Asian elephants can read human body language

Body and face orientation both matter when elephants decide it’s worth communicating.

Elephants are often celebrated for their intelligence and emotional depth, but how much do they actually understand about us? 

A study conducted at the Golden Triangle Asian Elephant Foundation in Chiang Rai, Thailand, suggests that Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) are highly perceptive of human attention, as they read visual cues that signal whether communication is even worth attempting.

Ten captive female Asian elephants were observed as an experimenter stood before them in four different orientations: facing them fully, turning away entirely, or showing only body or only face.

When both the experimenter's body and face were oriented toward them, the elephants gestured the most frequently. Body orientation emerged as a stronger cue than facial direction, but only when paired with eye contact. Neither signal alone was enough to significantly prompt communication.

So if you ever have the opportunity to interact with an elephant, make sure you pay full attention with your body language.

Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) recognise human visual attention ...

Antifungals are ‘ampho-terrible’ no more
Scientists have identified a molecule that acts as a plug to clog proteins that are critical for the toxicity of the dangerous fungus Cryptococcus. The notoriously drug-resistant fungus causes symptoms similar to pneumonia and is particularly dangerous for people with compromised immune systems. Currently, the go-to drug class is amphotericin, deemed “ampho-terrible” by biochemist Gerry Wright. “Fungal cells are a lot like human cells, so the drugs that hurt them tend to hurt us too,” he says. “That’s why there are so few options available to patients.” After a decade of research, researchers discovered butyrolactol A, which acts as an adjuvant to make Cryptococcus more susceptible to other drugs.

Butyrolactol A enhances caspofungin efficacy via flippase inhibitio...

Discovery could lead to new treatments for drug-resistant fungal infections

Fungal infections kill millions of people each year, and modern medicine is struggling to keep up. But researchers have identified a molecule that may help turn the tide — butyrolactol A, a chemical compound that targets a deadly, disease-causing fungi called Cryptococcus neoformans. 

Infections caused by Cryptococcus are extremely dangerous. The pathogen, which can cause pneuomia-like symptoms, is notoriously drug-resistant, and it often preys on people with weakened immune systems, like cancer patients or those living with HIV. And the same can be said about other fungal pathogens, like Candida auris or Aspergillus fumigatus — both of which, like Cryptococcus, have been declared priority pathogens by the World Health Organization. Despite the threat, though, doctors have only three treatment options for fungal infections

The gold standard is a drug class called amphotericin  - that is often called “amphoterrible,” because of the major toxic side-effects that it has on humans.  

“Fungal cells are a lot like human cells, so the drugs that hurt them tend to hurt us too. That’s why there are so few options available to patients.”  

The other two antifungal drug classes that are available — azoles and echinocandins — are much less effective treatment options, especially against Cryptococcus. 

So, with a stagnant antifungal drug pipeline, a limited arsenal of approved medicines, and rising rates of drug resistance, scientists are now betting on something called “adjuvants” as a solution to the growing health threat.  

Adjuvants are helper molecules that don’t actually kill pathogens like drugs do, but instead make them extremely susceptible to existing medicine.

Part 1

The researchers found butyrolactol A, a known-but-previously-understudied molecule produced by certain Streptomyces bacteria. The researchers found that the molecule could synergize with echinocandin drugs to kill fungi that the drugs alone could not.

Discovery could lead to new treatments for drug-resistant fungal in...

Part 2

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