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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 6, 2024 at 12:44pm

The reason insects circle lights at night: They lose track of the sky

It's an observation as old as humans gathering around campfires: Light at night can draw an erratically circling crowd of insects. In art, music and literature, this spectacle is an enduring metaphor for dangerous but irresistible attractions. And watching their frenetic movements really gives the sense that something is wrong—that instead of finding food and evading predators, these nocturnal pilots are trapped by a light.

Sadly, centuries of witnessing what happens have produced little certainty about why it happens. How does a simple light change fast, precise navigators into helpless, flittering captives? We are researchers examining flight, vision and evolution, and we have used high-speed tracking techniques in research published in Nature Communications to provide an answer.

Samuel T. Fabian et al, Why flying insects gather at artificial light, Nature Communications (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-44785-3

https://theconversation.com/the-surprising-reason-why-insects-circl...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 3, 2024 at 11:31am

WHO Warns Cancer Cases Will Jump 77% by 2050. Here's Why.

The number of new cancer cases will rise to more than 35 million in 2050 – 77 percent higher than the figure in 2022, the World Health Organization's cancer agency warned recently.

The WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) cited tobacco, alcohol, obesity and air pollution as key factors in the estimated rise.
"Over 35 million new cancer cases are predicted in 2050", a statement said, a 77-percent increase from the some 20 million cases diagnosed in 2022.

"The rapidly-growing global cancer burden reflects both population ageing and growth, as well as changes to people's exposure to risk factors, several of which are associated with socioeconomic development.

"Tobacco, alcohol and obesity are key factors behind the increasing incidence of cancer, with air pollution still a key driver of environmental risk factors."

The most-developed countries are expected to record the greatest increases in case numbers, with an additional 4.8 million new cases predicted in 2050 compared with 2022 estimates, the WHO said.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 3, 2024 at 10:06am

Doing science is the ultimate act of rebellion

For women in science it is partly about shattering stereotypes and glass ceilings.

For everybody in science, it is about shattering myths, superstitions, ancient way of thinking, unproven and baseless beliefs, irrationality and everything else an evolved human mind shouldn't be doing.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 3, 2024 at 10:00am

Autoimmune disease link to X chromosome
A molecular coating found on the X chromosome might be one of the reasons women account for around 80% of all cases of autoimmune disease, a category that includes conditions such as lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. In most mammals, including humans, a male’s cells typically include one copy of the X chromosome, whereas a female’s cells typically carry two. Half of women’s X chromosomes are coated with RNA and proteins that muzzle the genes inside — and are targeted by misguided immune molecules. Experiments in male mice with a lupus-like disease showed that those with a form of this coating had higher autoantibody levels and more extensive tissue damage.

https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(24)00002-3?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS0092867424000023%3Fshowall%3Dtrue

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 3, 2024 at 9:47am

Herbivorous animals can be fooled to leave the plants alone 

 Researchers have shown it is possible to shield plants from the hungry maws of herbivorous mammals by fooling them with the smell of a variety they typically avoid.

Findings from the study published in Nature Ecology & Evolution show tree seedlings planted next to the decoy smell solution were 20 times less likely to be eaten by animals.

This is equivalent to the seedlings being surrounded by actual plants that are unpalatable to the herbivore. In most cases it does trick the animals into leaving the plants alone.

Herbivores cause significant damage to valuable plants in ecological and economically sensitive areas worldwide, but killing the animals to protect the plants can be unethical.

So, researchers  created artificial odors that mimicked the smell of plant species they naturally avoid, and this gently nudged problematic herbivores away from areas we didn't want them to be. Given that many herbivores use plant odor as their primary sense to forage, this method provides a new approach that could be used to help protect valued plants globally, either in conservation or protecting agricultural crops.

The researchers selected an unpalatable shrub in the citrus family, Boronia pinnata, and a palatable canopy species, Eucalyptus punctata, to test the concept.

The study compared using B. pinnata solution and the real plant and found both were equally successful at protecting eucalypt seedlings from being eaten by wallabies.

Olfactory misinformation provides refuge to palatable plants from mammalian browsing, Nature Ecology & Evolution (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41559-024-02330-x

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 2, 2024 at 9:56am

Parrots can move along thin branches using ‘beakiation’

The sidestep involves shuffling across the underside of a branch using both feet and the beak

To move along narrow branches, a parrot can hang from a branch with its beak, swing its body sideways and grab hold farther along with its feet. The newly described gait, dubbed beakiation, expands the birds’ locomotive repertoire and underscores how versatile their beaks are, researchers report January 31 in Royal Society Open Science.

Parrots “are specialized for climbing and moving around in the trees". What would happen if you flip a bird upside down or make them go onto the tiniest branch possible?

Scientists put four rosy-faced lovebirds (Agapornis roseicollis) to the test. Birds placed on a suspended bar just 2.5 millimeters in diameter realized that the best way to shuffle along it was to use their beaks and feet in a cyclical side-swinging motion. The birds traveled 10 centimeters per second on average during each stride (beak touchdown to beak touchdown).

Watch a parrot “beakiate” along a bar

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.231397

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 2, 2024 at 9:17am

Differences in heart rate variability in pregnant women could be marker for premature delivery

A team of obstetricians, gynecologists and data analysts has found evidence that wrist-based heart rate monitors could predict a premature birth.

In their study, reported on the open-access site PLOS ONE, pregnant volunteers wore WHOOP monitors prior to giving birth.

Previous research has shown that after becoming pregnant, women experience heart rate variability, defined as fluctuations in the amount of time between heartbeats. This variability declines as the pregnancy progresses, around 33 weeks. At that point, variability begins to increase steadily until birth.

For this new study, the research team wondered if the same changes in variability occur with women who experience premature deliveries. To find out, they turned to WHOOP, a maker of strap-on wrist sensors that monitor heart rate, noting that a small study conducted previously with researchers at WHOOP had shown that the device could be used to track heart rate variability in pregnant women.

In the new study, 241 pregnant women of various nationalities living in 15 countries agreed to wear the device in the months leading up to their delivery. The researchers found that heart rate variability for the women who delivered on or near their due date corresponded with previous findings—variability declined until approximately seven weeks before delivery. But things were markedly different for those women who delivered early—variability patterns were much less consistent. And variability also began a steady increase approximately seven weeks before delivery, which, in their cases, was well before their due dates.

The research team suggests that heart rate monitoring devices could become a new tool for use by obstetricians in monitoring their patients. Such devices, they note, may not only allow for better prediction of delivery dates, but could also help in employing therapies designed to prolong at-risk pregnancies.

Summer R. Jasinski et al, Wearable-derived maternal heart rate variability as a novel digital biomarker of preterm birth, PLOS ONE (2024). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0295899

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 2, 2024 at 9:11am

ALMA spots the shadow of a molecular outflow from a quasar when the universe was less than 1 billion years old

Theoretical predictions have been confirmed with the discovery of an outflow of molecular gas from a quasar when the universe was less than a billion years old.

A quasar is a compact region powered by a supermassive black hole located in the center of a massive galaxy. They are extremely luminous, with a point-like appearance similar to stars, and are extremely distant from Earth. Owing to their distance and brightness, they provide a peek into conditions of the early universe, when it was less than 1 billion years old.

Researchers have discovered the first evidence of suppression of star formation driven by an outflow of molecular gas in a quasar-host galaxy in the early universe. Their findings, based on observations they made using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), in Chile, were published in The Astrophysical Journal.

Molecular gas is vital to the formation of stars. As the primary fuel of star formation, the ubiquity and high concentrations of molecular gas within a galaxy would lead to a vast number of stars being formed. By ejecting this gas into intergalactic space faster than it could be consumed by star formation, molecular outflows effectively suppress the formation of stars in galaxies that host quasars.

Theoretical work suggests that molecular gas outflows play an important role in the formation and evolution of galaxies from an early age, because they can regulate star formation. Quasars are especially energetic sources, so  scientists expected that they may be able to generate powerful outflows.

The quasar the researchers observed, J2054-0005, has a very high redshift—it and the Earth are apparently moving away from each other very fast.

The findings from this study are the first strong evidence that powerful molecular gas outflows from quasar-host galaxies exist and impact galaxy evolution at the early cosmic age.

Molecular outflow in the reionization-epoch quasar J2054-0005 revealed by OH 119 μm observations, The Astrophysical Journal (2024). DOI: 10.3847/1538-4357/ad0df5

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 1, 2024 at 2:48pm

What draws the moth to the flame

Nocturnal insects appear drawn to artificial lights because they instinctively twist their backs towards bright objects. The instinct to tilt their backs towards the brightest thing available at night — the sky — allows insects to quickly figure out which way is up. Researchers who tracked insects’ flight patterns with motion-capture cameras found that this even leads the animals to flip upside down and crash into the ground when the light source is underneath them. The researchers suggest reducing upward-facing lights and ground reflections to avoid confusing flying insects at night.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-024-44785-3

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 1, 2024 at 2:39pm

 that's not what astronomers observe in today’s universe

(Below)

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