95 articles from MONDAY 30.1.2023

U.S. scientists brace for tighter scrutiny of potentially risky research

Federally funded scientists who work with potentially harmful bacteria, viruses, and other agents could soon face a major expansion of U.S. government oversight. An expert group last week recommended broadening rules that require universities and funding agencies to determine whether proposed studies count as dual-use research—work that carries the risk of intentionally or accidentally...

Predicting human group sizes with physics

Only by knowing the average number of friends each person has, scientists at Complexity Science Hub (CSH) were able to predict the group sizes of people in a computer game. For this purpose, they modeled the formation of social groups on an example from physics, namely the self-organization of particles with spin.

How to reduce the temptation to cheat: Empathy

Adopting a partner's perspective increases commitment and desire for the partner, while simultaneously decreasing sexual and romantic interest in alternative mates, according to a new study by a team of psychologists. The findings suggest that perspective taking discourages people from engaging in behaviors that may hurt their partners and damage their relationship.

AI: World likely to hit key warming threshold in 10-12 years

The world will likely breach the internationally agreed-upon climate change threshold in about a decade, and keep heating to break through a next warming limit around mid-century even with big pollution cuts, artificial intelligence predicts in a new study that's more pessimistic than previous modeling.

Powering wearable technology with MXene textile supercapacitor 'patch'

Researchers at Drexel University are one step closer to making wearable textile technology a reality. Recently published in the Journal of Materials Chemistry A, materials scientists from Drexel's College of Engineering, in partnership with a team at Accenture Labs, have reported a new design of a flexible wearable supercapacitor patch. It uses MXene, a material discovered at Drexel University in...

Dolphins and humans team up to catch fish in Brazil

For more than 140 years, fishers in southeastern Brazil have formed an unusual partnership with local dolphins . In the small coastal city of Laguna, men wait for the marine mammals to swim up a narrow lagoon, herding silvery mullet from the Atlantic Ocean into shallower waters. As soon as the fishers spot a dolphin slapping its tail, lifting its head, and diving deeply,...

Solid material that 'upconverts' visible light photons to UV light photons could change how we utilize sunlight

The importance of solar power as a renewable energy resource is increasing. Sunlight contains high-energy UV light with a wavelength shorter than 400 nm, which can be broadly used, for example, for photopolymerization to form a resin and activation of photocatalysts to drive reactions that generate green hydrogen or useful hydrocarbons (fuels, sugars, olefins, etc.). The latter of these is often...

This groundbreaking biomaterial heals tissues from the inside out

A new biomaterial that can be injected intravenously, reduces inflammation in tissue and promotes cell and tissue repair. The biomaterial was tested and proven effective in treating tissue damage caused by heart attacks in both rodent and large animal models. Researchers also provided proof of concept in a rodent model that the biomaterial could be beneficial to patients with traumatic brain...

Mie voids could bring about control of light in air

Resonant optical phenomena in metals and dielectrics have profound applications in many fields. The nanoscale confinement allows for unpreceded control of light-matter interaction at surfaces and interfaces, manipulating and controlling the light flow. Resonant phenomena are usually associated with radiative and intrinsic loss channels, which are detrimental in many systems. Metals show strong...

How a novel class of sulfonamides potently blocks malaria transmission

Malaria is a devastating disease, with 247 million cases and 619,000 deaths reported in 2021 alone. Malaria causes fever and a flu-like illness that occurs when people are infected with the parasite Plasmodium falciparum, which is spread by mosquitoes. Drugs to treat malaria symptoms and insecticides to kill malaria-spreading mosquitoes have improved in recent decades, but the parasite and the...

Political orientation could be predicted by differences in brain activation and synchronization

A first-of-its-kind study scanned the brains of dozens of politically involved participants while they watched campaign-ads and speeches by parties from both ends of the political spectrum, just before one of the last rounds of elections. The participants, half right-wing and half left-wing, were scanned using magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), a method that measures brain activation.