Science news

• Apollo Coder and 'Apollo 13' Actor Receive Presidential Medals of Freedom

  22-11-2016 23:58
  A computer scientist who created the on-board flight software for NASA's Apollo spacecraft and an actor who famously portrayed an astronaut whose life relied on that programming were among the recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom presented Tuesday (Nov. 22) at the White House.
  
  Read more

• Researchers find potential therapy for brain swelling during concussion

  22-11-2016 23:48
  A team of biomedical engineering researchers has identified a cause of fluid swelling of the brain, or cellular edema, that occurs during a concussion.
  
  Read more

• Mood ring materials: New way to detect damage in failing infrastructure

  22-11-2016 23:48
  "Mood ring materials" constitute a new type of smart sensing technology that could play an important role in minimizing and mitigating damage to the nation's failing infrastructure, say investigators.
  
  Read more

• New research could make ethanol production more efficient and economic

  22-11-2016 23:46
  The enzymes needed to convert corn starch to glucose fermented to ethanol by yeast can now be found in new corn and ‘superior yeast,’ reducing the total enzyme addition by more than 80 percent, say researchers.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Huge Underground Ice Deposit on Mars Is Bigger Than New Mexico

  22-11-2016 22:53
  
  A giant deposit of buried ice on Mars contains about as much water as Lake Superior does here on Earth, a new study reports. "This deposit is probably more accessible than most water ice on Mars, because it is at a relatively low latitude and it lies in a flat, smooth area where landing a spacecraft would be easier than at some of the other areas with buried ice," co-author Jack Holt, of the University of Texas, Austin, said in a statement. The researchers, led by Cassie Stuurman of the Institut
  
  Read more

• Buying Your First Telescope? What You Need to Know

  22-11-2016 22:50
  
  Hoping to buy a telescope this holiday season? To make sure that you make the right purchase — one that will foster a lifelong love of astronomy for your loved ones — here's what the experts at Sky & Telescope magazine had to say.
  
  Read more

• [Research Article] Selective control of up-regulated and down-regulated genes by temporal patterns and doses of insulin

  22-11-2016 22:38 via stke.sciencemag.org
  Transcriptomic analysis and mathematical modeling reveal selective gene regulation by insulin.
  
  Read more

• [Research Article] Integrating network reconstruction with mechanistic modeling to predict cancer therapies

  22-11-2016 22:38 via stke.sciencemag.org
  Unexpected drug combinations for cancer treatment emerge from modeling signaling pathways affected by genomic mutations.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• [Research Article] A computationally identified compound antagonizes excess FGF-23 signaling in renal tubules and a mouse model of hypophosphatemia

  22-11-2016 22:38 via stke.sciencemag.org
  A ligand-targeted compound may alleviate hypophosphatemia-associated metabolic deficiencies in patients with excess production of FGF-23.
  
  Read more

• [Editors' Choice] TRAF6 targets p53

  22-11-2016 22:38 via stke.sciencemag.org
  TRAF6-mediated ubiquitylation of p53 regulates both mitochondrial apoptosis and cell cycle arrest.
  
  Read more

• [Editors' Choice] Cancer, host metabolism, and immunotherapy

  22-11-2016 22:38 via stke.sciencemag.org
  Tumor-induced metabolic stress associated with cachexia suppresses the antitumor immune response in mice.
  
  Read more

• [Editors' Choice] Activating the MAPK pathway with a kinase instead of a GTPase

  22-11-2016 22:38 via stke.sciencemag.org
  The kinase PBL27 links activation of a pathogen recognition receptor to activation of immune signaling in Arabidopsis thaliana.
  
  Read more

• [Editors' Choice] A noncanonical role for Janus kinase 1 in lymphoma

  22-11-2016 22:38 via stke.sciencemag.org
  JAK1-dependent chromatin phosphorylation promotes the survival of aggressive lymphoma cells.
  
  Read more

• Astronomers discover dwarf galaxy orbiting the Milky Way

  22-11-2016 22:35 via cbc.ca
  
  Astronomers have discovered another neighbour orbiting our home galaxy, the Milky Way — and it could be the faintest satellite dwarf galaxy discovered so far.
  
  Read more

• Blow It Up: Inflatable Space Station Habitat Shows Promise in Early Tests

  22-11-2016 22:30
  
  An inflatable space habitat that could save weight and volume on future missions is showing how well it can do its job. Called the Bigelow Expandable Activity Module, or BEAM, the habitat is an inflatable spheroid made of fabric that starts off folded into a shape like a flattish cone with the top cut off. The first tests were in May. Crewmembers aboard the ISS expanded BEAM, using low pressure, and then allowed the air tanks inside the habitat to open and pressurize it to the same level as the
  
  Read more

• Social media sites censor a range of content, new report says

  22-11-2016 22:20 via cbc.ca
  
  In light of criticism of 'fake news,' Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has said the company 'must be extremely cautious about becoming arbiters of truth ourselves.' But a new report says Facebook already censors and removes a wide variety of content, as do other social media platforms.
  
  Read more

• Thanksgiving in space: turkey, green beans & even football

  22-11-2016 21:51
  
  CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Turkey and football will be the main Thanksgiving headliners up on the International Space Station.
  
  Read more

• Trump says keeping 'open mind' on climate change - New York Times

  22-11-2016 20:01
  (Reuters) - U.S. President-elect Donald Trump said on Tuesday he thinks there is some connection between climate change and human activity and "clean air is vitally important," a New York Times reporter said in a tweet. Trump, who met Times reporters and editors in New York, "says he is keeping 'an open mind'" on the issue, the Times' reporter wrote on Twitter. Trump has previously called man-made global warming a hoax.
  
  Read more

• Turkey, football headline Thanksgiving for 6 astronauts

  22-11-2016 19:27
  CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Turkey and football will be the main Thanksgiving headliners up on the International Space Station.
  
  Read more

• Study sheds light on parasite that causes river blindness

  22-11-2016 19:19
  The parasite that causes river blindness infects about 37 million people in parts of Africa and Latin America, causing blindness and other major eye and skin diseases in about 5 million of them. A study now sheds light on the genetic makeup of the parasite, a step toward the goal of eradication.
  
  Read more

• Alarming disparities in health outcomes could be prevented by breastfeeding

  22-11-2016 19:19
  Lack of paid leave and outdated maternity care are barriers to breastfeeding that disproportionately impact families of color. This is the first study to show how these disparities translate into differences in health outcomes.
  
  Read more

• New views of dwarf planet Ceres as Dawn moves higher

  22-11-2016 19:06
  The brightest area on Ceres stands out amid shadowy, cratered terrain in a dramatic new view from NASA's Dawn spacecraft, taken as it looked off to the side of the dwarf planet.
  
  Read more

• Widespread land losses from 2010 Gulf oil spill, study finds

  22-11-2016 19:00
  Dramatic, widespread shoreline loss is revealed in new NASA/U.S. Geological Survey annual maps of the Louisiana marshlands where the coastline was most heavily coated with oil during the 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
  
  Read more

• Ancient cemetery provides peek into Philistines’ lives, health

  22-11-2016 19:00
  
  Burial site offers new look at Israelites’ mysterious enemies.
  
  Read more

• Zika-caused birth defect may become clear only after birth

  22-11-2016 18:52
  
  NEW YORK (AP) — Researchers say a severe birth defect caused by Zika infection may not be apparent at birth but develop months afterward, further confirmation that the virus can cause unseen damage to developing babies.
  
  Read more

• WWII Shipwrecks 'Vanish' After Plundering by Illegal Scavengers

  22-11-2016 18:36
  
  Illegal salvagers have plundered at least six World War II shipwrecks near Indonesia for scrap metal, including the wreck of an American submarine that has now "completely vanished," according to investigators. The damaged wrecks include three Dutch and two British warships sunk by Japanese forces after the Battle of the Java Sea in February 1942, and the American submarine USS Perch, which sank in the Java Sea in March 1942 after being damaged in an attack on Japanese destroyers. The scale of d
  
  Read more

• Massive tidal turbine in Bay of Fundy generating electricity for 1st time

  22-11-2016 18:34 via cbc.ca
  
  Nova Scotia's energy minister hailed North America's first successful grid-connected tidal turbine Tuesday, calling the project an "unprecedented step towards a lower carbon future."
  
  Read more

• Glassmaking may have begun in Egypt, not Mesopotamia

  22-11-2016 18:00
  
  Ancient Mesopotamians lagged behind Egyptians as glassmakers.
  
  Read more

• Environmental hotspot

  22-11-2016 17:56 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The "Freiburg Cup", which comes with a deposit of €1, is going down well with German students.
  
  Read more

• Test of 'Impossible' EmDrive Space Engine Passes Peer Review

  22-11-2016 17:43
  
  Good news for all you EmDrive enthusiasts: A new study suggesting that the seemingly impossible space engine may actually work has passed the peer-review process. The study — which was led by physicist Harold "Sonny" White, of NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston — found that an EmDrive design generated small amounts of thrust in the lab. Development of the EmDrive was begun by British scientist Roger Shawyer about 15 years ago.
  
  Read more

• Not Super, But Still Brilliant: What Causes Regular Novas?

  22-11-2016 17:32
  
  Paul Sutter is an astrophysicist at The Ohio State University and the chief scientist at COSI Science Center. Imagine how surprised Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe would have been when he examined a "new star" that appeared in the sky in November 1572.
  
  Read more

• Old blood carries risks for brain

  22-11-2016 17:00
  
  Young blood may not save the brain, by one measure at least.
  
  Read more

• Does Lying on Your Back During Pregnancy Increase Stillbirth Risk?

  22-11-2016 16:50
  
  For women in the third trimester of their pregnancy, lying down on their back may place stress on the fetus, which could increase the risk of stillbirth in certain cases, a small new study from New Zealand suggests. However, experts say that it's too early to make recommendations based on the findings, and that pregnant women do not need to change the way they lie down as a result of the study. "It is not possible to draw a firm link between maternal position and stillbirth risk from this study
  
  Read more

• Nat Geo Channel's 'Mars' Shows Hazards of Human Spaceflight

  22-11-2016 16:30
  
  Viewers who tuned in for the television debut of "Mars" last week (Nov. 14) may recall the nail-biting scenes in which the Daedalus crew struggles to safely land its spacecraft near its pre-built Martian base camp. The crewmembers make it to Mars alive — for now — but are a whopping 75.6 kilometers (46.8 miles) away from camp. Though the Daedalus spacecraft, which is designed like SpaceX's reusable rockets, was built to be able to lift off and land again, there isn't enough fuel left
  
  Read more

• Dodo skeleton sells for £280,000 at auction

  22-11-2016 16:14 via bbc.co.uk
  
  A nearly complete dodo skeleton is sold at auction for £280,000.
  
  Read more

• Marijuana Use May Impair Your Coordination

  22-11-2016 16:02
  
  Smoking pot may impair your coordination and other motor skills, even when you're not high, a new review of studies finds. In the review, researchers found that people who used marijuana had differences in brain areas called the corticostriatal networks compared with people who didn't use the drug. The researchers' review of literature included 14 studies published between 1992 and 2015 that looked specifically at motor function in cannabis users, along with numerous other studies that exam
  
  Read more

• Women Have Always Lived Longer, Study Finds

  22-11-2016 16:01
  
  The investigators found that, "in spite of the huge gains in human longevity over the past century, the male-female difference has not shrunk," said Susan Alberts, a professor of biology at Duke University and a co-author of the new study. The researchers did find that the the amount by which women outlived men varied across populations. For instance, the largest male-female difference in life span among the populations studied was in modern-day Russia, where the gap is approximately 10 years.
  
  Read more

• Yo-Yo Dieting May Pose Heart Risks in Women

  22-11-2016 16:00
  
  Women whose weight fluctuates by more than 10 lbs. (4.5 kilograms) over the course of a decade, but who are not overweight, may have an increased risk of heart problems, a new study finds. In the study, researchers looked at data from nearly 160,000 postmenopausal women who took part in the Women's Health Initiative (WHI), a large study that began in 1991 and is aimed at looking at the major health problems women face after menopause. The scientists found that among the women whose weight w
  
  Read more

• Rate of Dementia Declines Among US Seniors

  22-11-2016 15:58
  
  The American population is getting older, but the percentage of U.S. seniors with dementia is actually declining, a new study found. In the study, the researchers analyzed information from a nationally representative sample of about 21,000 U.S. adults ages 65 and older who were tested for dementia from 2000 to 2012. In 2000, 11.6 percent of older adults had dementia, but that number dropped to 8.8 percent by 2012, the researchers found.
  
  Read more

• Have Spacesuit, Will Inspire: 'First Doll in Space' Getting Astronaut Outfit

  22-11-2016 15:36
  
  The "First Doll in Space" is getting her very own spacesuit. "Stargazer Lottie," a doll made by Irish toy company Arklu, spent more than 260 days aboard the International Space Station from December 2015 through August 2016 as part of an educational outreach project in collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA). The seven-inch-tall (18 cm) figure, which was inspired by a young girl's passion for astronomy and space exploration, launched to space wearing the same outfit in which she is so
  
  Read more

• Foldable Cardboard 'EcoHelmet' Wins James Dyson Award's Top Prize

  22-11-2016 15:21
  
  The James Dyson Foundation announced today (Nov. 17) that Isis Shiffer is the 2016 International Winner of the James Dyson Award for her EcoHelmet design — a collapsible, biodegradable bike helmet that can be dispensed through vending machines at urban bike-share stations. Sir James Dyson, inventor and founder of the award, praised the EcoHelmet for presenting a simple and "elegant" solution to the problem of providing cheap, accessible helmets to users of urban bike-share programs.
  
  Read more

• Supermoon's High Tides Strand Octopus in Flooded Parking Garage

  22-11-2016 15:19
  
  Climate change's impact on sea levels has made tidal flooding in Miami more severe, according to scientists. After the "supermoon" earlier this month triggered high tides, parts of Miami flooded and at least one sea creature was left far from home: an octopus that became stranded in a flooded parking garage, reported the Miami Herald. Miami resident Richard Conlin discovered the octopus, and shared images of the displaced sea creature on Facebook.
  
  Read more

• Boko Haram launches three assaults in Cameroon within 24 hours

  22-11-2016 14:55
  YAOUNDE (Reuters) - Suspected Boko Haram militants launched three attacks in northern Cameroon within 24 hours, including a thwarted suicide strike on a camp for people who have been displaced by the conflict, security sources said on Tuesday. The Islamist militant group is based in northeastern Nigeria but regularly carries out raids in neighbouring Cameroon, Chad and Niger, prompting the four countries plus Benin to create a 10,000-strong joint task force. ...
  
  Read more

• How to Avoid Stephen Hawking's Dark Prediction for Humanity

  22-11-2016 13:27
  
  Stephen Hawking thinks humanity has only 1,000 years left of survival on Earth and that our species needs to colonize other planets. The famed physicist made the statement in a speech at Oxford University Union, in which he promoted the goal of searching for and colonizing Earth-like exoplanets. The dangers Hawking cited — from climate change, to nuclear weapons, to genetically engineered viruses — could indeed pose existential threats to our species, experts say, but predicting a mi
  
  Read more

• Bird Poop Cools the Arctic. No, It Won't Offset Climate Warming

  22-11-2016 13:26
  
  In short, chemical reactions that are set in motion by the bird droppings, or guano, change the properties of the clouds above, and make them more reflective, the researchers said. "Clouds can actually reflect energy that's coming from the sun back to space, which is a cooling effect," said study co-lead researcher Betty Croft, a research associate in the Department of Physics and Atmospheric Science at Dalhousie University in Nova Scotia, Canada. Baffin Island is part of the vast Arctic landsca
  
  Read more

• Chernobyl Bubble: How a Giant Arch Will Seal Nuclear Site

  22-11-2016 13:20
  
  To safely entomb the radioactive wreckage of Chernobyl, the site of the infamous 1986 nuclear accident, a mobile metal arch is now on the move that is taller than the Statue of Liberty. When nuclear reactor No. 4 exploded at the Chernobyl power plant in 1986 due to errors in both operation and design, it sent plumes of radioactive dust as far away as the United States and Japan, previous research found. To contain the fallout, the Soviet Union enclosed the ruins in a structure that is techn
  
  Read more

• Physicists Twist Light, Send 'Hello World' Message Between Islands

  22-11-2016 13:18
  
  When you make a phone call or browse the internet, chances are a lot of the communication happens over fiber-optic links transmitting billions of bits every second. Light waves are used in communications all the time. Radio is a form of light, as are lasers that are common in  fiber optics.
  
  Read more

• Ancient Inscriptions Show Life Once Flourished in Jordan's 'Black Desert'

  22-11-2016 13:16
  
  Thousands of inscriptions and petroglyphs dating back around 2,000 years have been discovered in the Jebel Qurma region of Jordan's Black Desert. "Nowadays, the Jebel Qurma area, and the Black Desert in general, is a highly inhospitable area, very arid and difficult to cross," said Peter Akkermans, a professor at Leiden University in the Netherlands who leads the Jebel Qurma Archaeological Landscape Project. The inscriptions are written in Safaitic, an alphabetic script used by people who lived
  
  Read more

• Telling Time in a Flash: Optical Clock Tested in Space for 1st Time

  22-11-2016 13:00
  
  Researchers have tested optical clock technology in space for the first time, showing that the extremely precise technology could find a use in space-based applications. The most advanced optical clocks keep time even more accurately than the atomic clocks that officially define the second, to within 1 second in tens of billions of years.
  
  Read more

• Space Fire! NASA Ignites Experiment on Private Cargo Spaceship

  22-11-2016 13:00
  
  The latest set of space-fire experiments has blazed up aboard the private Cygnus cargo spacecraft.
  
  Read more

Follow @ScienceUKnews on Twitter!