264 articles from MONDAY 12.4.2021

AstraZeneca blood clotting: what is this rare syndrome and how is it caused?

Evidence is growing of a link between the Covid-19 vaccine and a deadly thrombosis – and theories are emerging as to whySince rare but severe clotting was seen in some people following vaccination with AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine, researchers worldwide have been grappling to understand why the clotting syndrome, known as “thrombosis with thrombocytopenia” (clotting with a low platelet...

Road salts and other human sources are threatening world's freshwater supplies

When winter storms threaten to make travel dangerous, people often turn to salt to melt snow and ice. Road salt is an important tool for safety, but a new study warns that introducing salt into the environment -- for de-icing roads, fertilizing farmland or other purposes -- releases toxic chemical cocktails that create a serious and growing global threat to our freshwater supply and human health.

Researchers find bubbles speed up energy transfer

Energy flows through a system of atoms or molecules by a series of processes such as transfers, emissions, or decay. You can visualize some of these details like passing a ball (the energy) to someone else (another particle), except the pass happens quicker than the blink of an eye, so fast that the details about the exchange are not well understood. Imagine the same exchange happening in a busy...

Road salts and other human sources are threatening world's freshwater supplies

When winter storms threaten to make travel dangerous, people often turn to salt, spreading it liberally over highways, streets and sidewalks to melt snow and ice. Road salt is an important tool for safety, because many thousands of people die or are injured every year due to weather related accidents. But a new study led by Sujay Kaushal of the University of Maryland warns that introducing salt...

Bottom-up is the way forward for nitrogen reduction at institutions

Nitrogen is an element basic for life—plants need it, animals need it, it's in our DNA—but when there's too much nitrogen in the environment, things can go haywire. On Cape Cod, excess nitrogen in estuaries and salt marshes can lead to algal blooms, fish kills, and degradation of the environment.

Researchers engineer probiotic yeast to produce beta-carotene

Researchers have genetically engineered a probiotic yeast to produce beta-carotene in the guts of laboratory mice. The advance demonstrates the utility of work the researchers have done to detail how a suite of genetic engineering tools can be used to modify the yeast.

Plastic planet: Tracking pervasive microplastics across the globe

Really big systems, like ocean currents and weather, work on really big scales. And so too does your plastic waste, according to new research from Janice Brahney from the Department of Watershed Sciences. The plastic straw you discarded in 1980 hasn't disappeared; it has fragmented into pieces too small to see, and is cycling through the atmosphere, infiltrating soil, ocean waters and air....

165 new cancer genes identified with the help of machine learning

A new algorithm can predict which genes cause cancer, even if their DNA sequence is not changed. A team of researchers combined a wide variety of data, analyzed it with 'Artificial Intelligence' and identified numerous cancer genes. This opens up new perspectives for targeted cancer therapy in personalized medicine and for the development of biomarkers.