Tech
NEW YORK -- In a scientific first, Columbia neuroengineers have created a system that translates thought into intelligible, recognizable speech. By monitoring someone's brain activity, the technology can reconstruct the words a person hears with unprecedented clarity. This breakthrough, which harnesses the power of speech synthesizers and artificial intelligence, could lead to new ways for computers to communicate directly with the brain.
The exceptional climate-altering capabilities of cattle are mainly due to methane, which they blast into the atmosphere during their daily digestive routine. Cattle urine is a lesser-known climate offender. It produces nitrous oxide (N2O), which has warming power far greater than that of carbon dioxide (CO2), the main driver of global warming. A study conducted by the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) and partners shows that these N2O emissions can be significantly curbed by healthy cattle pastures.
Binge and heavy drinking may trigger a long-lasting genetic change, resulting in an even greater craving for alcohol, according to a Rutgers-led study in the journal Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.
Total release foggers, commonly known as "bug bombs," are ineffective at removing cockroaches from indoor environments, according to a new study from North Carolina State University.
Bug-bomb chemicals fail to reach places where cockroaches congregate the most - on the underside of surfaces and inside cabinets, NC State researchers say. Besides leaving behind numerous cockroaches, bug bombs also leave behind nasty toxic residue in the middle of floors and countertops, areas cockroaches generally avoid but which are heavily used by humans and pets.
Inmates want to quit smoking but don't have access to smoking cessation programs in state prisons, increasing the risk - especially among black male inmates -- of cancer, heart disease, stroke and other smoking-related diseases, according to Rutgers researchers.
BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Surgery to remove the thymus gland in patients with myasthenia gravis (MG), a rare autoimmune disease affecting neuromuscular function, provides significant clinical benefits for as long as five years after the procedure, according to a paper published on Jan. 25 in The Lancet Neurology.
NEW YORK, January 24, 2019 - Solar rays are a plentiful, clean source of energy that is becoming increasingly important as the world works to shift away from power sources that contribute to global warming. But current methods of harvesting solar charges are expensive and inefficient--with a theoretical efficiency limit of 33 percent. New nanomaterials developed by researchers at the Advanced Science Research Center (ASRC) at The Graduate Center of The City University of New York (CUNY) could provide a pathway to more efficient and potentially affordable harvesting of solar energy.
Popular music has changed over the years, and the music of 2019 is noticeably different from the music of the 1960s or 1970s. But it is not just the music that changed, but also the lyrics. Data scientists at Lawrence Technological University in Michigan used quantitative analytics to study the change in lyrics of popular music over seven decades, from the 1950s to 2016. The results showed that the expression of anger and sadness in popular music has increased gradually over time, while the expression of joy has declined.
Russian scientists have developed a new method for synthesizing para-carboxyplenylsiloxanes, a unique class of organosilicon compounds. The resulting compounds are promising for creating self-healing, electrically conductive, heat- and frost-resistant silicones.
A team of scientists from I.M. Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University (MSMU) discovered that earthworms efficiently process rice straw and enrich the soil with organic matter increasing its fertility and preventing the burning of the straw that takes quite long to naturally decompose. The results of the study were published in the European Journal of Soil Biology. The work was supported with a grant of the Russian Science Foundation.
New Rochelle, NY, January 23, 2019--A new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) study found that smoking in the three months prior to assisted reproductive technology (ART) treatment was associated with higher adjusted odds of cycle cancellation resulting in no embryo transfer and cancellations before fresh oocyte retrieval or frozen embryo transfer. Associations between smoking and selected ART clinical outcomes are described in an article published in Journal of Women's Health, a peer-reviewed publication from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers.
Researchers from Higher School of Economics analyzed 62 million public posts on the most popular Russian social networking site VK and found that both men and women mention sons more often than daughters. They also found that posts featuring sons receive 1.5 times more likes. The results have been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.
A new study has revealed first-time mothers who give birth via unplanned caesarean section are 15% more likely to experience postnatal depression.
The author of the study is calling for more mental health support for women whose babies are delivered via emergency caesarean section, or C-section - a surgical procedure usually carried out because of complications during labour.
The major new study, from the University of York, provides new evidence that emergency C-sections put new mothers at greater risk of experiencing mental health problems after giving birth.
Designating relatively small parcels of land as protected areas for wildlife with no habitat management -- which has frequently been done in urban-suburban locales around the world -- likely does not benefit declining songbird species, according to a team of researchers who studied a long-protected northeastern virgin forest plot.
While coral reefs worldwide are suffering severe damage due to global warming and ocean acidification, there is one place in the world where they are surviving these harsh conditions - the Gulf of Aqaba in the Red Sea.