social distancing laws, in Australia." She adds, "We don't know what the long-term impacts of the pandemic will be, but these figures certainly show a negative impact on mental health in the short-term."

What The Study Did: The association of neighborhood race/ethnicity and poverty with COVID-19 infections and related deaths in urban U.S. counties are examined in this observational study.

Authors: Samrachana Adhikari, Ph.D., of the New York University Grossman School of Medicine in New York, 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/jamanetworkopen.2020.16938)

Editor's Note: The article contains funding/support disclosures. Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, and funding and support.

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While data and news reports show that Black and Hispanic communities are disproportionately affected by the 2019 Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) pandemic, the role that neighborhood income plays in COVID-19 deaths is less clear. New analyses by a team of researchers at NYU Grossman School of Medicine examine the interplay between race/ethnicity and income on COVID-19 cases and related deaths in 10 major U.S. cities. The researchers found that non-white counties had higher cumulative incidences and deaths compared to predominantly white counties--and this was true for both low-income and high-income communities.

The findings - recently published online in JAMA Network Open - suggest that racial disparities in COVID-19 cases and deaths exist beyond what can be explained by differences in poverty rates. The researchers found that even among communities with higher median income, predominantly non-white communities still bore a greater burden of the virus - almost three times the incidence and deaths - compared to neighborhoods that identified as majority white. Yet income also plays an important contributing role. Indeed, the starkest racial/ethnic contrast between majority non-white and predominantly white counties was found when restricted to low-income counties only, where residents from predominantly non-white communities died from COVID-19 at nine times the rate as those living in predominantly white counties.

"While we expected to see greater numbers of COVID-19 cases and deaths in predominantly non-white, low-income communities, we were surprised that this relationship still held even after we accounted for poverty rates," said Samrachana Adhikari, PhD, assistant professor, Department of Population Health, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, and lead author of the study. "Given our findings, we believe that structural racism may explain these racial disparities in number of cases and deaths noted in Black counties."

How the Study was Conducted

Using publicly available data from the 2018 U.S. Census Small Areas Income and Poverty Estimates program, the Centers for Disease Control, and state health departments, the researchers examined cumulative COVID-19 cases and deaths per 100,000 across 158 urban counties (accounting for 64 percent of confirmed COVID-19 cases) spanning 10 large U.S. cities: New York City, Boston, New Orleans, Detroit, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Miami, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Seattle. Using the census data, the team linked median income and proportion of non-white residents in each county and used statistical analysis to identify differences in cumulative incidents and death, and their association with neighborhood race/ethnicity and poverty levels. All data analyzed included COVID-19 cases and deaths observed through May 10, 2020.

"We have known for decades that racism kills. Racism is a public health issue which has been implicated in the racial gap in mortality and in health outcomes," says Gbenga Ogedegbe, MD, MPH, professor of Population Health and Medicine at NYU Langone and one of the study's co-authors.

"Because the differences in COVID-19 cases and mortality cannot be explained by poverty alone, our findings give credence to our hypothesis that structural racism underlies the disproportionately higher rates of COVID-19 infections and alarmingly high rates of deaths in predominantly Black communities. The fact that non-white residents died from the virus at higher rates than white residents in both wealthier and poorer communities should be a major alarm bell to policymakers at the national and local government levels, academic medical centers, and the country at large," says Ogedegbe.

One of the study's limitations, according to Adhikari, is that it covers only large metropolitan areas and that the data analyzed are aggregated at the county level. More granular data at the individual level, as well as a breakdown of residents by race and ethnicity, would provide greater insight into the drivers of this troubling association, as well as expose most affected neighborhoods in need of more robust public health interventions, says Adhikari.

Following a decade-long effort, scientists have mapped out the genome of an aphid-like pest capable of decimating vineyards. In so doing, they have discovered how it spreads -- and potentially how to stop it.

The research team's work on the genome was published this past week in a BMC Biology paper. In it, they identified nearly 3,000 genes enabling the insect, phylloxera, to colonize and feed on grape vines by creating what are essentially nutritionally enhanced tumors. The insects live in and feed off of the structures they create.

"In effect, phylloxera creates its own refrigerator on the plant that it can feed from whenever it wants," said Paul Nabity, an assistant professor of plant-insect ecology at UC Riverside. In addition to feeding the insects, these structures also protect them from attack by other parasites.

A heavy phylloxera infestation, as occurred in the Pacific Northwest last year, could cause grapevines to lose their leaves. If the infestation reaches the roots, the plants could die.

The tumor-like structures, known as galls, disrupt the vine's ability to move nutrients and feed itself. They also create wounds in roots that make grapevines more susceptible to fungi and other pathogens, ultimately killing the vines.

Claude Rispe from the French National Institute for Agriculture, Food, and Environment led the research team, while Nabity helped identify how phylloxera secrete molecules that can change the immune system of grapevines.

"These molecules alter the plant's defense systems and make it so that the plant doesn't know it's being attacked," Nabity said.

When phylloxera was accidentally introduced to Europe in the 1860s, it nearly brought French viticulture to an end, causing vines to weaken and die. French and American scientists collaborated on a solution that is still used today.

Native North American grapevines co-evolved with phylloxera and are now resistant to it. However, most of the grapes we eat and drink are European varieties. As a result, growers have to graft North American roots onto their European grapevines to give them tolerance to this insect.

Though phylloxera are considered negative, not all of their effects on plants are necessarily bad. When they feed on plants and start creating gall structures, they change the cells in the leaf surface. Protective cells on the leaves become tiny pores called stomata, which allow movement of gases in and out of the cells.

"We think this is a means to reduce the negative impact on its host," Nabity said. "Stomata can create carbon gains for plants that can offset how much the insects are taking from it."

Now that the genes involved in the attack on non-native grapes have been identified, it may be possible to engineer phylloxera-resistant grapevines.

"Growers currently have to graft roots to make their plants viable," Nabity said. "A lot of money and effort could be saved with pest-resistant rootstocks."

In most organisms, small bits of RNA play a key role in gene regulation by silencing gene expression. They do this by targeting and docking onto complementary sequences of gene transcripts (also RNA molecules), which stops the cell machinery from using them to make proteins. This mechanism is called RNA interference (RNAi), and it is critically important in biology.

Remarkably, the RNAi phenomenon is not necessarily confined to single cells; it can also manifest in other tissues and organs far away from the cell of origin. Researchers have been able to observe it mostly in plants, but also in "lower" animals such as the nematode worm C. elegans.

Proteins and DNA ruled out

Still, one key question had so far gone unanswered: which messenger substance traverses cells and tissues? "We were able to rule out proteins 20 years ago, once it was discovered that RNAi can travel in plants," says Olivier Voinnet, Professor of RNA Biology at ETH Zurich. RNAi requires that the messenger docks to a complementary sequence of the gene transcript to be silenced. "Proteins alone don't have this capability. DNA leaving the cell nucleus is also unlikely," Voinnet continues. "The most likely candidate has always been an RNA molecule." What has been unclear until now is which precise type and form of RNA - long, short, single-? or double-?stranded, bound to proteins or not.

Double-?stranded fragments travel far and wide

But now, the ETH researchers are shedding light on this process in a new study. They are the first to demonstrate unequivocally that these distant messengers in plants are short double?stranded RNA molecules. These consist of pairs (or double-?strands) of just 21 to 24 nucleotides (the building blocks of RNA) called small interfering RNAs, or siRNAs for short.  The team's paper was recently published in the journal Nature Plants.

siRNAs usually emerge as large and complex populations from the genomes of viruses that have infected a cell. But a cell's own genes can also serve as blueprints for these molecules. As a result, cells can use RNAi to silence not only invading viruses but also their own genes.

Because RNAi moves, plants have the amazing capacity to modulate gene expression at a distance. This might be particularly important for them to constantly adapt their new growth, enabling what is called "phenotypic plasticity".

To move or not to move

In their new study, the researchers ruled out the possibility that other types of nucleic acids or complexes composed of RNA and proteins move across plant cells. "We can definitively show that double?stranded siRNAs are necessary and sufficient to induce RNAi in distant cells and tissues of plants," Voinnet says.

Not only did the ETH researchers identify the elusive long-?distance messengers, they also show, in their study, how siRNAs move and carry out their function. They found that, as long as an siRNA molecule exists as a free double-?strand, it is mobile because it cannot bind to a matching RNA transcript. To bind, it first has to be "uploaded" to a specific Argonaute (AGO) effector protein. Only once bound to the correct AGO protein can the siRNA silence the target transcript; the process eventually destroys the fragment itself. The model plant used for the study has ten different AGO proteins, several of which recognise matching siRNA fragments with specific signatures; these signatures are not homogeneous among the large cohorts of mobile siRNAs produced from viruses or the plant's own genes.

AGO proteins determine siRNA movement patterns

Different AGO proteins occur in distinct cells and tissues. The ETH researchers found that as part of the uploading process, matching AGO proteins "consume" a fraction of siRNAs in the cell of origin, but the non-?loaded fraction can exit the cell.

Depending on the presence or absence of certain AGO proteins within the cells traversed by the mobile siRNAs, the molecules, again, will be consumed or not. For example, if there are a plethora of AGO proteins on hand, they will trap plenty of siRNAs with various signatures, essentially stopping movement. If a cell contains hardly any AGO, on the other hand, then most siRNAs will leave and travel greater distances. And finally, if a cell contains large quantities of only one specific AGO, then only those siRNAs with the matching signature will be consumed, while the others will move. In other words, siRNAs are selectively filtered and consumed as they make their way through the plant tissue.

Until now, the plant RNAi community had thought that RNAi moves along linear gradients. However, this does not take into account that AGO proteins selectively use up some siRNAs - but not others - as they move. The new study points out that this consumption process is, in fact, anything but linear.

Countless movement patterns

"The amount and diversity of AGO proteins in traversed cells coupled to the siRNA-?intrinsic signatures function together as a kind of molecular sieve, the form of which may differ from cell type to cell type along the siRNA path. Depending on the spatial configuration of this sieve, a wide variety of siRNA movement patterns can be produced," Voinnet explains. He adds: "Even more interestingly, some AGOs can be induced by stress or developmental signals such that the spatial shape of the sieve can change and evolve at any given time".

The countless movement patterns thus lend the mobile RNAi system almost boundless flexibility and versatility in shaping gene expression across distances. Now that they have understood the process, the team of researchers is trying to engineer artificial sieves in plants as a way to control, with high precision, when and where specific siRNAs can move, a method which could have applications in agriculture. 

The huge task of phasing out coal requires a detailed roadmap to sequence coal plant retirement with a range of policy instruments and support for key stakeholders which will expand current notions of a just transition, leading energy experts have said.

Governments should be prepared to pay billions of pounds to operators of coal-fired power plants in agreements to shut down their plants early, a new paper published in Nature Climate Change today recommends.

The paper recommends extensive compensation should also be considered for regional economies hardest hit by the loss of coal producers and energy-intensive industries that will have to absorb higher energy prices in order to ensure a just transition to greener energy production.

To prevent regions such as the coal belt in the United States or dependent communities in Germany and Poland being abandoned after coal, the study recommends governments should foot the bill for extensive improvements to localised transport and communication infrastructure, higher education provision, new business opportunities and the relocation of government services.

And to shield the poor from electricity price rises resulting from replacing coal plants with more costly alternative power generation, governments and regulators should consider Just Transition measures including adjusting electricity tariffs, investing in community benefit funds or subsidizing energy efficiency through weatherization and retrofits programmes targeted at the most in need or vulnerable.

Benjamin K Sovacool, Professor of Energy Policy in the Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU) at the University of Sussex Business School, said: "Paying billions to some of the world's biggest polluters to avert a climate catastrophe they helped to create may sound unpalatable to some environmentalists

"But compensating the biggest losers from coal phase-out, alongside improving equity and accountability processes, will go a long way towards achieving all the other aspects of a just energy transition including legitimacy, desirability, speed of transition and financing.

"Simply put: a just transition requires more than just safeguarding jobs, and involves protecting the resilience of entire communities across both high-carbon as well as low-carbon energy pathways."

In the new paper published today, 13 energy experts led by Michael Jakob and Jan Christoph Steckel from the Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change (MCC) in Berlin outline that while the power sector must stop using coal without carbon capture-and-storage within 30 years, coal combustion currently accounts for 40% of global CO2 emissions from energy and coal use with growing demand in China, India and other Asian countries.

To quicken the rate of coal phase-out to meet the Paris Agreement timelines, the study authors recommend governments remove all coal subsidies immediately to create a level playing field for clean energy sources.

Dr Steckel said: "In my view, the novel twist we give to the debate is that we need to think of "who's losing" beyond a "particular group", "get them paid", and we also propose how this could be financed via a tax on carbon."

And policymakers and legislators should also consider imposing additional carbon costs on coal plants to accelerate phase-out and raise funds in support of affected workers, communities and consumers, the academics recommend.

Dr Jakob, lead author of the study, said: "Coal phase-out can only succeed if it takes into account social objectives and priorities. It is crucial that the modalities of coal phase-out are seen as fair and that the process corresponds to political realities. Policymakers need to understand in more detail who will be affected by a transition away from coal, how these societal groups can be effectively compensated and how powerful vested interests can be counterbalanced."

Coal phase-out is also likely to affect the competitiveness of other industries such as steel, aluminium, chemicals, and other important components of industrial strategy, the study warns.

To counter the risk of carbon leakage through the migration of energy-intensive industries to regions with laxer climate measures, policymakers should consider a range of measures including carbon contracts for difference or mechanisms of technology transfer .

Co-author Professor Frank Jotzo, from the Australian National University's Crawford School of Public Policy and Director of the Centre for Climate Economics and Policy at ANU, said: "What is needed in the transition away from coal is a clear way forward for regional economies and communities, creating prospects for new jobs and business opportunities, while limiting adverse impacts on consumers and energy-intensive industries."

Coronavirus tracing applications for the detection of infection chains are currently being developed and made available across the world. Such contact-tracing apps are a central component of national strategies for relaxing restrictions. However, for these apps to be successful, they must be widely accepted and ac-tively used by a large proportion of the population. An international research team led by the University of Göttingen has investigated how decision-makers can use app designs to achieve mass acceptance. The results of the study have been published in the European Journal of Information Systems.

The study focuses on three particular aspects that also play a prominent role in public debate. How should privacy be respected? What inconveniences are acceptable? And who benefits from using the app? In order to find answers to these questions, the research team designed various coronavirus tracing apps. The ac-ceptance of the various app designs was then examined in an experimental study. The results show that these aspects are weighted differently within the population. For example, while privacy is important for people who are critics of such an application as well as for those who are undecided about it, convenience, which is optimized for example through low battery consumption or by being user-friendly, seems to be particularly important for those who are undecided.

"The key challenge in developing an application for contact-tracing, compared to the other apps we use every day, resides less in the implementation of the core technical functionalities," explains Dr Simon Trang, Assistant Professor for Information Security and Compliance at the University of Göttingen and first author of the study, "the main concern must rather be to present an app that is accepted by the broad, heteroge-neous mass of the population. If this proves unsuccessful, the entire project will fail. Mass acceptance thus becomes the main design requirement for decision-makers in this new class of mobile apps". Co-author Dr Manuel Trenz, Professor for Interorganizational Information Systems at the University of Göttingen, adds: "The decision makers therefore have to ask themselves which specific part of the population still needs to be convinced in order to achieve mass acceptance and make the app a success. And then one should fo-cus on those aspects that we have identified as particularly important for these groups."

It seems crucial to communicate the beneficial outcomes of the app in a certain way. Arguments that focus on the benefits to society convince the critics and undecided (for example: "Protect the population"), while highlighting benefits to the individual (for example: "Protect yourself") can be ineffective or even counter-productive. "Surprisingly, we also find this negative effect when both benefits are communicated together," reports co-author Dr Welf Weiger, Assistant Professor of Digital Marketing at the University of Göttingen and Alfaisal University. The researchers therefore recommend a clearly focused communication strategy that emphasizes the benefits of contact-tracing apps to society - as opposed to what many countries are cur-rently doing.

Professor Monideepa Tarafdar from Lancaster University Management School and one of the authors of the new study said: "More than half of the population must install and actively use the app in order for it to be effective and for lockdown to be lifted safely. In light of the urgency of the situation, and the fact the gov-ernment will roll it out voluntarily, getting a true understanding of how to get the masses to accept - and crucially, use - one single app, is the most important consideration for developers. Our study reveals that one app simply cannot fit all - so the government needs to understand what the majority of us think about the system in order for it to be successful."

"Our results provide an explanation for the failure of existing contact-tracing apps such as those in France and Norway. At the same time, the results provide decision-makers in countries where these apps are still being developed with important insights into key considerations for designing these applications to contrib-ute effectively to the containment of the Covid-19 pandemic and the return to normal life," concludes Trang.

In addition to the medical and economic crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic has also affected many people's subjective well-being. This is the result of a long-term study by psychologists from Leipzig University and Saint Louis University with 979 people from all over Germany. The study examined changes in subjective well-being between December 2019 and May 2020. This study, led by organizational psychologists Hannes Zacher and Cort W. Rudolph, found that between March and May 2020 - in the early stage of the pandemic - average life satisfaction and the experience of positive feelings decreased significantly, on average around 0.2 points each on a seven-point scale. Surprisingly, there was also a slight decrease in the experience of negative feelings such as anger and fear during this phase. The researchers have just published the results of their study in the renowned scientific journal American Psychologist.

In the investigation, subjective well-being was defined and measured as high levels of life satisfaction and the frequent experience of positive feelings such as joy, as well as the rare experience of negative feelings such as anger or fear. The personal assessment of the pandemic, for example as a threat or a challenge, as well as various functional and dysfunctional coping strategies such as problem solving or alcohol consumption were examined as factors influencing subjective well-being during the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic.

While the scientists found no evidence for changes in subjective well-being when surveying people in the period before the COVID-19 pandemic, between December 2019 and March 2020, this changed significantly in the weeks afterwards due to the crisis. People who rated the pandemic as a challenge and the consequences of the pandemic as controllable generally showed a higher level of subjective well-being. In addition, people reported higher subjective well-being when they actively solved problems, focused on the positive aspects of the crisis and received social support. On the other hand, those who perceived the crisis as a threat, denied it, or blamed themselves for the consequences of the crisis felt less well. The same was true for people who tried to cope with the crisis with alcohol or drugs.

"Psychologists can take advantage of the results by helping to improve their clients' general skills in making constructive assessments in times of crisis and using successful coping strategies," says Zacher. The Volkswagen Foundation is funding the continuation of the long-term study over the next 18 months with €50,000. The study will examine how the COVID-19 pandemic affects changes in the world of work, such as acceptance of the home office, virtual teamwork, and job insecurity, as well as the development of physical and mental health.