294 articles from TUESDAY 6.10.2020

Expanded newborn screening could save premature infants' lives

Expanding routine newborn screening to include a metabolic vulnerability profile could lead to earlier detection of life-threatening complications in babies born preterm, according to a study by UC San Francisco researchers. The new method, which was developed at UCSF, offers valuable and time-sensitive insights into which infants are at greatest risk during their most vulnerable time, immediately...

New study rebuts 75-year-old belief in reptile evolution

A statistical analysis of that vast database is helping scientists better understand the evolution of these cold-blooded vertebrates by contradicting a widely held theory that major transitions in evolution always happened in big, quick (geologically speaking) bursts, triggered by major environmental shifts.

2 scientists win Nobel chemistry prize for gene-editing tool

Two scientists won the Nobel Prize in chemistry Wednesday for developing a way of editing genes likened to “molecular scissors” that offer the promise of one day curing inherited diseases. Working on opposite sides of the Atlantic, Frenchwoman Emmanuelle Charpentier and American Jennifer A. Doudna came up with a method known as CRISPR-cas9 that can be used to change the DNA of animals, plants...

What kind of collision made the moon?

It is thought the celestial body was created in a cosmic crash 4.5bn years ago It could so easily have turned out differently. About 4.5bn years ago, the Earth is believed to have collided with another planet, Theia, resulting in the formation of the moon. A more glancing blow might have resulted in a “hit-and-run” and a moon-less Earth; while more of a head-on collision may have blasted away...

NASA-NOAA satellite finds Hurricane Delta rapidly intensifying

Infrared imagery from NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite revealed that Hurricane Delta has been rapidly growing stronger and more powerful. Infrared imagery revealed that powerful thunderstorms circled the eye of the hurricane and southern quadrant as it moved through the Caribbean Sea on Oct. 6.

Evolution of the Y chromosome in great apes deciphered

New analysis of the DNA sequence of the male-specific Y chromosomes from all living species of the great ape family helps to clarify our understanding of how this enigmatic chromosome evolved. A clearer picture of the evolution of the Y chromosome is important for studying male fertility in humans as well as our understanding of reproduction patterns and the ability to track male lineages in the...

UK to buy 1m antibody home tests despite accuracy concerns

Scientists question purchase of tests from British consortium before evaluation made publicThe Department of Health has announced it is buying 1m home antibody tests from a British consortium, even though experts say the only data published about them raises major questions about their accuracy.The government is spending millions of pounds on the tests, made by the UK Rapid Test Consortium. The...

Revising climate models with new aerosol field data

Smoke from the many wildfires burning in the West have made air quality hazardous for millions of people in the United States. And it is the very tiniest of the aerosol particles in that air that make it particularly harmful to human health. But for decades, we haven't known how long these particles actually stay aloft.

Experiments with twisted 2-D materials catch electrons behaving collectively

Scientists can have ambitious goals: Curing disease, exploring distant worlds, clean-energy revolutions. In physics and materials research, some of these ambitious goals are to make ordinary-sounding objects with extraordinary properties: Wires that can transport power without any energy loss, or quantum computers that can perform complex calculations that today's computers cannot achieve. And the...

Evidence of Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and MND in brains of young people exposed to dirty air

After examining the brainstems of 186 young Mexico City residents aged between 11 months and 27 years of age, researchers, found markers not only of Alzheimer's disease, but also of Parkinson's and of motor neuron disease (MND) too. These markers of disease were coupled with the presence of tiny, distinctive nanoparticles within the brainstem - their appearance and composition indicating they were...