163 articles from FRIDAY 19.11.2021

Reading the mind of a worm

It sounds like a party trick: scientists can now look at the brain activity of a tiny worm and tell you which chemical the animal smelled a few seconds before. But the findings of a new study are more than just a novelty; they help the scientists better understand how the brain functions and integrates information.

Phages kill dystentery-causing bacteria and reduce virulence in surviving bacteria

Phages are viruses that infect bacteria and can also be used to treat human infections. However, as with antibiotics, bacteria can readily evolve resistance to phage attack, highlighting a key limitation to the use of phages as therapeutics. Now, researchers have shown that the naturally occurring phage A1-1 kills Shigella flexneri, a major cause of dysentery in sub-Saharan Africa and southern...

Suffering from psoriasis? Blame this trio of proteins

About 7.5 million Americans suffer from psoriasis, an autoimmune disease that shows up as patches of red, inflamed skin and painful, scaly rashes. Although there are effective treatments for psoriasis, not everyone responds to these therapies -- and for many, the relief is temporary. Scientists have discovered how a key protein called TWEAK damages skin cells in psoriasis patients. Their findings,...

Breeding plants with genes from one parent

Scientists are a step closer to breeding plants with genes from only one parent. New research led by plant biologists at UC Davis shows the underlying mechanism behind eliminating half the genome and could make for easier and more rapid breeding of crop plants with desirable traits such as disease resistance.

Cystic fibrosis faithfully modeled in a human Lung Airway Chip

Despite advances in patient screenings and breakthrough therapies that allow CF patients now to live into their mid- to late 30s or 40s, sometimes even longer, all patients are plagued by bacteria settling in their mucus, which causes inflammation in their lungs, and eventually causes their respiratory systems to fail. A major barrier to developing new and urgently needed treatments is the lack of...

‘Gas station in space’: new plan to make rocket fuel from junk in Earth’s orbit

Australian company joins global effort to recycle dangerous space debrisGet our free news app; get our morning email briefingAn Australian company is part of an international effort to recycle dangerous space junk into rocket fuel – in space.The orbit our planet depends on is getting clogged with debris from old spacecraft. Dead satellites and spent rocket parts are whizzing around at speeds of...

Breeding plants with genes from one parent

Scientists are a step closer to breeding plants with genes from only one parent. New research led by plant biologists at the University of California, Davis, published Nov. 19 in Science Advances, shows the underlying mechanism behind eliminating half the genome and could make for easier and more rapid breeding of crop plants with desirable traits such as disease resistance.

Loss of tree species has cumulative impact on biodiversity

Diseases affecting different UK tree species have been shown to have a multiplying effect on the loss of associated biodiversity, according to new research published in the Journal of Ecology by James Hutton Institute scientists and partners in the UK and Portugal. The research team reveals that the decline of ash and oak trees may affect more species than just the ones that only use oak and ash...

Researchers prepare dual stimulus responsive alginate hydrogel

Stimuli-responsive hydrogels not only express excellent biocompatibility, but also can respond when exposed to external stimulation, enabling a wider range of applications in biomedicine. However, at present, stimuli-responsive hydrogel shows poor mechanical properties and limited response to a single stimulus. There is a great need for stimuli-responsive hydrogels with excellent mechanical...

Mosquitoes have a mutual symbiotic relationship with malaria-causing pathogen

Cornelius Vanderbilt Professor of Biological Sciences Laurence J. Zwiebel is part of a team of researchers at Vanderbilt and the Johns Hopkins Malaria Research Institute who are working to understand how Plasmodium falciparium—the pathogen that causes malaria in humans—affects the mosquitoes that spread the disease. The research was spearheaded by Ann Carr, a current visiting scholar and...

Can defects turn inert materials into useful, active ones?

Demonstrating that a material thought to be always chemically inert, hexagonal boron nitride (hBN), can be turned chemically active holds potential for a new class of catalysts with a wide range of applications, according to an international team of researchers.

Surveys show horseweed is a persistent and unpredictable foe in soybean crops

Horseweed is one of the most common and most troublesome weeds in soybean production—shown to cause yield losses of up to 39 percent in the Midwest growing region. A single horseweed plant can produce up to 200,000 seeds that can be easily spread across vast distances. In addition, herbicide resistance has made horseweed increasingly difficult to control.

By keeping ferroelectric 'bubbles' intact, researchers pave way for new devices

When a magician suddenly pulls a tablecloth off a table laden with plates and glasses, there is a moment of suspense as the audience wonders if the stage will soon be littered with broken glass. Until now, an analogous dilemma had faced scientists working with special electrical bubbles to create the next generation of flexible microelectronic and energy storage devices.

Winged Gods and walking griffons: A plate with a depiction of Scythian Gods has been found in Middle Don

Expedition members of IA RAS have found a unique plate depicting winged Scythian gods surrounded by griffons during their excavations of the burial ground Devitsa V in Ostrogozhsky District of Voronezh region. This is the first case of such a finding in the Scythian barrows on Middle Don. No other items depictions of gods from the Scythian pantheon have been found in this area.

Urbanization not always bad for food and land use diversity

Widely accepted myths that urbanization negatively impacts food and land use biodiversity are incorrect, according to a team of researchers who developed a framework for evaluating this intersection. Their results could also affect nutrition and food insecurity in urban areas.