147 articles from FRIDAY 30.8.2019

New plan targets salmon-eating sea lions in Columbia River

More than 1,100 sea lions could be killed annually along a stretch of the Columbia River on the Oregon-Washington border to boost faltering populations of salmon and steelhead, federal officials said Friday. The National Marine Fisheries Service said it's taking public comments through Oct. 29 on the plan requested by Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Native American tribes. "The changes in the...

Hurricane puts 10 million in the crosshairs in Florida

An increasingly alarming Hurricane Dorian menaced a corridor of some 10 million people—and put Walt Disney World and President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in the crosshairs—as it steamed toward Florida on Friday with the potential to become the most powerful storm to hit the state's east coast in nearly 30 years.

NASA satellites on-hand as Dorian becomes a category 3 hurricane

As Hurricane Dorian was upgraded to a Category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale, NASA's fleet of satellites were gathering data during the day to assist weather forecasters and scientists. At 2:00 pm EDT the National Hurricane Center (NHC) posted a supplemental advisory. NHC reports that "extremely dangerous Hurricane Dorian poses a significant threat to Florida and the...

Swedish teen climate activist leads protest near UN

Teen climate activist Greta Thunberg drew crowds on land Friday after her two-week sail across the Atlantic as the 16-year-old Swede led a protest march in front of the United Nations. Hundreds of activists, many of them teenagers, surrounded her outside U.N. headquarters, chanting, "Fossil lobbyists have got to go" and, "It's too hot!" — referriang to global warming. It was the New York...

Early start of 20th century arctic sea ice decline

Boulder, Colo., USA: Arctic sea-ice has decreased rapidly during the last decades in concert with substantial global surface warming. Both have happened much faster than predicted by climate models, and observed Arctic warming is much stronger than the global average. Projections suggest that Arctic summer sea-ice may virtually disappear within the course of the next fifty or even thirty years.

Moving faster in a crowd

Cell particles move more quickly through a crowded cellular environment when the crowding molecules are non-uniformly distributed. New research also shows that particle transport in crowded cells can actually be faster than movement in a non-crowded environment as long as the particles are moving from densely crowded areas to less crowded areas. Understanding the rate at which particles move in...

Climate activist Thunberg joins hundreds of teens at UN protest

Swedish climate change campaigner Greta Thunberg joined hundreds of other teenagers protesting outside the United Nations Friday in her first demonstration on US soil since arriving by zero-carbon yacht. Thunberg, 16, has spurred teenagers and students around the world to gather every Friday under the rallying cry "Fridays for future" to call on adults to act now to save the planet. "Stop...

How to simulate softness

What factors affect how human touch perceives softness, like the feel of pressing your fingertip against a marshmallow, a piece of clay or a rubber ball? By exploring this question in detail, researchers discovered clever tricks to design materials that replicate different levels of perceived softness. The findings provide fundamental insights into designing tactile materials and haptic interfaces...

Discovery paves the way for earlier detection of type 1 disease

Scientists have discovered what may be the earliest possible biological marker of type 1 diabetes, formerly known as juvenile type 1 diabetes. If their mouse study can be replicated in humans, which they are now attempting to do, the timing of therapeutic intervention may be drastically improved for patients who are on course to develop the disease.

Oxygen depletion in ancient oceans caused major mass extinction

For years, scientists struggled to connect a mechanism to this mass extinction, one of the 10 most dramatic ever recorded in Earth's history. Now, researchers have confirmed that this event, referred to by scientists as the Lau/Kozlowskii extinction, was triggered by an all-too-familiar culprit: rapid and widespread depletion of oxygen in the global oceans.

Evidence for past high-level sea rise

Scientists, studying evidence preserved in speleothems in a coastal cave, illustrate that more than three million years ago -- a time in which the Earth was two to three degrees Celsius warmer than the pre-industrial era -- sea level was as much as 16 meters higher than the present day.

Early start of 20th century Arctic sea ice decline

Arctic sea-ice has decreased rapidly during the last decades in concert with substantial global surface warming. Both have happened much faster than predicted by climate models, and observed Arctic warming is much stronger than the global average. Projections suggest that Arctic summer sea-ice may virtually disappear within the course of the next fifty or even thirty years.

Storage and release of mechanical waves without energy loss

A new discovery could allow light and sound waves to be stored intact for an indefinite period of time and then direct it toward a desired location on demand. Such a development would greatly facilitate the ability to manipulate waves for a variety of desired uses, including energy harvesting, quantum computing, structural-integrity monitoring, information storage, and more.

New radiomics model uses immunohistochemistry to predict thyroid nodules

Researchers have validated a first-of-its-kind machine learning-based model to evaluate immunohistochemical characteristics in patients with suspected thyroid nodules, achieving 'excellent performance' for individualized noninvasive prediction of the presence of cytokeratin 19, galectin 3, and thyroperoxidase based upon CT images.

AI uncovers new details about Old Master paintings

Artificial intelligence can be used to analyse high-resolution digital X-ray images of paintings, providing more insight for conservators and those restoring classic works of art. A new algorithm was developed and used on the world famous Ghent Altarpiece, as part of an investigative project led by UCL. The finding is expected to improve our understanding of art masterpieces and provide new...

The Northern Lights Could Be Visible Across the Northern U.S. This Weekend. Here’s How to See the Aurora

Parts of the northern United States from Montana to northern New England could get a glimpse of the Northern Lights over Labor Day Weekend, space weather forecasters say. The Northern Lights, or the Aurora Borealis, are a luminous and sometimes colorful display seen in the night sky. They occur when charged particles from the sun interact with gasses in Earth’s atmosphere. Typically, they...

Trump accused of tweeting image from secret intelligence briefing as he says US not involved in Iran satellite launch failure

Donald Trump has tweeted what appears to be a new, high resolution image of the site of a failed Iranian satellite launch, claiming that the United States had nothing to do with the incident.The image was posted shortly after Mr Trump was scheduled to receive an intelligence briefing, and experts say was likely taken from briefing documents. It has the reflection of what appears to be a flash in...

Scientists discover way to ‘grow’ tooth enamel

Experts produce clusters of enamel-like calcium phosphate to crack age-old problemScientists say they have finally cracked the problem of repairing tooth enamel.Though enamel is the hardest tissue in the body, it cannot self-repair. Now scientists have discovered a method by which its complex structure can be reproduced and the enamel essentially “grown” back. Continue...

Breakthrough enables storage and release of mechanical waves without energy loss

Light and sound waves are at the basis of energy and signal transport and fundamental to some of our most basic technologies—from cell phones to engines. Scientists, however, have yet to devise a method that allows them to store a wave intact for an indefinite period of time and then direct it toward a desired location on demand. Such a development would greatly facilitate the ability to...

Scientists discover evidence for past high-level sea rise

An international team of scientists, studying evidence preserved in speleothems in a coastal cave, illustrate that more than three million years ago—a time in which the Earth was two to three degrees Celsius warmer than the pre-industrial era—sea level was as much as 16 meters higher than the present day. Their findings represent significant implications for understanding and predicting the...