Новости за 17.02.2022

Elephant sharks offer a novel perspective on how humans evolved. A new study parses some previously unexplained reproductive differences.

A new study describes previously unexpected properties in a complex quantum material, findings that have implications for future quantum devices.

Researchers have uncovered a basic but surprising fact: your kitchen sponge is a better incubator for diverse bacterial communities than a laboratory Petri dish. But it's not just the trapped leftovers that make the cornucopia of microbes swarming around so happy and productive, it's the structure of the sponge itself.

Epidemiological data have long linked depression with Alzheimer’s disease (AD), a neurodegenerative disease characterized by progressive dementia that affects nearly 6 million Americans. Now, a new study identifies common genetic factors in both depression and AD. Importantly, the researchers found that depression played a causal role in AD development, and those with worse depression experienced a faster decline in memory.

Synthetic biologists have developed a low-cost, easy-to-use, hand-held device that can let users know -- within mere minutes -- if their water is safe to drink. The new device works by using powerful and programmable genetic networks, which mimic electronic circuits, to perform a range of logic functions.

Tunability in lenses typically requires bulky components, but researchers have created a metasurface lens that uses a piezoelectric thin film to change focal length when a small voltage is applied. The compact and lightweight lens could be useful for portable medical diagnostic instruments, drone-based 3D mapping and other applications where miniaturization can open new possibilities.

Certain types of bacteria are unable to survive and thrive outside host organisms. This makes their isolation and identification technically challenging. Recently, a researcher successfully isolated a new bacterial strain of the candidate bacterial group, Candidatus phylum Dependentiae, from a pond.

Acute myeloid leukemia, which affects blood and bone marrow cells, is a particularly dangerous form of cancer. More than half of patients under the age of 60 die. This proportion rises to 85% for patients over 60. A team has now identified a previously unknown mechanism that could lead to the development of new therapies. The selective activation of AMPK, a key enzyme in the energy balance of tumor cells, would indeed lead to their death by triggering the cells stress response. Moreover, the scientists... Читать дальше...

Whether nectar-sucking butterflies or blood-sucking mosquitoes - the ingestion of liquid food has long been known for many insects and other arthropods. A research team now shows that millipedes also use a sucking pump to ingest liquid food. A sucking pump has thus evolved independently in different groups of organisms over several 100 million years. In the process, astonishingly similar biomechanical solutions for ingesting liquid food have evolved in widely distant animal groups.

The combination of mathematical modeling and experiments identifies the difference in molecular clockworks of the master and slave clock neurons in Drosophila. This solves the long-standing mystery of the molecular mechanisms underlying how the circadian (~24h) clock can exhibit paradoxical characteristics of robustness (strong rhythms), and plasticity (flexible adaption).

Agility dogs lacking core strength from routine physical exercise may be more susceptible to one of the most common canine knee injuries, a cranial cruciate ligament rupture, which is similar to an ACL tear in humans. According to a research survey documenting activity and injury odds of more than 1,200 agility dogs, just about any physical exercise seems to lower the risk of rupturing the ligament, but some exercises seem to increase the risk. In addition, the size and shape of the dog -- and thereby... Читать дальше...

Advanced imaging technology has helped scientists confirm that the destruction of brain synapses underlies the cognitive deficits experienced by patients with Alzheimer's disease. For many years, scientists have assumed that the loss of connections between brain cells caused Alzheimer's-related symptoms, including memory loss, but actual evidence of the role of synaptic loss had been limited to a small number of brain biopsies and post-mortem brain exams conducted on patients with moderate or advanced disease. Читать дальше...

The time a person spends on different smartphone apps is enough to identify them from a larger group in more than one in three cases say researchers, who warn of the implications for security and privacy. They fed 4,680 days of app usage data into statistical models. Each of these days was paired with one of the 780 users, such that the models learnt people's daily app use patterns. The researchers then tested whether models could identify an individual when provided with only a single day of smartphone... Читать дальше...

Conducting a meta-analysis of 3,000 patients over 36 studies (carefully vetted from more than 1,200 studies in all), psychologists were able to find that specific exercise helps episodic memory -- 3 times a week for 4 months, with greater improvements among those who are age 55 to 68 years.

Researchers have discovered how certain flavonoids -- a type of metabolic product from plants and other organisms -- can kill yellow fever mosquito larvae. These compounds inhibit an enzyme, called Nobo, which is used to synthesize ecdysone, a key hormone in the life cycle of insects. The most efficient flavonoid tested, desmethylglycitein (DMG), could be used to make new types of insecticides to replace current ones, to which mosquitoes are becoming resistant.

Repetitive headers and accidental head impacts in soccer are leading to changes in blood patterns, linked to brain signalling pathways and potential alterations -- the latest study to assess potential dangers of heading in soccer shows.

Sickle cell anemia is an inherited blood disorder where red blood cells become sickle/crescent shaped. It causes frequent infections, swelling in the hands and legs, pain, severe tiredness and delayed growth or puberty. Treatment typically focuses on controlling symptoms and may include pain medicines during crises; hydroxyurea to reduce the number of pain episodes; antibiotics and vaccines to prevent bacterial infections and blood transfusions. While a remedy for this severe disease has remained elusive... Читать дальше...

A new study adds to a growing body of evidence that organoids -- lab-grown collections of cells that mimic a patient's tumor -- are a promising avenue for drug discovery to improve outcomes in patients with cancer, particularly rare cancers for which clinical data on drug effectiveness is often lacking.

There has been debate over the best treatment for a certain type of stroke caused by a blockage of a large artery in the brain. A new meta-analysis finds that people who have this kind of stroke who can be treated within four-and-a-half hours after their symptoms start may do better after their stroke when treated with both a clot-busting drug and physical clot removal, compared to physical removal only. Combining the two therapies, called bridging therapy, was linked to better chances of a person... Читать дальше...

A new study suggests that people with mild traumatic brain injuries may be more likely to have cognitive impairment, cognitive decline or both one year later, compared to people who were not injured. People with poor cognitive outcomes were also more likely to have other symptoms like anxiety and lower satisfaction with life.