169 articles from WEDNESDAY 8.6.2022

NASA's Webb telescope: Engineered to endure micrometeoroid impacts

Micrometeoroid strikes are an unavoidable aspect of operating any spacecraft, which routinely sustain many impacts over the course of long and productive science missions in space. Between May 23 and 25, NASA's James Webb Space Telescope sustained an impact to one of its primary mirror segments. After initial assessments, the team found the telescope is still performing at a level that exceeds all...

A bellwether for COVID-19

An analysis of data from university COVID-19 screening programs reveals omicron arrived earlier and took over more quickly than experts predicted. Data from university screening programs helped researchers alert hospitals about an imminent surge of omicron cases. The findings suggest university screening programs could be a valuable tool for surveillance of future infectious diseases.

Social isolation is directly associated with later dementia

Interdisciplinary study shows changes to brain structures associated with memory and cognitive function are directly linked to social isolation. The data shows that socially isolated people are 26% more likely to develop later dementia. The study has implications for health and social care policy, in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Southern Ocean as never seen before

With the second version of the International Bathymetric Chart of the Southern Ocean (IBCSO v2), an international group of researchers recently presented the best and most detailed seafloor map of the Southern Ocean, which plays a pivotal role in the Earth system.

Walking towards healthier knees

A new study reveals that walking for exercise can reduce new frequent knee pain among people age 50 and older diagnosed with knee osteoarthritis, the most common form of arthritis. Additionally, findings from the study indicate that walking for exercise may be an effective treatment to slow the damage that occurs within the joint.

Concern grows that human monkeypox outbreak will establish virus in animals outside Africa

Some content has been removed for formatting reasons. Please view the original article for the best reading experience. Eleven days after being bitten by one of her pet prairie dogs, a 3-year-old girl in Wisconsin on 24 May 2003 became the first person outside of Africa to be diagnosed with monkeypox. Two months later, her parents and 69 other people in the United States had suspected or...

New insights into neutron star matter

An international research team has for the first time combined data from heavy-ion experiments, gravitational wave measurements and other astronomical observations using advanced theoretical modeling to more precisely constrain the properties of nuclear matter as it can be found in the interior of neutron stars. The results were published in the journal Nature.

Investigating the magnetic properties of helium-3

In a joint experimental-theoretical study published in Nature, physicists at the Heidelberg Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics (MPIK), together with collaborators from RIKEN, Japan, investigated the magnetic properties of the isotope helium-3. For the first time, the electronic and nuclear g-factors of the 3He+ ion were measured directly with a relative precision of 10–10. The...

Experimental drug targets early stages of Parkinson’s

Some content has been removed for formatting reasons. Please view the original article for the best reading experience. An experimental drug is raising new hopes for those with Parkinson’s disease. So far, the compound has only been tested in animals and in an initial safety assessment in humans. But results show it inhibits a cellular pathway that gives rise to the disease, which...

Rental seekers with foreign-sounding names get fewer callbacks from landlords: study

In Sweden, a study that sent fictitious applications in response to real housing ads has found that male applicants with foreign-sounding names received fewer callbacks than male applicants with a name that signals Swedish ethnicity. Hemrin Molla and colleagues at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on June 8, 2022.

Trials of new Covid vaccine raise hopes of once-a-year booster

Moderna shot is said to produce eightfold increase in antibody levels against Omicron in first four weeksAn updated version of Moderna’s Covid vaccine produces an eightfold increase in antibody levels against the Omicron variant, according to early trial results, raising hopes for a once-a-year booster to protect against the disease.The vaccine is the first “bivalent” formulation to combine...

Protein discovery reinvigorates promising new therapeutic

Engineers have developed a therapeutic that they say avoids major allergic reactions that plagued previous versions while maintaining its therapeutic activity. The keys to the discovery were the use of a similar, membrane-bound version of stem cell factor delivered in engineered lipid nanocarriers.