Science news

• New Twitter feature allows users to mute notifications from unknown accounts

  10-07-2017 23:12 via cbc.ca
  
  Twitter, in its latest step to curb abusive behaviour on its platform, rolled out new features on Monday to help users disable notifications from accounts that they want to avoid.
  
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• Just one night of poor sleep can boost Alzheimer’s proteins

  10-07-2017 22:15
  
  Deep sleep may prevent the buildup of Alzheimer’s proteins.
  
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• Fossil sheds light on bird evolution after asteroid strike

  10-07-2017 21:30 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Newly-discovered fossil suggests birds evolved very rapidly after the dinosaurs went extinct.
  
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• Plenty of sleep tech on the market, but you still may not get a good night's rest

  10-07-2017 21:26 via cbc.ca
  
  Pillows that track your snoozing patterns? A bed that adjusts based on how much you twist and turn? Companies are adding more technology into their products, hoping to lure customers craving a better night's sleep.
  
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• Critical European infrastructure networks constantly targeted by foreign hackers, sources say

  10-07-2017 17:52 via cbc.ca
  
  Cyber attackers are regularly trying to attack data networks connected to critical national infrastructure systems around Europe, according to current and former European government sources with knowledge of the issue.
  
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• China tests self-sustaining space station in Beijing

  10-07-2017 16:56
  
  BEIJING (Reuters) - Sealed behind the steel doors of two bunkers in a Beijing suburb, university students are trying to find out how it feels to live in a space station on another planet, recycling everything from plant cuttings to urine.
  
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• Shells record West Antarctic glacier retreat

  10-07-2017 16:26 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The remains of tiny marine organisms document the wind-driven, warm-water melting in West Antarctica.
  
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• How a crop-destroying fungus mutated to infect wheat

  10-07-2017 14:00
  
  Study details how wheat got a new pathogen called blast fungus.
  
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• Improved Vaccination Rates Would Fall Victim to Senate Health Cuts

  10-07-2017 12:45 via rss.sciam.com
  
  Public health experts warn that more kids and families would go without shots 
  -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
  
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• Jupiter's Great Red Spot ready for close-up as Juno spacecraft goes 'screaming' past

  10-07-2017 11:00 via cbc.ca
  
  On Monday, NASA's Juno spacecraft will peer into a storm on Jupiter that's at least 350 years old.
  
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• Disrupting the disrupters — Tesla faces the challenge of the mini-fluorescent: Don Pittis

  10-07-2017 11:00 via cbc.ca
  
  Bright ideas like the coiled fluorescent light bulbs are soon tossed aside. Could Tesla go the same way?
  
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• Drinking sugary beverages in pregnancy linked to kids’ later weight gain

  10-07-2017 06:05
  
  Consuming sugary drinks while pregnant may mean kids are heavier when they reach elementary school age.
  
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• Younger primary care physicians have greater turnover

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Academy of Family Physicians) This article appears in the July/August 2017 issue of Annals of Family Medicine. Link will go live at 5 p.m. ET, July 10.
  
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• Wyss Center joins $19M project to engineer brain-computer interface network

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Wyss Center for Bio and Neuroengineering) The Wyss Center in Geneva is set to work with Brown University on a US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) program to develop a high-resolution, implantable neural interface network for new medical therapies.
  
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• World's first demonstration of space quantum communication using a microsatellite

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT)) The National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) developed the world's smallest and lightest quantum-communication transmitter (SOTA) onboard the microsatellite SOCRATES. We succeeded in the demonstration of the first quantum- communication experiment from space, receiving information from the satellite in a single-photon regime in an optical ground station in Koganei city. This is a major step tow
  
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• Working the [immune] system

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Pittsburgh) The National Institute on Aging, one of the 27 Institutes and Centers of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has awarded Bryan Brown, assistant professor of bioengineering at Pitt's Swanson School of Engineering, a five-year, $1.57 million R01 grant to examine how aging affects implantable medical devices.
  
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• Who should treat patients with opioid use disorder?

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Academy of Family Physicians) This point/counterpoint and editorial appear in the July/August 2017 issue of Annals of Family Medicine. Links will go live at 5 p.m. ET, July 10.
  
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• USC and Georgia Tech receive $ 6.8 million for DARPA project

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Southern California) The USC Viterbi School of Engineering and Georgia Tech have been selected to receive Department of Defense Research Projects Agency (DARPA) funding under the Hierarchal Identify Verify Exploit (HIVE) program. Georgia Tech and USC are to receive total funding of$6.8M over 4.5 years to develop a powerful new data-analysis and computing platform.
  
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• Under stress, brains of bulimics respond differently to food

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Psychological Association) Magnetic resonance imaging scans suggest that the brains of women with bulimia nervosa react differently to images of food after stressful events than the brains of women without bulimia, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.
  
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• UC San Diego scientists invent new tool for the synthetic biologist's toolbox

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of California - San Diego) Researchers at the University of California San Diego have invented a new method for controlling gene expression across bacterial colonies. The method involves engineering dynamic DNA copy number changes in a synchronized fashion. The results were published in the July 10, 2017 online edition of Nature Genetics.
  
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• UA astronomers track the birth of a 'super-earth'

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Arizona) 'Synthetic observations' simulating nascent planetary systems could help explain a puzzle -- how planets form -- that has vexed astronomers for a long time.
  
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• Training/support have ongoing impact on delivery of alcohol intervention

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Academy of Family Physicians) This article appears in the July/August 2017 issue of Annals of Family Medicine. Article link goes live at 5 p.m. ET, July 10.
  
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• Touchscreen test reveals why some birds are quicker to explore than others

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Lincoln) Birds such as parrots and crows have been using touchscreen technology as part of an international research study examining whether the ways in which animals respond to new things influences how eager they are to explore.
  
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• Survey reveals widespread bias in astronomy and planetary science

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) In an online survey about their workplace experiences, 88 percent of academics, students, postdoctoral researchers and administrators in astronomy and planetary science reported hearing, experiencing or witnessing negative language or harassment relating to race, gender or other physical characteristics at work within the last five years. Of the 423 respondents, 39 percent reported having been verbally harassed and 9 percent said they had suffered phy
  
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• Survey finds Medicaid enrollees satisfied with coverage, physician access

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health) Enrollees in Medicaid reported in a nationwide survey that they're largely satisfied with the health care they receive under the program, according to researchers at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
  
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• Study finds 'sexism' in sexual assault research, but this time men are the target

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Florida Atlantic University) Sexism is alive and well, but this time men are the target. A new study debunks a long-standing theory that sexual assault isn't as emotionally traumatizing for men as it is for women and that it doesn't result in similar emotional impacts, especially depression. Men make up about 38 percent of sexual assault and rape incidents reported, and those in the military are particularly vulnerable and more unlikely to report an assault.
  
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• Study: Being near colleagues helps cross-disciplinary research on papers and patents

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Want to boost collaboration among researchers? Even in an age of easy virtual communication, physical proximity increases collaborative activity among academic scholars, according to a new study examining a decade's worth of MIT-based papers and patents.
  
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• Stem cell advance brings bioengineered arteries closer to reality

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Morgridge Institute for Research) New stem cell derivation techniques developed at the Morgridge Institute for Research and the University of Wisconsin-Madison have produced, for the first time, functional arterial cells at both the quality and scale to be relevant for disease modeling and clinical application.
  
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• Spontaneous system follows rules of equilibrium

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Northwestern University) Discovery could be the beginning of a general framework of rules for seemingly unpredictable non-equilibrium systems.
  
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• Single protein controls genetic network essential for sperm development

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Case Western Reserve University) Scientists have found a single protein -- Ptbp2 -- controls a network of over 200 genes central to how developing sperm move and communicate. The protein works by regulating how RNA is processed during each stage of sperm development.
  
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• Rural physicians report significant barriers in treating opioid use disorder

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Academy of Family Physicians) This item features an article published in the July/August 2017 Annals of Family Medicine.
  
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• Researchers revolutionize brain-computer interfaces using silicon electronics

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Columbia University School of Engineering and Applied Science) Columbia Engineering Professor Ken Shepard, a pioneer in the development of electronics that interface with biological systems, is leading a team to invent an implanted brain-interface device that could transform the lives of people with neurodegenerative diseases or people who are hearing and visually impaired.
  
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• Portland State NASA grant furthers satellite ocean research

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Portland State University) NASA has awarded a four-year, $283,000 grant to Portland State University engineering professor Ed Zaron to continue his research on tides and sub-surface ocean waves using satellite data. The work is particularly important to climate scientists in their efforts to measure sea level rise, a major symptom of global warming.
  
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• Physicians' losses can contribute to burnout

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Academy of Family Physicians) This article appears in the July/August 2017 Annals of Family Medicine. Link goes live at 5 p.m. ET, July 10.
  
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• On-site ecstasy pill-testing services may reduce user risks at concerts and raves

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Johns Hopkins Medicine) Johns Hopkins scientists report that data collected over five years by volunteers who tested pills free of charge at music festivals and raves across the United States suggest that at least some recreational users of illegal drugs may choose not to take them if tests show the pills are adulterated or fake.
  
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• Not every sperm is sacred: Longer-lived sperm produce healthier offspring

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of East Anglia) Males can produce hundreds of millions of sperm within a single ejaculate depending on the species. Does it matter then which sperm is actually fertilizing the egg? New research shows that selecting for longer-lived sperm results in offspring with better survival prospects early in life and higher quality as adults. The study by UEA, UK and Uppsala University, Sweden, could have major implications for adaptive evolution and research into assisted fertilization technol
  
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• New UTSA study describes method to save lives in chemical attacks

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Texas at San Antonio) A new study by Kiran Bhaganagar, associate professor of mechanical engineering at The University of Texas at San Antonio, and her research group, Laboratory of Turbulence Sensing & Intelligence Systems, is taking a closer look at the damage caused by chemical attacks in Syria. The Syrian Civil War, ongoing since 2011, has seen hundreds of people killed through the use of chemical weapons.
  
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• New survey highlights gender, racial harassment in astronomy and planetary science

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Geophysical Union) Women of color working in astronomy and planetary science report more gender and racial harassment than any other gender or racial group in the field, according to a new study revealing widespread harassment in these scientific disciplines.
  
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• New book provides guide to evidence-based practices in addiction treatment

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (McMaster University) A definitive guide to clinical research on addiction for front-line clinicians is found in a new book. Integrating Psychological and Pharmacological Treatments for Addictive Disorders is published by Routledge.'There's no silver bullet for treating addiction,' says James MacKillop of McMaster University, one of four co-editors. 'But there are many treatments that have strong evidence behind them. We wanted to create a go-to reference to put the best practices in treatment a
  
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• New £60m automotive facility to propel UK jobs and investment

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Bath) News of significant UK government funding to build a major new automotive facility through the University of Bath.
  
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• New £60 million automotive facility to propel UK jobs and investment

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Bath) News of significant UK government funding to build a major new automotive facility through the University of Bath.
  
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• NASA is studying fungi to keep space travelers safe on new worlds

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (BioMed Central) Human presence in closed habitats that may one day be used to explore other planets is associated with changes in the composition of the fungal community - the mycobiome - that grows on surfaces inside the habitat, according to a study published in the open access journal Microbiome.
  
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• NASA gives eastern Pacific Ocean's Hurricane Eugene 'eye exam'

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center) NASA satellites gave the Eastern Pacific Ocean's Hurricane Eugene an 'eye exam' as it studied the storm in infrared and visible light. NASA satellite imagery taken at different times showed Eugene's eye open and closed.
  
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• Nagoya forensic scientists recover human DNA from mosquitos

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Nagoya University) Nagoya University forensic scientists show that viable DNA samples can be taken from mosquito blood meal that has been digested for up to two days.
  
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• More evidence shows natural plant compound may reduce mental effects of aging

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Salk Institute) Salk scientists find benefits of antioxidant fisetin in mouse model of premature aging, Alzheimer's disease.
  
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• Miami project presents data demonstrating therapeutic potential of SRK-015 in SCI

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (University of Miami Miller School of Medicine) The Miami Project to Cure Paralysis and Scholar Rock present preclinical data demonstrating therapeutic potential of SRK-015 in spinal cord injury at 35th Annual National Neurotrauma Symposium.
  
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• Medical trainees find meaning in written reflection

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Academy of Family Physicians) This article appears in the July/August 2017 Annals of Family Medicine. Link goes live at 5 p.m. ET, July 10.
  
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• Lutein and zeaxanthin isomers benefits during high screen exposure

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (OmniActive Health Technologies) An exciting new peer reviewed publication based on ongoing research on macular carotenoids from the University of Georgia demonstrates that supplementation with lutein and zeaxanthin isomers can protect against a growing issue among the general population -- the undesirable effects of prolonged exposure to high-energy blue light emitted from digital screens of computers, tablets and smartphones.
  
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• July/August 2017 Annals of Family Medicine

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (American Academy of Family Physicians) This tip sheet features highlights from the July/August 2017 issue of Annals of Family Medicine research journal, including articles on health care reform, cancer screen and medical errors.
  
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• Journal of Orthoptera Research joins scholarly publisher Pensoft's open access portfolio

  10-07-2017 06:00
  
  (Pensoft Publishers) The Orthopterists' Society's Journal of Orthoptera Research joins the growing portfolio of open access titles published on the Pensoft-developed journal publishing platform ARPHA. While preserving its well-known style and expertise on the order Orthoptera, the journal now offers modern design, intuitive interface, and high-tech perks for authors, readers, reviewers and editors alike. The first issue in collaboration with Pensoft is live on the new journal's website as of Jun
  
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