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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 3, 2023 at 9:54am

Discovery of new ice may change our understanding of water

Researchers  have discovered a new type of ice that more closely resembles liquid water than any other known ices and that may rewrite our understanding of water and its many anomalies.

The newly discovered ice is amorphous—that is, its molecules are in a disorganized form, not neatly ordered as they are in ordinary, crystalline ice. Amorphous ice, although rare on Earth, is the main type of ice found in space. That is because in the colder environment of space, ice does not have enough thermal energy to form crystals.

For the study, published in the journal Science, the research team used a process called ball milling, vigorously shaking ordinary ice together with steel balls in a jar cooled to -200 degrees Centigrade.

They found that, rather than ending up with small bits of ordinary ice, the process yielded a novel amorphous form of ice that, unlike all other known ices, had the same density as liquid water and whose state resembled water in solid form. They named the new ice "medium-density amorphous ice" (MDA).

The team suggested that MDA (which looks like a fine white powder) may exist inside ice moons of the outer solar system, as tidal forces from gas giants such as Jupiter and Saturn may exert similar shear forces on ordinary ice as those created by ball milling. In addition, the team found that when MDA was warmed up and recrystallized, it released an extraordinary amount of heat, meaning it could trigger tectonic motions and "icequakes" in the kilometers-thick covering of ice on moons such as Ganymede.

 Alexander Rosu-Finsen et al, Medium-density amorphous ice, Science (2023). DOI: 10.1126/science.abq2105. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abq2105

https://phys.org/news/2023-02-discovery-ice.html?utm_source=nwlette...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 3, 2023 at 9:48am

Network science is the study of physical, biological, social and other phenomena through the creation of network representations. These representations can sometimes offer very valuable insight, unveiling interesting patterns in data and relationships between connected entities.

  Network science and network visualizations are superb in summarizing and explaining complex systems in one image in a quick and objective way.

A network is essentially an object that consists of several nodes and links that connect these nodes. Network scientists  build these networks using data that relates to specific phenomena involving different interconnected parties or entities.

Two data scientists working at Central European University, Baoba Inc. and Revolut recently used network science to examine the FIFA World Cup 2022. The network representations they created, outlined in a paper published on Research Gate, allowed them to shed some new light on the fascinating interconnected world of soccer stars and clubs.

To build a network, researchers need a data source that shows relationships between the entities they are studying. In the example of soccer, this could be a team just as much as individual players. So, first things first—researchers needed data. This is where expert knowledge is required.

So the researchers collected the data necessary to build their FIFA World Cup 2022 Networks from transfermarkt.com, a soccer-related website owned by Axel Springer SE. This website contains a vast amount of information about soccer players and clubs, including players' team memberships and transfer histories, as well as both ongoing and past championship results.

So they came up with this: 

 Milan Janosov et al, FIFA World Cup 2022—The Network Edition, Unpublished (2023). DOI: 10.13140/rg.2.2.20650.29129

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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 2, 2023 at 3:00pm

A Mysterious Whirlpool Appeared Over Hawaii, And It Could Be Because of SpaceX

A ghostly blue spiral spotted in the sky over Hawaii could be related to a SpaceX satellite launch.

The National Astronomical Observatory of Japan spotted the mysterious spiral through its Subaru Telescope on Janua..., just after SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket carrying a large military satellite for the US Space Force.

https://www.sciencealert.com/a-mysterious-whirlpool-appeared-over-h...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 2, 2023 at 1:47pm

Light-activated nanoscale drills can kill pathogenic fungi

That stubborn athlete's foot infection an estimated 70% of people get at some point in their life could become much easier to get rid of thanks to nanoscale drills activated by visible light.

Proven effective against antibiotic-resistant infectious bacteria and cancer cells, the molecular machines developed by researchers are just as good at combating infectious fungi, according to a new study published in Advanced Science.

The molecular machines developed by them are nanoscale compounds whose paddlelike chain of atoms moves in a single direction when exposed to visible light. This causes a drilling motion that allows the machines to bore into the surface of cells, killing them. This study is the first to show that, indeed, these molecules can also be effective against fungi.

In contrast to most antifungals, development of resistance to the visible-light activated nanoscale drills was not detected. Spinning at 2-3 million times per second, their rotors cause fungal cells to disintegrate by disrupting their metabolism.

By targeting the mitochondria,  these molecules disrupt the cell's metabolism, resulting in an overall energy imbalance that leads to an uncontrolled flow of water and ions such as calcium into the cell, eventually causing the cell to explode.

Ana L. Santos et al, Visible‐Light‐Activated Molecular Machines Kill Fungi by Necrosis Following Mitochondrial Dysfunction and Calcium Overload, Advanced Science (2023). DOI: 10.1002/advs.202205781

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 2, 2023 at 1:23pm

Using CRISPR to detect cancer biomarkers

Most cancer diagnostic techniques rely on uncomfortable and invasive procedures, such as biopsies, endoscopies or mammograms. Blood samples could be a less unpleasant option, though only a few forms of the disease can currently be diagnosed this way. But now, researchers reporting in ACS Sensors have developed an easy-to-use method that can detect small amounts of cancer-related molecules in exosomes in plasma and effectively distinguish between malignant and benign samples.

Exosomes are small vesicles that pinch off from a host cell, carrying cargo, such as nucleic acids, lipids and proteins, inside. This means that they provide a window into the condition of the cell they originated from. Accordingly, the unique intracellular environment of cancerous cells will be reflected in their exosomes through biomarkers such as micro RNAs (miRNAs). These are very small nucleic acids, only a few nucleotides in length, that regulate protein expression in cells and can become dysregulated in tumors. Therefore, it's possible that a blood test could someday detect cancerous cells simply by targeting these exosomal miRNAs.

But quantifying miRNAs has been difficult because they are present at very low levels in exosomes, requiring laborious processes that can introduce contamination and report unreliable results. So, some researchers have analyzed RNA and proteins in vesicles with the gene-editing tool CRISPR. Butother scientists wanted to develop a way to detect the small numbers of cancer-related exosomal miRNAs using a different CRISPR system with a unique RNase activity that was sensitive, reliable and effective. To create the detection method, the team designed a CRISPR/Cas13a system to cut apart a fluorophore and quencher-labeled reporter molecule, then packed it into a liposome—essentially a manufactured version of an exosome. When the two types of compartments fused together, the CRISPR cargo would then interact with the exosomal genetic material. If the target miRNA sequence was present, the Cas13a protein became activated and cut apart the reporter molecule, producing a fluorescent signal. In these experiments, the team targeted miRNA-21, which is involved in the development of several diseases, including breast cancer. The method successfully detected this miRNA within a mixture of similar sequences with high sensitivity. In other experiments, the researchers tested the method on a group of exosomes from healthy human cells and groups derived from breast cancer cells. The system consistently differentiated the cancer-related exosomes from those derived from healthy cells, showing it could be useful as a cancer diagnostic. The researchers say that this method has the potential to make cancer diagnosis and monitoring quicker and easier by analyzing blood samples.

Highly effective detection of exosomal miRNAs in plasma using liposome-mediated transfection CRISPR/Cas13a, ACS Sensors (2023). pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acssensors.2c01683

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 2, 2023 at 1:15pm

Study examines how reflecting on your values before opening your mouth makes for happier relationships

Ever found yourself angry at a situation and in desperate need to tell the world about it by ranting to anyone who'll listen? Maybe it's time to pause; inhale and reflect on what values you hold dear.

A new interdisciplinary study, conducted by philosophers,  linguists and  psychologists  has found that a process of reflecting on life values before a debate can enhance people's willingness to listen to others and engage with them in a civil dialogue.

The analysis revealed that the process of reflecting on values first helped to inspire individuals' "intellectual humility" (their awareness of their own fallibility and openness to others' views): 60.6% of participants who reflected on their values first showed more humility compared to the average person who was not given this task. In a seemingly ever-distant world where opinions appear increasingly polarized, the researchers suggest their results show grounds for optimism. If people were to stop and reflect on the values which are important to them, debates in the online and offline world could be far more harmonious, they think.

Using Self-Affirmation to Increase Intellectual Humility in Debate, Royal Society Open Science (2023). DOI: 10.1098/rsos.220958. royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.220958

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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 2, 2023 at 12:58pm

Physicists observe rare resonance in molecules for the first time

If s/he hits just the right pitch, a singer can shatter a wine glass. The reason is resonance. While the glass may vibrate slightly in response to most acoustic tones, a pitch that resonates with the material's own natural frequency can send its vibrations into overdrive, causing the glass to shatter.

Resonance also occurs at the much smaller scale of atoms and molecules. When particles chemically react, it's partly due to specific conditions that resonate with particles in a way that drives them to chemically link. But atoms and molecules are constantly in motion, inhabiting a blur of vibrating and rotating states. Picking out the exact resonating state that ultimately triggers molecules to react has been nearly impossible. MIT physicists may have cracked part of this mystery with a new study appearing in the journal Nature. The team reports that they have for the first time observed a resonance in colliding ultracold molecules. They found that a cloud of super-cooled sodium-lithium (NaLi) molecules disappeared 100 times faster than normal when exposed to a very specific magnetic field. The molecules' rapid disappearance is a sign that the magnetic field tuned the particles into a resonance, driving them to react more quickly than they normally would. The findings shed light on the mysterious forces that drive molecules to chemically react. They also suggest that scientists could one day harness particles' natural resonances to steer and control certain chemical reactions.

Juliana Park, A Feshbach resonance in collisions between triplet ground-state molecules, Nature (2023). DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-05635-8. www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-05635-8

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 1, 2023 at 9:32am

An illuminated water droplet creates an 'optical atom'

Shining light on a water droplet creates effects analogous to what happens in an atom. This can help us understand how atoms work, write researchers from the  in a new journal article published in Physical Review Letters.

If you whisper by the wall in the dome of St Paul's Cathedral in London, you'll discover that the sound bounces off the dome's walls all the way around and is audible on the opposite side. Which is why the Cathedral's dome has been dubbed "the whispering gallery."

The same effect is achieved when a beam of light is shone into a water droplet. Rays of light bounce off the inner wall of the water droplet over and over again, going around and around inside the droplet. When its circumference is a multiple of the light's wavelength, a resonance phenomenon occurs, just like the sound inside the Cathedral's dome, making the droplet shine brighter.

In their  experiments with laser light, we could see that the light is trapped inside the water droplet. When the droplet shrinks due to evaporation, it appears to flash every time its size is right to create the resonance phenomenon.

You cannot change the size of the dome in St. Paul's Cathedral, but a water droplet changes size as it evaporates. The researchers then discovered how the droplet flashed in a way similar to what occurs when an electron is emitted from an atom when illuminated by light of varying wavelengths. They were also able to use a quantum mechanics analogy to explain how the resonances—the size of the droplet when the scattering was greatest—correspond to the energy levels of an atom. This makes the droplet a model of an atom with the added bonus that its size can be varied. It provides deeper insights into how light scatters while being a model for understanding how atoms work.

Javier Tello Marmolejo et al, Fano Combs in the Directional Mie Scattering of a Water Droplet, Physical Review Letters (2023). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.130.043804

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 1, 2023 at 9:27am

The neuroscientists used electroencephalography—or EEG—sensors attached to the head to measure electrical activity in the brain of 80 study participants, and sample brainwave rhythms.

The team took alpha waves readings. The mid-range of the brainwave spectrum, this wave frequency tends to dominate when we are awake and relaxed.

Alpha waves oscillate between eight to twelve hertz: a full cycle every 85-125 milliseconds. However, every person has their own peak alpha frequency within that range.

Scientists used these readings to create an optical "pulse": a white square flickering on a dark background at the same tempo as each person's individual alpha wave.

Participants got a 1.5-second dose of personalized pulse to set their brain working at its natural rhythm—a technique called "entrainment"—before being presented with a tricky quick-fire cognitive task: trying to identify specific shapes within a barrage of visual clutter.

A brainwave cycle consists of a peak and trough. Some participants received pulses matching the peak of their waves, some the trough, while some got rhythms that were either random or at the wrong rate (a little faster or slower). Each participant repeated over 800 variations of the cognitive task, and the neuroscientists measured how quickly people improved.

The learning rate for those locked into the right rhythm was at least three times faster than for all the other groups. When participants returned the next day to complete another round of tasks, those who learned much faster under entrainment had maintained their higher performance level.

The intervention itself is very simple, just a brief flicker on a screen, but when we hit the right frequency plus the right phase alignment, it seems to have a strong and lasting effect.

Importantly, entrainment pulses need to chime with the trough of a brainwave. Scientists think this is the point in a cycle when neurons are in a state of "high receptivity".

Elizabeth Michael et al, Learning at your brain's rhythm: individualized entrainment boosts learning for perceptual decisions, Cerebral Cortex (2022). DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhac426

Part 2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 1, 2023 at 9:24am

Tuning into brainwave rhythms speeds up learning in adults, study finds

Scientists have shown for the first time that briefly tuning into a person's individual brainwave cycle before they perform a learning task dramatically boosts the speed at which cognitive skills improve.

Calibrating rates of information delivery to match the natural tempo of our brains increases our capacity to absorb and adapt to new information, according to the team behind the study.

The researchers say that these techniques could help us retain "neuroplasticity" much later in life and advance lifelong learning.

Each brain has its own natural rhythm, generated by the oscillation of neurons working together. Scientists simulated these fluctuations so the brain is in tune with itself—and in the best state to flourish. 

The brain's plasticity is the ability to restructure and learn new things, continually building on previous patterns of neuronal interactions. By harnessing brainwave rhythms, it may be possible to enhance flexible learning across the lifespan, from infancy to older adulthood.

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