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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 12:03pm

The damage that causes concussion can be quite subtle. The brain can’t move that much in the skull, explains Stewart. “The brain virtually fills the intercranial cavity, and there’s a little thin film of fluid that fills up what space is left.” But, in the split second after an impact, the head rapidly decelerates, and the resulting forces transmit deep inside the brain. The gelatinous grey matter undergoes significant shear forces when the head stops suddenly, pushing and pulling the brain tissue in a way that can cause structural damage.

And those forces can affect the brains of men and women in profoundly different ways.

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02089-2?utm_source=Natur...

Part 2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 12:02pm

Why sports concussions are worse for women

As women’s soccer, rugby and other sports gain popularity, scientists are racing to understand how the female brain responds to head injury.

 A growing body of data suggests that female athletes are at significantly greater risk of a traumatic brain injury event than male athletes. They also fare worse after a concussion and take longer to recover. As researchers gather more data, the picture becomes steadily more alarming.

Researchers have offered some explanations for the greater risk to women, although the science is at an early stage. Their ideas range from differences in the microstructure of the brain to the influence of hormones, coaching regimes, players’ level of experience and the management of injuries.

Given that most, if not all, sports-concussion protocols are based on data from men, female athletes ranging from schoolgirls to this year’s Olympic football squads are being put at risk of serious injury. We take all of these data, primarily from studies on men; we apply them to women. That’s just got to change.

Coaching protocols at all levels are changing to try to prevent injury, but these have generally neglected to include a huge cohort: women.

Studies from US collegiate sports have shown that female athletes are 1.9 times more likely to develop a sports-related concussion than are their male contemporaries in comparable sports(1). Those female students also missed many more study days as they recovered.

It’s not just the number of head injuries that differs between women and men, but also their nature. A review of 25 studies of sport-related concussion suggests that female athletes are not only more susceptible to concussion than are males, but also sustain more-severe concussions (2)

Footnotes:

1. Bretzin, A. C. et al. Am. J. Sports Med. 46, 2263–2269 (2018).

2. McGroarty, N. K., Brown, S. M. & Mulcahey, M. K. Orthop. J. Sports Med. 8, 2325967120932306 (2020).

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 11:50am

Alternative cement with low carbon footprint developed

Researchers at the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) in Germany and the Brazilian University of Pará have developed a climate-friendly alternative to conventional cement. Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions can be reduced during production by up to two thirds when a previously unused overburden from bauxite mining is used as a raw material. The alternative was found to be just as stable as the traditional Portland cement. The results were published in Sustainable Materials and Technologies.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 11:47am

Experimental confirmation of wave-particle duality

The 21st century has undoubtedly been the era of quantum science. Quantum mechanics was born in the early 20th century and has been used to develop unprecedented technologies which include quantum information, quantum communication, quantum metrology, quantum imaging, and quantum sensing. However, in quantum science, there are still unresolved and even inapprehensible issues like wave-particle duality and complementarity, superposition of wave functions, wave function collapse after quantum measurement, wave function entanglement of the composite wave function, etc.

To test the fundamental principle of wave-particle duality and complementarity quantitatively, a quantum composite system that can be controlled by experimental parameters is needed. So far, there have been several theoretical proposals after Neils Bohr introduced the concept of "complementarity" in 1928, but only a few ideas have been tested experimentally, with them detecting interference patterns with low visibility. Thus, the concept of complementarity and wave-particle duality still remains elusive and has not been fully confirmed experimentally yet.

To address this issue, a research team from the Institute for Basic Science (IBS, South Korea) constructed a double-path interferometer consisting of two parametric downconversion crystals seeded by coherent idler fields. The device generates coherent signal photons (quantons) that are used for quantum interference measurement. The quantons then travel down two separate paths before reaching the detector. The conjugate idler fields are used for extracting path information with controllable fidelity, which is useful for quantitatively elucidating the complementarity.

Quantitative Complementarity of Wave-Particle Duality, Science Advances (2021). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abi9268

https://phys.org/news/2021-08-experimental-wave-particle-duality.ht...

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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 10:25am

A big part of the food waste problem is changing how we shop and view food and our mindset around what constitutes waste. But research shows the best way to tackle food waste among consumers is to highlight the potential money that can be saved as well as the “feel-good factor”, or moral value, of doing a good thing for the environment. knowledge on how to use leftovers to create new meals helps a lot.

A more creative approach to food waste comes via a circular food system, which prevents food waste from being discarded. It can, for example, be converted into renewable energy. Waste can even be transformed into more food for humans (for example, tofu from leftover soybeans), as well as animal feed.

Support businesses or restaurants that use waste foods in their products or meals. Planning your meals around sell-by dates. Not throwing out food if it’s a bit wilted or bruised and only buying what you need – especially on special occasions where food can often go uneaten and to waste.

You can also show supermarkets that “wonky” fruit and veggies are just as good as the “normal” shaped produce by buying these over the perfect looking pears or potatoes.

Ultimately, it’s not going to be any single thing that solves food waste, but a collective approach can enable us to make the changes that need to happen.

https://theconversation.com/we-throw-away-a-third-of-the-food-we-gr...

part2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 10:21am

We throw away a third of the food we grow – here’s what to do about waste

One-third of all food produced each year is squandered or spoiled before it can be consumed. Research also suggests that high-income countries waste as much food as sub-Saharan Africa produces.

This food waste then ends up in landfills to rot – which releases greenhouse gases. And when this is combined with the amount of energy it takes to produce, manufacture, transport and store this food, it contributes a staggering 3 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide to our planet. To put that in context, if food waste was a country, it would be the third-highest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, after the US and China.

But the good news is there are numerous techniques, technologies and policies that together could help reduce global food waste at every point in the process of producing and consuming it.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation for the United Nations, lack of infrastructure, limited knowledge on storage and food handling, combined with unfavourable climatic conditions, can lead to a lot of food spoilage and waste in low-income countries.

On the other hand, in high-income countries, aesthetic preferences and arbitrary sell-by dates mean food easily becomes waste. Cosmetic blemishes, produce that is too ripe, too big, too little or even the wrong shape can lead to perfectly good fruits and vegetables going to waste.

As the global population continues to increase, it places real pressure on world food production. So we must stop food wastage. what are the causes for food waste?

 1.plant diseases and pests – along with poor harvesting techniques – can be a big factor in the high levels of food waste 

artificial intelligence (AI) powered drones can help farmers become more resourceful and reduce the overuse of pesticides in food production. This is important because pesticides can adversely affect the food ecosystem. 

part1 

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 10:11am

Researchers discover hidden SARS-CoV-2 'gate' that opens to allow COVID infection

Since the early days of the COVID pandemic, scientists have aggressively pursued the secrets of the mechanisms that allow severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) to enter and infect healthy human cells.

Researchers  have discovered how glycans—molecules that make up a sugary residue around the edges of the spike protein—act as infection gateways. They essentially figured out how the spike actually opens and infects. The research team's gate discovery opens potential avenues for new therapeutics to counter SARS-CoV-2 infection. If glycan gates could be pharmacologically locked in the closed position, then the virus is effectively prevented from opening to entry and infection.

A glycan gate controls opening of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, Nature Chemistry (2021). DOI: 10.1038/s41557-021-00758-3 , www.nature.com/articles/s41557-021-00758-3

https://phys.org/news/2021-08-hidden-sars-cov-gate-covid-infection....

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 9:56am

This exotic particle had an out-of-body experience; these scientists took a picture of it

Scientists have taken the clearest picture yet of electronic particles that make up a mysterious magnetic state called quantum spin liquid (QSL).

The achievement could facilitate the development of superfast quantum computers and energy-efficient superconductors.

The scientists are the first to capture an image of how electrons in a QSL decompose into spin-like particles called spinons and charge-like particles called chargons.

 Ruan, W., Chen, Y., Tang, S. et al. Evidence for quantum spin liquid behaviour in single-layer 1T-TaSe2 from scanning tunnelling microscopy. Nat. Phys. (2021). doi.org/10.1038/s41567-021-01321-0 , www.nature.com/articles/s41567-021-01321-0

https://phys.org/news/2021-08-exotic-particle-out-of-body-scientist...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 9:53am

Scientists harness human protein to deliver molecular medicines to cells

Researchers have developed a new way to deliver molecular therapies to cells. The system, called SEND, can be programmed to encapsulate and deliver different RNA cargoes. SEND harnesses natural proteins in the body that form virus-like particles and bind RNA, and it may provoke less of an immune response than other delivery approaches.

Segel M, Lash B, et al. Mammalian retrovirus-like protein PEG10 packages its own mRNA and can be pseudotyped for intercellular mRNA delivery. Science. Online August 19, 2021. DOI: 10.1126/science.abg6155

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-08-scientists-harness-human-pro...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on August 20, 2021 at 9:28am

Rattlesnake rattles trick human ears

Rattlesnakes increase their rattling rate as potential threats approach, and this abrupt switch to a high-frequency mode makes listeners, including humans, think they're closer than they actually are, researchers report August 19th in the journal Current Biology.

The acoustic display of rattlesnakes, which has been interpreted for decades as a simple acoustic warning signal about the presence of the snake, is in fact a far more intricate interspecies communication signal. The sudden switch to the high-frequency mode acts as a smart signal fooling the listener  about its actual distance to the sound source. The misinterpretation of distance by the listener thereby creates a distance safety margin.

Additional results showed that rattlesnakes adapt their rattling rate in response to the approach velocity of an object rather than its size.

Snakes do not just rattle to advertise their presence, but they evolved an innovative solution: a sonic distance warning device similar to the one included in cars while driving backwards.

Current Biology, Forsthofer and Schutte et al.: "Frequency modulation of rattlesnake acoustic display affects acoustic distance perception in humans" www.cell.com/current-biology/f … 0960-9822(21)00973-8 , DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2021.07.018

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Rattlesnakes vigorously shake their tails to warn other animals of their presence. Past studies have shown that rattling varies in frequency, but little is known about the behavioral relevance of this phenomenon or what message it sends to listeners. Researchers noticed that rattling increased in frequency when they approached rattlesnakes but decreased when they walked away.

https://phys.org/news/2021-08-rattlesnake-rattles-human-ears.html?u...

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