365 articles from WEDNESDAY 18.11.2020
Good with faces? This test will tell you if you're a 'super-recognizer'
If you have an uncanny knack for remembering people's faces, you might be what's known as a "super-recognizer." Australian researchers say their online facial recognition test is the best way to confirm whether you fit the...
Climate change: Warmer winters linked to increased drowning risk
Rising temperatures are destabilising lake and river ice, boosting the risk of people drowning.
Online password '123456' more popular than ever and easy to crack
People are still using the most basic of internet passwords that can be easily cracked, according to a database analysis by password manager...
Nasa says landing astronauts on moon by 2024 is unlikely
Costs and overruns on key technology have hit schedule of Artemis programme, says report Nasa has said it will be “hard-pressed to land astronauts on the moon by the end of 2024”. The assessment by the agency’s office of inspector general comes in a report dated 12 November and titled 2020 Report on Nasa’s Top Management and Performance Challenges”.Originally, Nasa had been working...
Chromosomes look different than you think
In high school textbooks, human chromosomes are pictured as wonky Xs like two hotdogs jammed together. But those images are far from accurate. "For 90 percent of the time," said Jun-Han Su, "chromosomes don't exist like that."
Study finds opposite-gender mentorships may be more beneficial to female researchers
A new study by researchers at NYU Abu Dhabi examined data representing thousands of mentor-protégé relationships and found that mentorship quality predicted the scientific impact of the papers written by protégés—without their mentors—after their mentorship. Significantly, the researchers also found that increasing the proportion of female mentors was associated not only with a reduction...
Small finlets on owl feathers point the way to less aircraft noise
A recent research study conducted by City, University of London's Professor Christoph Bruecker and his team has revealed how micro-structured finlets on owl feathers enable silent flight and may show the way forward in reducing aircraft noise in future.
Does air pollution increase women's risk of dementia?
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 22:11
Older women who live in locations with higher levels of air pollution may have more brain shrinkage, the kind seen in Alzheimer's disease, than women who live in locations with lower levels, according to a new study.
Ovarian cancer cells cooperate to metastasize
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 22:11
In a study on human ovarian cancer cells in mice, researchers discovered a transient, cooperative interaction between cell subpopulations that allows otherwise nonmetastatic tumor cells to become aggressive and spread.
Revolutionary CRISPR-based genome editing system treatment destroys cancer cells
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 22:11
Researchers have demonstrated that the CRISPR/Cas9 system is very effective in treating metastatic cancers, a significant step on the way to finding a cure for cancer. The researchers developed a novel lipid nanoparticle-based delivery system that specifically targets cancer cells and destroys them by genetic manipulation. The system, called CRISPR-LNPs, carries a genetic messenger (messenger...
Researchers identify three drugs as possible therapeutics for COVID-19
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 22:11
Researchers have identified three drugs, already approved for other uses in humans, as possible therapeutics for COVID-19, the illness caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Surprises in 'active' aging
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 22:11
Aging is a process that affects not only living beings. Many materials, like plastics and glasses, also age -- ie they change slowly as their particles try to pack better. Biological materials, such as living tissue, show similar behavior to glasses except that the particles are actual cells with their own propulsion. Researchers used computer simulations to explore the aging behavior of these...
Pandemic has surprising impacts on public transit demand
The COVID-19 pandemic had surprising effects on demand for public transit in American cities, new research suggests.
Physicists use computer simulation to investigate aging in living glassy systems
Aging is a process that affects not only living beings. Many materials, like plastics and glasses, also age—i.e. they change slowly over time as their particles try to pack better—and there are already computer models to describe this. Biological materials, such as living tissue, can show similar behavior to glasses except that the particles are actual cells or bacteria which have their own...
Oysters produce 3-D structures organised by physical processes
Scientists from the University of Granada (UGR) have discovered that oysters are capable of producing three-dimensional structures organized by physical (colloidal) processes—the result of which resembles a solid foam—by using a unique technique, similar to that of a 3-D printer. This technique enables them to develop their shell structures sheet-by-sheet, which resolves the problem of limited...
Study finds sexual lineage plays key role in transgenerational plasticity
A new pair of papers published in the Journal of Animal Ecology has shown that sexual lineage matters for how offspring receive adaptations from parents in stickleback fish. Researchers in the Bell lab studied how parents who were exposed to predators passed the behavioral information to their offspring in different ways based on sex.
Leveraging collective intelligence and AI to benefit society
A solar-powered autonomous drone scans for forest fires. A surgeon first operates on a digital heart before she picks up a scalpel. A global community bands together to print personal protection equipment to fight a pandemic. “The future is now,” says Frédéric Vacher, head of innovation at Dassault Systèmes. And all of this is possible with…
Small finlets on owl feathers point the way to less aircraft noise
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 20:19
Researchers reveals how the microstructure of small finlets on owl feathers enable silent flight.
A new understanding of ionic interactions with graphene and water
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 20:18
New findings could inform design of environmental technologies behind water purification processes and electric energy storage.
Scientists defy nature to make insta-bling at room temperature
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 20:18
An international team of scientists has defied nature to make diamonds in minutes in a laboratory at room temperature - a process that normally requires billions of years, huge amounts of pressure and super-hot temperatures.
Algae breathe life into 3D engineered tissues
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 20:18
3D bioprinted algae can be harnessed as a sustainable source of oxygen for human cells in engineered vascularized tissues, researchers report. They embedded the bioprinted photosynthetic algae, along with human liver-derived cells, in a 3D hydrogel matrix to create honeycomb-shaped tissues with lobules, similar to the human liver.
Smartphone screen time linked to preference for quicker but smaller rewards
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 20:18
In a new study, people who spent more time on their phones -- particularly on gaming or social media apps -- were more likely to reject larger, delayed rewards in favor of smaller, immediate rewards.
Novel magnetic spray transforms objects into millirobots for biomedical applications
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 20:18
An easy way to make millirobots by coating objects with a glue-like magnetic spray has been developed. Driven by the magnetic field, the coated objects can crawl, walk, or roll on different surfaces. As the magnetic coating is biocompatible and can be disintegrated into powders when needed, this technology demonstrates the potential for biomedical applications, including catheter navigation and...
Curved origami provides new range of stiffness-to-flexibility in robots
- ScienceDaily
- 20/11/18 20:18
Curved origami structures provide tunable flexibility to robots.