source: Phys.org
Researchers from the Victoria University of Wellington have demonstrated a link between invasive ant species and increased levels of diseases in bees. Read Full Article Here
source: Phys.org
At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, anti-China fervor stoked consumer discrimination that cost Chinese restaurants $7.4 billion in lost revenue in 2020—losses 18.4 percent greater than at other types of restaurants—according to a new study by researchers from Boston College, the University of Michigan, and Microsoft Research, published today in the journal Nature Human Behaviour. Read Full Article Here
African rhino numbers are declining at unsustainable rates in core state-run parks which is why more than half the continent’s remaining rhinos are now on private land.
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source: Phys.org
source: Phys.org
ChatGPT is a powerful language model developed by OpenAI that has the ability to generate human-like text, making it capable of engaging in natural language conversations. This technology has the potential to revolutionize the way we interact with computers, and it has already begun to be integrated into various industries. Read Full Article Here
China’s National Bureau of Statistics has confirmed what researchers such as myself have long suspected—that 2022 was the year China’s population turned down, the first time that has happened since the great famine brought on by Chinese leader Mao Zedong in 1959-1961.
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source: Phys.org
The evolutionary secrets that enable the medicinal herb known as barbed skullcap to produce cancer fighting compounds have been unlocked by a collaboration of UK and Chinese researchers.
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source: Phys.org
The red junglefowl—the wild ancestor of the chicken—is losing its genetic diversity by interbreeding with domesticated birds, according to a new study led by Frank Rheindt of the National University of Singapore published January 19 in the journal PLOS Genetics.
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source: Phys.org
source: Phys.org
The rapid growth of plastic waste is an ever-growing environmental and energy challenge. Selectively converting waste plastics to naphtha, a main feedstock for ethylene and the plastic industry, shows high potential to partially replace petroleum-route naphtha and alleviate global net carbon emissions. Read Full Article Here
source: Phys.org
A team of researchers from the University of Queensland, La Trobe University and Monash University, all in Australia, has found evidence that suggests the evolutionary loss of a ryanodine receptor isoform may explain how muscles in warm-blooded creatures evolved to allow for the generation of heat even when at rest. The paper is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Read Full Article Here
source: Phys.org
The folded leaf of an oak tree, faded yellow, dotted with dark spots. We pick up on the information contained in leaves almost subconsciously when strolling through the forest. But the researchers at UZH’s Remote Sensing Laboratories are taking this ability to the next level. Read Full Article Here
source: Phys.org
One of last year’s space highlights was the NASA DART mission’s collision with Dimorphos, the small moon of the binary asteroid Didymos (seen left). The impact measurably shifted the target asteroid’s orbit around its primary while casting a plume of debris thousand of kilometers out into space. Read Full Article Here
When the company OpenAI launched its new artificial intelligence program, ChatGPT, in late 2022, educators began to worry. ChatGPT could generate text that seemed like a human wrote it. How could teachers detect whether students were using language generated by an AI chatbot to cheat on a writing assignment?
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source: Phys.org
source: Phys.org
Research led by the University of Southampton has revealed how supermassive black holes (SMBHs) are feeding off gas clouds which reach them by traveling hundreds of thousands of light years from one galaxy to another. Read Full Article Here
source: Phys.org
Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology reveal how a methane-generating microbe can grow on toxic sulfite without becoming poisoned. Read Full Article Here
It’s not at every university that laser pulses powerful enough to burn paper and skin are sent blazing down a hallway. But that’s what happened in UMD’s Energy Research Facility, an unremarkable looking building on the northeast corner of campus. If you visit the utilitarian white and gray hall now, it seems like any other university hall—as long as you don’t peak behind a cork board and spot the metal plate covering a hole in the wall.
Gene therapies have the potential to treat neurological disorders like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, but they face a common barrier—the blood-brain barrier. Now, researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have developed a way to move therapies across the brain’s protective membrane to deliver brain-wide therapy with a range of biological medications and treatments.
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source: Phys.org
Lasers are intense beams of colored light. Depending on their color and other properties, they can scan your groceries, cut through metal, eradicate tumors, and even trigger nuclear fusion. But not every laser color is available with the right properties for a specific job.
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source: Phys.org
source: Phys.org
A Cornell researcher has completed a decades-long program to develop new varieties of tomato that naturally resist pests and limit transfer of viral disease by insects. Read Full Article Here
Varroa destructor is an ectoparasitic mite that can cause European honey bee colonies to collapse by spreading Deformed wing virus as they feed. A study published in PLOS Pathogens by Zachary Lamas and colleagues at the USDA-ARS and the University of Maryland suggests a relatively small number of mites can contribute to a large number of infected bees.
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source: Phys.org
We can frequently find in our daily lives a localized wave structure that maintains its shape upon propagation—picture a smoke ring flying in the air. Similar stable structures have been studied in various research fields and can be found in magnets, nuclear systems, and particle physics. In contrast to a ring of smoke, they can be made resilient to perturbations. This is known in mathematics and physics as topological protection.
source: Phys.org
Even though one in 10 U.S. households is food insecure, only 28% of those 13.5 million households took advantage of food pantries in 2021—partly because of the perception that food pantry offerings are lower quality than what’s available in grocery stores, according to new Cornell research. Read Full Article Here
University of Wyoming College of Education faculty members have published a paper in the journal PLOS ONE describing the development of an interactive dashboard that combines data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), the U.S. Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
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source: Phys.org
In 2015, a submarine volcano in the South Pacific erupted, forming the Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai island, destined to a short, seven-year life. A research team led by the University of Colorado Boulder and Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) jumped on the rare opportunity to study the early microbial colonizers of a newly formed landmass and to their surprise, the researchers discovered a unique microbial community that metabolizes sulfur and atmospheric gases, similar to organisms found in deep sea vents or hot springs.
source: Phys.org
Students who take math in the 12th grade improve their chances of enrolling and continuing in higher education, according to a new report by the Los Angeles Education Research Institute at UCLA. Read Full Article Here
Researchers cover thousands of years in a quest to understand the elusive origins of the Black Death
source: Phys.org
Seeking to better understand more about the origins and movement of bubonic plague, in ancient and contemporary times, researchers at McMaster University, University of Sydney and the University of Melbourne, have completed a painstaking granular examination of hundreds of modern and ancient genome sequences, creating the largest analysis of its kind. Read Full Article Here
