Perhaps you saw the headlines last week about a new analysis finding that people who consumed a lot of fiber are significantly less likely to die from heart disease, stroke, Type 2 diabetes, and colon cancer. How could such a frumpy nutrient make such a big difference in our health? After all, fiber is, by definition, indigestible by humans. It provides no vitamins, minerals, or energy. And yet, fiber intake is consistently linked with lower disease risk....
The items below are highlights from the free newsletter, “Smart, useful, science stuff about COVID-19.” To receive newsletter issues daily in your inbox, sign up here. David Tuller at Kaiser Health News reports that saliva tests for SARS-CoV-2 are catching on in the U.S., but only represent a “small percentage of the more than 900,000 tests conducted daily on average at the end of September." A University of Illinois chemist quoted in the 10/6/20 story says of saliva tests, “You don’t need swabs, you don’t need health care workers, you don’t need [chemicals to stabilize spit-samples], and you don’t need RNA isolation [extraction] kits....
Dark matter, the substance no one has ever seen, continues to baffle cosmologists. New observations of the distribution of dark matter in a distant cluster of galaxies may even force scientists to propose a fifth force of nature—or to rewrite the basics of Newtonian gravity. Little wonder that many researchers hope that the unsettling result will turn out to be an observational fluke. Giant clusters of galaxies consist of two observable components....
The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research. The eruption of Mount Semeru in Indonesia on Saturday tragically claimed the lives of 22 people, with another 22 still missing and 56 injured. More than 5,000 people have been affected by the eruption, and more than 2,000 people have taken refuge at 19 evacuation points. Saturday’s eruption produced an ash plume that reached 15km into the atmosphere, along with hot pyroclastic flows—dense, fast-moving clouds of solidified lava, ash and gas....
By Victoria Cavaliere SEATTLE (Reuters) - Wildlife conservation groups have filed a lawsuit against the U.S. government for denying federal protection for rare wolverines in the mountains of Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, the groups’ attorney said Tuesday. The eight conservation organizations sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in federal court in Montana on Monday seeking to reverse an August decision not to apply Endangered Species Act safeguards for the reclusive but feisty member of the weasel family....
Of course, these algorithms are far from perfect, as was recently shown when a BBC journalist broke into his own voice-controlled bank account using his twin brother’s voice. Is this a case of computers just failing at something humans can do perfectly? We decided to find out. Each human being has a voice that is distinct and different from everyone else’s. So it seems intuitive that we’d be able to identify someone from their voice fairly easily....
A newborn brownbanded bamboo shark (Chiloscyllium punctatum) hatched in the lagoon tank at Steinhart Aquarium in San Francisco—almost four years after its mother was last in contact with a male! This finding is almost twice the previous sperm storage record of 843 days for sharks, which was held by the chain catsharks (Scyliorhinus rotifer). This amazing new discovery has added a new wrinkle to the already complicated field of shark reproductive biology....
Can genes protect abused children from future emotional turmoil? Have you ever wondered why some people are so much more resilient than others? Why some can bounce back from trauma, whereas others are doomed to a lifetime of depression and other mental angst? A new study indicates that genes may have something (read: a lot) to do with it. Researchers report in the Archives of General Psychiatry that children who are physically and emotionally abused but have the most protective variant of CRHR1, a gene that controls the body’s response to stress hormones, are less likely to suffer depression as adults....
50 Things to See in the Sky by Sarah Barker Princeton Architectural Press, 2019 ($16.95) In this stargazer’s guide (with a glow-in-the-dark cover), astrophysicist Barker gives tips for finding celestial phenomena with or without a telescope. She shares practical tips and tricks to navigate the boundless sky, such as how to identify the constellation Orion, spot the red supergiant star Betelgeuse and even locate the Apollo 11 moon landing site. The amusing illustrations and maps come in handy to identify the right time and place for observing....
Hawaii is renowned for its picture-perfect landscapes. But its island ecosystem is also prone to invasive species that can upset the natural balance. One such intruder is the Myrica faya tree that has made its way into the tropical forests of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. A new aerial monitoring technique is allowing scientists to detect the effects of this invader much earlier than traditional remote sensing approaches can, providing researchers with additional insight to control it....
On the six-month, 10,500-mile journey an albacore tuna typically makes from where it is caught in the southern Indian Ocean to a can on a U.S. grocery store shelf, it passes among countless hands—and from fishing boats on the high seas to larger vessels that ferry it to port in a process called transshipping. Now, for the first time, a series of satellite- and data-based analyses of the fishing supply chain shows how common this bucket brigade–like process is in the fishing industry, and could illuminate how it helps hide illegal fishing....
A well-known scientific principle describing how water moves through plants can help explain why trees may struggle to survive as the planet warms, scientists say in a new study. Using an equation called Darcy’s law, the research also helps explain why iconic giant trees like the California redwood could be especially vulnerable to rising temperatures. The concept was outlined in a paper published this month in the journal Nature Climate Change....
In addition to being a necessary (if awkward) component of romantic life, the first date can also be one of the most anxiety-provoking. Facing off over that infinite chasm of a white tablecloth, each member of a couple will inevitably be afflicted by a million troubled thoughts, including, “Is my date even attractive?” “Am I even attractive?” and “Did I remember to turn off the stove before I left the house?...
By Julie Steenhuysen CHICAGO (Reuters) - Heroin overdose deaths in the United States nearly quadrupled between 2002 and 2013, fueled by lower costs as well as increased abuse of prescription opiate painkillers, U.S. health officials said on Tuesday. Such medicines, which include Vicodin, OxyContin and Percocet, increase individuals’ susceptibility to heroin addiction, Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told Reuters. “Everything we see points to more accessible, less-expensive heroin all over the country,” Frieden said of the joint report by the CDC and the U....
And the winners are (drum roll please) … a telescope, the Smoky Mountains and a stormy night sky. That seemingly random list represents just some of the scenes captured by the winners of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s “Weather in Focus” photo contest, which sought to acknowledge the best snapshots of weather or the science used to forecast the weather, water availability and flooding. The winners across four categories came from a total of 2,000 entries of photographs taken between January 1, 2014 and March 31, 2015....
The world struggled to understand how COVID-19 spread during the pandemic’s first four months, but genetic sequences of the coronavirus reported by laboratories tell the real story—when the virus arrived in each place and where it came from. The sequences, which advance from left to right in the graphic, show that the virus jumped from an animal to humans in China, humans transmitted it to one another within China, then people traveling from there spread it globally person to person....
The classic red-and-white horseshoe magnet may have worked for Wile E. Coyote, but it can be a little inflexible. Now researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) have created a more malleable tool: a miniscule liquid-based magnet made from nanoparticles. Such flexible magnets could be useful in places where rigid ones cannot go, including soft robots or flexible electronics. And although they are not yet ready for practical applications, the liquid-based magnets reveal a new facet of nanoparticle behavior, which could pave the way for a novel range of magnetic materials, the researchers say....
As with most disasters, when the history of the COVID pandemic is written, there will be a fair amount of finger-pointing involved. Much more could have been done to mitigate the coronavirus impact in the United States, but in reality, there are very few countries that totally escaped this scourge. Scientific research has provided a lot of new knowledge by which to manage the pandemic—and of course, the development of vaccines in record time is welcome news....
(Reuters) - The Arctic zone has moved into a warmer, greener “new normal” phase, which means less habitat for polar bears and more access for development, an international scientific team reported on Thursday. Arctic air temperatures were higher - about 2.5 degrees F (1.5 degrees C) higher in 2011 than the baseline number for the previous 30 years - and there was a dramatic loss of sea ice and glacier mass, the scientists said in a telephone briefing....
If you visit Algonquin Provincial Park in Ontario, you may hear the high, lonesome howls of wolves. You may even be lucky enough to catch a glimpse of a distant pack racing through the forests. But when you show off your blurry pictures back home, what species should you boast that you saw? Depending on the scientist you ask, you may get a different answer. Some may even offer you a few different answers all at once....
