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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 14, 2025 at 7:06am

How the brain makes decisions more quickly than computers in risky situations

Research inspired by the principles of quantum mechanics, researchers from Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) and the University of Oxford reveal new findings to understand why the human brain is able to make decisions quicker than the world's most powerful computer in the face of a critical risk situation. The human brain has this capacity despite the fact that neurons are much slower at transmitting information than microchips, which raises numerous unknown factors in the field of neuroscience.

The research is published in the journal Physical Review E.

It should be borne in mind that in many other circumstances, the human brain is not quicker than technological devices. For example, a computer or calculator can resolve mathematical operations far faster than a person. So, why is it that in critical situations—for example, when having to make an urgent decision at the wheel of a car—the human brain can surpass machines?

Most accurate computational model yet to analyze connections between farthest neurons

This recent research clarifies this matter thanks to the design of a new model of brain computational analysis, called CHARM (Complex Harmonics Decomposition). It is the most accurate model to date for examining the functions of long-distance brain connections, which link neurons that are far apart and play a fundamental role in the brain dynamics that are activated when making critical decisions. It is also the first model to apply quantum mechanics as an instrument for analyzing the brain.

The  researchers describe this model in their study. 

Part 1

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 14, 2025 at 6:57am

Watching nature scenes can reduce pain, neuroimaging study shows

A new neuroimaging study has revealed that viewing nature can help ease how people experience pain, by reducing the brain activity linked to pain perception.

Published in the journal Nature Communications  the research offers a promising foundation for new types of non-pharmacological pain treatments. The paper is titled "Nature exposure induces analgesic effects by acting on nociception-related neural processing."

Using an fMRI scanner, researchers monitored the brain activity of 49 participants as they received pain delivered through a series of small electric shocks. When they were watching videos of a natural scene compared to a city or an indoor office, participants not only reported feeling less pain, but scans showed the specific brain responses associated with processing pain changed too.

The study used advanced machine-learning to analyze the brain networks related to pain processing. The team discovered that the raw sensory signals the brain receives when something hurts were reduced when watching a carefully designed, high-quality, virtual nature scene.

The study confirmed previous findings that suggest nature can reduce subjective reports of pain, and also marks the first clear demonstration of how natural environments influence the brain, helping to buffer against unpleasant experiences.

Nature exposure induces analgesic effects by acting on nociception-related neural processing', Nature Communications (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-025-56870-2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 14, 2025 at 6:49am

Restored grasslands need 75+ years for full biodiversity recovery, study finds

Recovered grasslands need more than 75 years of continuous management to regain their biodiversity because specialized pollinators are slow to return. This finding underscores the importance of preserving old grasslands as reservoirs of biodiversity, even if it is just as ski slopes.

Grasslands worldwide are rapidly disappearing due to land-use conversion and abandonment, leading to a well-documented loss of grassland biodiversity. Restoring abandoned grasslands by removing woody vegetation and resuming traditional land management practices has positive effects on biodiversity.

However, it is also known that this diversity lags behind that of old grasslands that have been under continued management for up to several millennia. The reasons for this are not really clear and satisfying solutions have not been proposed, say the experts.

The results of a study   published in the Journal of Applied Ecology paint a consistent picture. It takes 75 years of continuous management for the plant diversity in recovered grasslands to finally reach levels comparable to ancient grasslands.

However, that's still not enough for the pollinator community. Even after 75 years, pollinators are still less specialized and less successful at pollinating the plants, although the community continuously shifts towards higher specialization and successful pollination as grasslands get older.

The finding shows that once valuable old grasslands are lost, their restoration cannot be achieved quickly.

Long-term management is required for the recovery of pollination networks and function in restored grasslands, Journal of Applied Ecology (2025). DOI: 10.1111/1365-2664.70017

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 13, 2025 at 12:39pm

128 New Moons Found Orbiting Saturn

The race between Jupiter and Saturn for the most moons in the Solar System may have just finally come screeching to a halt.

A team of scientists has found a whopping 128 previously unknown moons hanging around Saturn, in a discovery officially recognized by the International Astronomical Union. This brings the planet's total number of known moons to 274, leaving Jupiter, with its mere 95 moons, in the dust.

https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.07081

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 13, 2025 at 9:32am

Mosquito pain receptors found to be less sensitive during extreme heat, which could nullify some natural bug sprays

Hotter temperatures may render natural insect repellents less effective against mosquitoes, according to a new study. Researchers found that a pain receptor called TRPA1 becomes less sensitive in mosquitoes when exposed to heat, meaning that the chemical cues that typically trigger insect avoidance behaviors are prevented from activating as strongly.

TRPA1, also known as the "wasabi receptor," helps animals detect noxious heat and harmful chemicals. In humans, this receptor can induce eye and skin irritation. In mosquitoes, it influences which hosts the insects find most alluring—specifically, those unprotected by repellents that drive them away.

What the researchers now  found was that the chemicals were not able to activate the mosquito wasabi receptor as effectively when temperatures exceeded the heat activation threshold.

Typical insect repellents create a chemical barrier that discourages proximity and prevents mosquitoes from reaching their target. Yet because their receptors are desensitized in warmer temperatures, natural substances like citronellal and catnip oil, known for their repellent properties, would be less effective. Products with those ingredients may be less effective if you're using them at temperatures that are considered extreme heat events, say the researchers.

Yeaeun Park et al, Heat activation desensitizes Aedes aegypti transient receptor potential ankyrin 1 (AaTRPA1) to chemical agonists that repel mosquitoes, Pesticide Biochemistry and Physiology (2025). DOI: 10.1016/j.pestbp.2025.106326

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 13, 2025 at 8:50am

Food insecurity raises risk of heart disease over time: A 20 year study

Struggling to afford food today could mean heart problems tomorrow. Young adults experiencing food insecurity have a 41% greater risk of developing heart disease in midlife, even after accounting for demographic and socioeconomic factors, according to a new  Medicine study.

Food insecurity means struggling to get enough nutritious food to stay healthy.

That makes it a clear target for prevention—if we address food insecurity early, we may be able to reduce the burden of heart disease later."

The study was published in JAMA Cardiology.

Among the 3,616 study participants, those experiencing food insecurity were 41% more likely to develop cardiovascular disease than their food-secure counterparts. Over the study period, 11% of food-insecure individuals developed heart disease, compared to 6% of those with adequate food access.

By following people over two decades, researchers were able to show that food insecurity, on its own, significantly increases the risk of developing cardiovascular disease. 

 Food Insecurity and Incident Cardiovascular Disease Among Black and White US Individuals, 2000-2020, JAMA Cardiology (2025). DOI: 10.1001/jamacardio.2025.0109

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 13, 2025 at 8:44am

Cells 'speed date' to find their neighbours when forming tissues

In developing hearts, cells shuffle around, bumping into each other to find their place, and the stakes are high: pairing with the wrong cell could mean the difference between a beating heart and one that falters.

A study published in the Biophysical Journal demonstrates how heart cells go about this "matchmaking" process. The researchers model the intricate movements of these cells and predict how genetic variations could disrupt the heart development process in fruit flies.

In both humans and fruit flies, the heart's tissues arise from two distinct regions of the embryo, which are initially far apart. As development progresses, these cells journey toward each other, ultimately merging into a tube-like shape that will become the heart. For the heart to develop correctly, these cells must align and pair up precisely.

As the cells come together, they jiggle and adjust, and somehow always end up pairing with a heart cell of the same type. This observation inspired researchers to explore how cells match up in the first place and how they know when they've found the right fit.

Developing heart cells have tentacle-like protrusions called filopodia, which probe and grab onto potential partners.

Earlier researchers found that proteins create waves that pull mismatched cells apart, giving them another chance to find the right match.

It's basically like cells are speed dating. They have just a few moments to determine if they're a good match, with molecular 'friends' ready to pull them apart if they're not compatible.

The researchers found that heart cells seek stability where they remain closest to stillness—like a rolling ball that eventually comes to a stop, known as energy equilibrium in physics.

In developing heart cells, this principle applies when cells find a balance between connection forces and their ability to adjust to strain—also known as adhesive energy and elasticity. Based on this observation, the team developed a model that shows how cells can self-organize.

Scientists tested their model on fruit fly hearts with mutations and misalignments. By calculating the adhesive energy between different cell types and assessing tissue elasticity, the model predicted how cells would match and rearrange.

Although rare, sometimes the heart tube ends up with one cell on one side when it should have two, or two cells when there should be four. The model produced outcomes that closely mirrored what was observed in real embryos.

This  new model not only enhances our understanding of how cells match and align during heart development but also has broader applications. Similar cell-matching processes are crucial in neuronal connections, wound repair, and facial development, where hiccups can lead to conditions like cleft lip.

Interfacial energy constraints are sufficient to align cells over large distances, Biophysical Journal (2025). DOI: 10.1016/j.bpj.2025.02.011

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 13, 2025 at 7:24am

When somebody says 'shut up!', how do you stop speaking?

A premotor cortical network in the brain allows people to voluntarily stop speaking, study suggests

Speech is a unique human ability that is known to be supported by various motor and cognitive processes. When humans start speaking, they can decide to cease at any point; for instance, if they are interrupted by something happening or by another person speaking to them.

The ability to voluntarily stop speaking plays a central role in social interactions, as it allows people to engage in conversations with others while adaptively responding to social cues, environmental stimuli or interruptions.

Researchers  recently set out to better understand how the human brain controls the ceasing of speech using tools to record neurophysiological signals. Their paper, published in Nature Human Behaviour, unveils a previously unknown premotor cortical network that could support voluntary speech inhibition.

Researchers recruited 13 patients diagnosed with treatment-resistant epilepsy who had electrodes implanted on their brains' surfaces to better understand the brain regions that contribute to their epileptic seizures. These patients were asked to complete a speech-stopping task, which asked them to follow instructions on when to start and stop speaking, while their neural activity was recorded.

Neural recordings revealed distinct activity in the premotor frontal cortex correlated with stopping speech. This activity was found in largely separate cortical sites from regions encoding vocal tract articulatory movements. Moreover, this activity primarily occurred with abrupt stopping in the middle of an utterance, rather than naturally completing a phrase.

The findings gathered by this team of researchers hint at the existence of a specialized brain mechanism that supports the voluntary control of speech.

The researchers conducted further tests aimed at validating the existence of this mechanism by stimulating specific parts of the premotor frontal cortex.

Electrocortical stimulation at many premotor sites with inhibitory stop activity caused involuntary speech arrest, which contradicts previous clinical interpretations of this effect as evidence for critical centers of speech production," wrote the team in their paper. "Together, these results suggest a previously unknown premotor cortical network that supports the inhibitory control of speech, providing implications for understanding both natural and altered speech production."

Overall, the results of this study suggest that the human ability to voluntarily stop speech is supported by a particular inhibitory control neural network that had not been uncovered before.

Lingyun Zhao et al, Inhibitory control of speech production in the human premotor frontal cortex, Nature Human Behaviour (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41562-025-02118-4

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 12, 2025 at 11:37am

Turtle Dance
Researchers found that the turtles exhibited significantly higher levels of ‘turtle dance’ behaviour when they were in their designated feeding fields, strongly suggesting that they could distinguish between the two magnetic fields.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on March 12, 2025 at 11:24am

A 'Yellow Brick Road' at The Bottom of The Pacific Ocean

An example of ancient active volcanic geology!

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