The time of day of your surgery could have long-term impacts on your health. That’s according to researchers who looked at the way circadian rhythm—the body’s internal clock—affects  the outcomes of a patient recovering from a complex heart procedure.

Patients who underwent open-heart surgery in the afternoon experienced better health outcomes compared to those who got operated on in the morning, study authors found after six years of observing nearly 600 patients who underwent heart valve replacement. In the subsequent 500 days after surgery, researchers found, those patients who had surgery after noon had half the risk of a major cardiac event—for instance myocardial infarction, acute heart failure, or death—as those who had surgeries before then.

University of Lille-France professor David Montaigne, the study’s lead author, suggests that the study’s findings indicate that scheduling changes could decrease injury or death.

“There are few other surgical options to reduce the risk of post-surgery heart damage, meaning new techniques to protect patients are needed,” Montaigne said in a statement. “Our findings suggest this is because part of the biological mechanism behind the damage is affected by a person’s circadian clock and the underlying genes that control it.”

The findings are the latest in a growing body of evidence suggesting that time of day plays an important role in how well various medical treatments work. Studies show that the efficacy of some vaccines and cancer treatments may be affected by the time of day when a therapy is administered or medicine is taken. For example, research has found that patients who received a seasonal flu vaccination before 11 a.m. produced more antibodies than those who had one after 3 p.m.

“This study underscores the importance of the circadian rhythm biology that’s finally starting to gain recognition in science. This could potentially save a lot of lives. 

http://www.thelancet-press.com/embargo/heartsurgery.pdf

Earth’s multiscale microbial diversity Catalogue

A meta-analysis of microbial community samples collected by hundreds of researchers for the Earth Microbiome Project. Coordinated protocols and new analytical methods, particularly the use of exact sequences instead of clustered operational taxonomic units, enable bacterial and archaeal ribosomal RNA gene sequences to be followed across multiple studies and allow us to explore patterns of diversity at an unprecedented scale. The result is both a reference database giving global context to DNA sequence data and a framework for incorporating data from future studies, fostering increasingly complete characterization of Earth’s microbial diversity.

https://www.nature.com/articles/nature24621

Nov. 10th: World Science Day for Peace and Development
An internationally celebrated day to highlight the importance of science in and for society and that science, peace and development are interlinked

Celebrated every 10 November, World Science Day for Peace and Development highlights the important role of science in society and the need to engage the wider public in debates on emerging scientific issues. It also underlines the importance and relevance of science in our daily lives.

How science is saving lives....

A team of researchers from Germany, Austria, and Italy gave a young boy with the genetic disease junctional epidermolysis bullosa (JEB) new skin cells that saved his life. The work is detailed in the Nature paper "Regeneration of the entire human epidermis using transgenic stem ce..."

JEB is caused by genetic mutations in the genes LAMA3, LAMB3 or LAMC2. These three genes are required to form the protein laminin - a key component of the extracellular matrix which acts like the glue that holds cells together. When one of these genes is mutated, the extracellular matrix is disrupted and the skin blisters, erodes, and has recurrent infections. This disease is a nightmare - resulting in pain while living and an early death.  

Altering a gene (in this case, making a correction) is done in labs all around the world every day. This team of scientists had talent to do this. They worked with a genetic disease with known mutations in cells that could be modified in cells that could then grafted back onto the patient.

The first step in the process was the correction of the genetic mutation.

This is potentially the least complicated step in this process. The scientists had all of the information and tools necessary to make this happen. The DNA was constructed and put into a virus that infects skin cells. This viral vector is an incredibly useful way to place DNA into cells. The new DNA then becomes part of the genome of the skin cell. In this process, the skin cell now has a corrected version of the mutated gene in their genome. 

The second step of the process was making more of the corrected cells. In this particular part of the process - as our skin is one of the few organs that have stem cells positioned in and amongst our normal skin cells (called keratinocytes)- these are not the frequently discussed pluripotent stem cells; instead, these stem cells are dedicated to making more skin. This is important for the normal wear and tear that happens to our skin. When the mutated gene was corrected in one of these cells, it would make more cells with the corrected gene. Over time, there were enough cells to graft onto the patient. 

Both of these two major steps are events that happen in labs across the world every day. But, like many significant advancements, this was made possible by a combination of the right problem, the right tools and good hands of motivated scientists. So, some good old fashioned genetic sequencing and cell culture have saved a boys life - and that is the most amazing scientific story of the year.  

More than 15,000 scientists from 184 countries issue 'warning to humanity'

More than 15,000 scientists around the world have issued a global warning: there needs to be change in order to save Earth.

It comes 25 years after the first notice in 1992 when a mere 1,500 scientists issued a similar warning. 

This new cautioning — which gained popularity on Twitter with #ScientistsWarningToHumanity — garnered more than 15,000 signatures. 

What is it about? Read the article here:

http://scientistswarning.forestry.oregonstate.edu/sites/sw/files/Wa...

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A team of researchers in Singapore has identified a molecular pathway that suppresses virus-induced cancers. They published their findings in PLOS Pathogens. Some cancers are known to be caused by viral infections. For example, two strains of the human papillomavirus (HPV) are responsible for up to 70 percent of cervical cancer cases. The virus causes abnormal cell growth by inserting its genetic material into the cells of the cervix. Uncontrolled cell growth is typically prevented by the shortening of telomeres—protective caps on the ends of chromosomes. Each time a cell divides into two, the telomeres get shortened, and the cell eventually stops dividing. Cancer cells, however, are known to bypass this limit by producing telomerase, an enzyme that extends the length of telomeres. In HPV-infected cells, the protein TIP60 is known to prevent progression to cervical cancer, but the interactions between TIP60 and telomerase remain unknown. In this study, researchers at the Cancer Science Institute of Singapore (CSI Singapore) and the National University of Singapore (NUS) examined the regulation of telomerase by TIP60 in virus-induced cancer cells. The team discovered that TIP60 inhibits telomerase by interacting with and modifying a partner molecule, Sp1. When TIP60 modifies Sp1, Sp1 can no longer bind to the regulatory sequences of the telomerase gene to activate it. This results in less production of telomerase, which prevents the cancer cells from continuous division. The identification of this molecular pathway opens a new window of hope for therapeutic interventions against cancers. “Our findings hold exciting potential in the fight against a range of virus-induced cancers, including cervical cancer, liver cancer and Burkitt’s Lymphoma,” said study corresponding author Dr. Sudhakar Jha, a principal investigator at CSI Singapore. “Given that 85 percent of cancers are triggered by high amounts of telomerase, our study, which lends a deeper insight into the inhibition of telomerase by TIP60, could also be applied to other groups of cancer such as breast, colorectal and ovarian cancer. Our next step is therefore to investigate the influence of this new pathway in these other groups of cancer,” he added. The article can be found at: Rajagopalan et al. (2017) TIP60 Represses Telomerase Expression by Inhibiting Sp1 Binding to the TERT Promoter.

Pollution might increase lightening strikes

Scientists have already linked aerosol emissions to increases in lightning over areas of the Amazon prone to forest fires (pdf) as well as regions of China with thick air pollution. The clearest example yet of humanity’s influence on atmospheric electrostatic discharges, however, surfaced recently when researchers discovered dense trails of lightning in the soot-filled skies over two of the world’s busiest shipping routes in the Indian Ocean and South China Sea.

Poring over 12 years of detailed data, atmospheric scientists Joel Thornton  at the University of Washington, postdoc Katrina Virts of NASA Marshall Space Flight Center and their colleagues found lightning flashes occur nearly twice as often directly above heavily trafficked shipping lanes as they do elsewhere over the ocean. The increased frequency of lightning follows the exhaust from ships and cannot be explained by meteorological factors such as winds or the atmosphere’s temperature structure, according to a study, published in Geophysical Research Letters in September.

The team noticed a greater density of lightning in locations where ships blast emissions, including sulfur and nitrogen oxides, into the air. Then the researchers tracked instances of lightning using the World Wide Lightning Location Network (WWLLN)—a system of acoustic sensors that detect electrical disturbances all around the globe.

Lightning is a natural feature of storms that occurs when certain conditions are met. Particles in a cloud rub together, gathering opposite charges that eventually separate into positive and negative regions. These two poles create a space across which a transfer of charge—or lightning bolt—may then occur. Sometimes the bolts transmit the charge to the ground and lightning strikes.

But we are now learning the amount of lightning generated may be influenced by factors that go beyond natural meteorology, including aerosols. Other recent studies have given credence to the idea aerosols are linked to more lightning. 

New solution to antibiotic resistance

One of the ways antibiotic resistance genes spread in hospitals and in the environment is that the genes are coded on plasmids that transfer between bacteria. A plasmid is a DNA fragment found in bacteria or yeasts. It carries genes useful for bacteria, especially when these genes encode proteins that can make bacteria resistant to antibiotics.Now a team of scientists at UdeM's Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine has come up with a novel approach to block the transfer of resistance genes. The study by Bastien Casu, Tarun Arya, Benoit Bessette and Christian Baron was published in early November in Scientific Reports.

The researchers screened a library of small chemical molecules for those that bind to the TraE protein, an essential component of the plasmid transfer machinery. Analysis by X-ray crystallography revealed the exact binding site of these molecules on TraE. Having precise information on the binding site enabled the researchers to design more potent binding molecules that, in the end, reduced the transfer of antibiotic-resistant, gene-carrying plasmids.

Building on their encouraging new data, Baron and his colleagues are now working with the medicinal chemists at UdeM's IRIC (Institut de recherche en immunologie et cancérologie) to develop the new molecules into powerful inhibitors of antibiotic resistance gene transfer. Such molecules could one day be applied in clinics in hospitals that are hotbeds of resistance, the researchers hope.

Ultimately, reducing the transfer of antibiotic-resistance plasmids could help preserve the potency of antibiotics, contributing to an overall strategy to help improve human health

The existence of Yeti as described in the folklore and mythology in the Tibetan Plateau–Himalaya region has been shrouded in mystery. According to the stories in the Himalayan region, Yeti, or the Abominable Snowman is an ape-like creature taller than a human being.

Though previous attempts in the biological identification of Yeti were not successful, a recent research report published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B suggests that Yeti is a bear. A multinational team of investigators led by Dr. Charlotte Lindqvist of the University of Buffalo at New York, report on new analyses of 24 field-collected and museum specimens, including hair, bone, skin and fecal samples, collected from bears or purported yetis in the Tibetan Plateau–Himalaya region. Of the nine samples of ostensibly "yeti" origin, eight turned out to be from bears native to the area.

The investigators used a set of genetic elements called mitochondria to characterize the genetic identify of the animal. The bulk of the genetic information in a cell is stored in the DNA which is contained in the nucleus. All nucleated cells also have a small circular DNA outside of the nucleus, within another cytoplasmic organelle called mitochondria. These DNA copies are therefore called mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA. As these mtDNAs are outside of the nucleus, only the maternal mtDNAs will be transferred to the offsprings. Therefore, mtDNA serves as a marker of ancestry.

Based on both amplified mtDNA loci as well as complete mitogenomes, they reconstructed maternal phylogenies to increase knowledge about the phylogenetic relationships and evolutionary history of Himalayan and Tibetan bears. The scientists were able to determine the clade affinities of all the purported yeti samples in this study and inferred their well-supported and resolved phylogenetic relationships among extant bears in the Tibetan Plateau and surrounding Himalayan Mountains.

Tianying Lan, Stephanie Gill, Eva Bellemain, Richard Bischof, Muhammad Ali Nawaz, Charlotte LindqvistEvolutionary history of enigmatic bears in the Tibetan Plateau–Himalaya region and the identity of the yeti. Proceedings of the Royal Society B Published 29 November 2017.DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2017.1804 

Antibiotic weakness: When the medicines you take themselves help microbes survive?

A new study has found that medications can change body chemistry to make it more hospitable to invading microbes! 

Antibiotics save lives, but they are not fail-safe. Even when microbes haven’t acquired drug-evading genetic mutations—a hallmark of antibiotic resistance—the medications don’t always clear infections. A new study identifies a surprising reason why: At infection sites, antibiotics change the natural mixture of chemicals made by the body in ways that protect infecting bacteria. They also thwart the ability of the host’s immune cells to fight off the intruders.

These chemical changes were incited not by bacterial cells, but by the animals’ own cells. The researchers learned this after giving antibiotics to so-called “germ-free” mice that had no bacteria and saw the same chemical changes. 

Scientists are not sure how the chemicals elicit these effects. But they note some of the compounds slow down aspects of bacterial metabolism, making the antibiotics less lethal. Most antibiotics speed up bacterial metabolism while also de-stabilizing the metabolic process, leading to the build-up of toxic molecules inside the bacteria that help to kill them. With this process dampened, bacteria more easily survive.

The findings do suggest infections are complicated environments, and that antibiotics influence more than just bacterial cells, often in unexpected ways. And it is important to understand these complications for effective treatments.

These findings, published recently in Cell Host & Microbe, could help scientists “build more effective treatments''.

http://www.cell.com/cell-host-microbe/fulltext/S1931-3128(17)30455-9

A new wave of thought to fight super bugs

For the first time, China has overtaken the United States in terms of the total number of science publications, according to statistics compiled by the US National Science Foundation (NSF).

The agency’s report, released on January 18, documents the United States’ increasing competition from China and other developing countries that are stepping up their investments in science and technology. Nonetheless, the report suggests that the United States remains a scientific powerhouse, pumping out high-profile research, attracting international students and translating science into valuable intellectual property.

Sunday, 11 February, is the International Day of Women and Girls in Science.

In order to achieve full and equal access to and participation in science for women and girls, and further achieve gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, the United Nations General Assembly adopted resolution A/RES/70/212 declaring 11 February as the International Day of Women and Girls in Science.

http://www.un.org/en/events/women-and-girls-in-science-day/

Lichens redefined...

For 150 years, scientists believed lichen were defined by a symbiotic relationship between a fungus and algae. The fungus provides structure and support for the organism, while the algae produces food through photosynthesis. However, researchers recently discovered that certain lichen have an additional fungus in the mix. This threesome was revealed after a team set out to explain what made one type of lichen toxic versus another that was seemingly identical.

Lichens may be a symbiosis of three organisms!

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/early/2016/07/20/science.aaf8287

According to new research diabetes could be five  separate types.

The results, published in The Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology, showed the patients could be separated into five distinct clusters.

• Cluster 1 - severe autoimmune diabetes is broadly the same as the classical type 1 - it hit people when they were young, seemingly healthy and an immune disease left them unable to produce insulin
• Cluster 2 - severe insulin-deficient diabetes patients initially looked very similar to those in cluster 1 - they were young, had a healthy weight and struggled to make insulin, but the immune system was not at fault
• Cluster 3 - severe insulin-resistant diabetes patients were generally overweight and making insulin but their body was no longer responding to it
• Cluster 4 - mild obesity-related diabetes was mainly seen in people who were very overweight but metabolically much closer to normal than those in cluster 3
• Cluster 5 - mild age-related diabetes patients developed symptoms when they were significantly older than in other groups and their disease tended to be milder

This new classification makes treatment better and scientists think treating these groups differently would produce better outcomes.

Space travel changes your DNA. How much of that is permanent?

When Scott Kelly came back from his 342-day mission on International Space Station, the initial findings revealed that his telomeres lengthened in space, but shortened in just two days following his return to Earth. These findings suggest that genetic changes are temporary and DNA returns to normal after the passage of some time. NASA used two astronauts, Mark and Scott Kelly, since they were twins and shared the same DNA, this made things easier for the space agency to find out the differences or in other word how space affected human body. 

While it’s possible for the DNA differences to be a temporary effect on the human body, NASA’s findings reveal otherwise. Approximately 7 percent of Scott Kelly’s DNA changed while he was in space. So, 7 percent of his DNA was altered permanently, while the remaining 93 percent reverted to normal as his body adapted to living on Earth.

Newer drugs make hepatitis C-positive kidneys safe for transplant

World renowned physicist Stephen Hawking has died at the age of 76.

He died peacefully at his home in Cambridge in the early hours of Wednesday, his family said.

The Briton was known for his work with black holes and relativity, and wrote several popular science books including A Brief History of Time.

At the age of 22 Prof Hawking was given only a few years to live after being diagnosed with a rare form of motor neurone disease.

Cancer is a dreaded disease. And chemotherapy has its pitfalls but becomes unavoidable sometimes. But how about making chemotherapy more safer and effective?

That is exactly what researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur have proposed - a new model for the transport of anti-cancer drugs to human brain tumours using liposomes—a small sac-like structure that transports nutrients in our cells. 

Liposomes, like our cell membranes, are made of molecules called phospholipids. In a cell membrane, these molecules are arranged into two layers. However, in a liposome, the two layers meet to form a hollow sphere filled with water. In this study, the researchers propose to replace the water in the empty area with anti-cancer drug molecules—a technique they claim improves transport of the drug molecules—to create a nanosized drug delivery system.

Besides, the lipid layer in the liposomes acts as a protective coat and prevents the anti-cancer drug from affecting healthy cells. Since these liposomes are in the bloodstream, they circulate for longer and collect at the tumour site, helping more of the drug reach their target cells. This approach causes less damage to the healthy cells of the body.

There is another aspect of tumours that makes it hard to use anti-cancer drugs in treatment without damaging the surrounding healthy cells. Tumorous cancer cells vary in their organisation, function and structure, making it difficult for drugs to target them specifically.  Also, the veins and arteries that supply blood to a tumour, twist and coil, making it more difficult to administer the anti-cancer drug into a tumour. Since the endothelial cells present in the tumour blood vessels are widely spaced out, drugs tend to leak out into the interstitial spaces between the cells, reducing the efficacy of the drugs.

The researchers analysed the structure of blood vessels of the cancerous brain tissue using dynamic contrast enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE-MRI) by taking multiple snapshots of the tumor vasculature over a period of time and comparing them. Using this data, they predicted the transport, accumulation and efficacy of the chemotherapeutic drug in a tumour with computational fluid dynamics—a branch of fluid mechanics that uses numerical analysis and data structures to solve and analyse problems that involve fluid flows. They also predicted the distribution of the drug in a tumour. “With the help of this model, we can predict the preferential deposition of chemotherapeutic drugs inside a tumour, thus predicting the healing of a tumour for a specific patient, provided we have the initial medical images of that patient".

The results of the study showed that a high amount of the anti-cancer drug Doxorubicin, which was not encapsulated by a liposome, accumulated in the interstitial spaces between tumour cells. This accumulation could potentially cause adverse side-effects like swelling, reddening and peeling of skin from the hands and feet. In contrast, the liposome-encapsulated drug remained inside a tumour for a longer time. They also found that the high concentration of liposome-coated drug aggregated at the tumour site and increased the therapeutic efficiency of the liposomal anticancer drug.

Medical imaging of the tumours helps predict the deposition of the anti-cancer drug in a tumour for a patient and look for chemotherapeutic drug options that could better suit him/her. This ability also allows doctors to develop a specific chemotherapeutic approach for each patient, based on the structure of their brain tumour and the blood vessels surrounding it.

http://biomechanical.asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/article.aspx?ar...

Eating very hot chillies might trigger reversible cerebral vasoconstriction syndrome — a temporary narrowing of arteries in the brain.

His is the first known instance of reversible cerebral vasoconstriction syndrome — a temporary narrowing of arteries in the brain — to be tied to eating a hot pepper, researchers report April 9 in British Medical Journal Case Reports. Such narrowed arteries can lead to severe pain called “thunderclap headaches” and are often associated with pregnancy complications or illicit drug use.

During a hot-pepper-eating contest, the man ate a chili dubbed the Carolina Reaper, named by Guinness World Records as the hottest pepper in the world. The Carolina Reaper is over 200 times as spicy as a jalapeño. About a minute later, he reported experiencing splitting headaches that came and went over two days before he sought treatment.

Initial tests failed to find anything out of the ordinary. But a CT scan of blood vessels in the man’s brain showed severely narrowed arteries. After treatment, including hydration and pain medication, the headaches stopped. When the researchers imaged his brain five weeks later, the arteries had returned to their normal size.

 http://casereports.bmj.com/content/2018/bcr-2017-224085

Scientists here say Dog is a biodiversity enemy

According to a new study, Canis lupus familiaris (dog, for short) is  an ‘invasive’ species in many ecosystems! Like the Japanese kudzu vine or the infamous Lantana, dogs are a non-native introduced species that are wreaking havoc on the ecological balance of many sensitive ecosystems. Now, a study by researchers from the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment explores the effect of free-ranging dogs, or strays, on their surroundings in India.

Previous studies have shown that domesticated dogs have imperilled 188 threatened species of animals and caused 11 mass extinctions, globally! Domestic dogs have been considered as invasive mammalian predators. After cats and rodents, they are the third most damaging invasive predators.

In countries like India, where the population of stray dogs are surging by the day without checks and bounds by a governing body, these dogs turn feral—a state in which they are neither truly wild not truly domesticated. “Unlike cats and rats which perhaps target smaller sized animals, feral dogs can target a larger range of prey size as predators as they can hunt in packs. Their impacts are as detrimental as cats and rats, though cats and rats have reported higher extinction for biodiversity.

The study shows that the threat from dogs on wildlife is real and could come in the way of conservational efforts. So, what can we do to curb this conflict? Managing dog population is the key, say the researchers.

 The researchers opine that in order to protect local wildlife and ensure a good quality of life for dogs, carefully planned population control programs should be implemented near protected forest areas.

Domesticated dogs are adding a new dimension to the threats many species of wildlife are already facing due to habitat loss, deforestation, encroachment, etc. Man’s best friend is turning out to be biodiversity’s biggest enemy, as this research shows.

https://zslpublications.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/acv...

WE ARE MARCHING FOR SCIENCE ON 14th  APRIL, 2018.

( We are part of Global March For Science)

Come join us and make it a great success

Hyderabad venue: Press club, Basheerbagh

Starts at 10 am.

Our demands...

• 1. Allocate at least 3% of GDP to scientific and technological research and 10% towards education
• 2. Stop propagation of unscientific, obscurantist outdated ideas, and develop scientific temper, human values and spirit of inquiry in conformance with Article 51A of the Constitution.
• 3. Ensure that the education system does not impart ideas that contradict scientific evidence.
• 4. Enact policies based on scientific evidence.

https://www.marchforscience.com/

http://breakthrough-india.org/MFS2018/

European Space Agency maps second magnetic field around Earth.

A second layer of the magnetic field has been found  around the earth. According to the reports, the magnetic field was discovered by the trio of satellites which were used to study the magnetic fields.

The mission was named “Swarm” which was launched in the year 2013. Four years of continuous efforts have proved fruitful, a lot of data was collected and as a result, it contributed to the mapping of the latest discovery in the world of space technology. The satellites revolve around the earth at 300-530 km.

 The newly discovered magnetic field is about 2-2.5 nanotesla at the satellite altitude which is about 20,000 times weaker than the earth’s existing magnetic field. The scientist stated that they have used Swarm to measure the magnetic signals of the tides from the ocean surface to the seabed.

Getting on the practical aspect of the newly discovered magnetic field it could be used to hone the models of global warming by naming the monitoring patterns of the heat energy as they change their positions globally. But in addition to this, the tidal magnetic signal also induces a weak magnetic response under the deep seabed. The findings will be further used to study the electrical properties of the earth lithosphere as well as the upper mantle.

Plastic degrading  enzyme created by scientists...

Scientists have created a substance capable of “eating” plastic that could help tackle the world’s pollution problem.

The substance is based on an enzyme – a “biological catalyst” – first produced by bacteria living in a Japanese recycling centre that researchers suggested had evolved it in order to eat plastic.

Dubbed PETase for its ability to break down the PET plastic used to make drinks bottles, the enzyme accelerated a degradation process that would normally take hundreds of years.

Fine-tuning this naturally produced enzyme allowed a research team to produce something capable of digesting plastic more effectively than anything found in nature.

By breaking down plastic into manageable chunks, the scientists suggest their new substances could help recycle millions of tonnes of plastic bottles.

Plastic is notoriously resistant to natural degradation, and the discovery of the Japanese plastic-eating bacteria in 2016 was heralded by experts and commentators alike as a potential natural solution to plastic pollution.

While attempting to verify these claims, University of Portsmouth biologist Professor John McGeehan and his colleagues accidentally created a super-powered version of the plastic-eating enzyme.

During an investigation of the enzyme’s structure, the scientists made a slight tweak to the part thought to be involved with plastic digestion.

Doing so ramped up the ability of the enzyme to degrade PET, and also gave it the ability to degrade an alternative form of PET known as PEF.

Evidence of a planet getting destroyed in our solar system...

An asteroid that slammed into the Sudan desert on Oct. 7, 2008, shot out lots of little space rocks holding a precious secret: diamonds that likely formed billions of years ago inside the embryo of a now-decimated planet.

That lost planet was the size of Mercury or perhaps Mars, researchers now say.

An asteroid that slammed into the Sudan desert on Oct. 7, 2008, shot out lots of little space rocks holding a precious secret: diamonds that likely formed billions of years ago inside the embryo of a now-decimated planet.

That planetary embryo would have then been destroyed through violent collisions, the researchers noted.

The research was published online (April 17) in the journal Nature Communications.

Plants repair their Sun -damaged DNA: If the ultraviolet radiation from the sun damages human DNA to cause health problems, does UV radiation also damage plant DNA? The answer is yes, but because plants can’t come in from the sun or slather on sunblock, they have a super robust DNA repair kit.

Research finds that this powerful DNA repair system in plants closely resembles a repair system found in humans and other animals.

The study, which appears in Nature Communications, is the first repair map of an entire multicellular organism. It revealed that the “nucleotide excision repair” system works much more efficiently in the active genes of plants as compared to humans. And this efficiency depends on the day/night cycle.

Excision repair,  is now widely viewed as the major mechanism of DNA repair—including repair of UV damage—in living organisms. 

The researchers performed XR-seq scans on cells from UV-exposed plants—Arabidopsis thaliana, the “lab rat” of plant research also known as thale cress or mouse-ear cress. The resulting repair maps revealed that excision repair in Arabidopsis works faster on genes that are active. Genes when active are transcribed into strands of RNA that may then be translated into proteins, the main machinery of cells. Prior studies from the Sancar lab showed that excision repair works more efficiently for actively transcribed genes in animals and bacteria. The phenomenon, called transcription-coupled repair, is thought to have evolved as a way to direct DNA repair where it is most acutely needed.

The researchers performed XR-seq on UV-exposed Arabidopsis over 24-hour periods to discover that the efficiency of transcription-coupled repair also varies according to the “circadian” day/night cycle for 10 to 30 percent of Arabidopsis‘s genes. This reflects the normal daily variations of transcription activity in these genes.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-03922-5

Plants repair their Sun -damaged DNA: If the ultraviolet radiation from the sun damages human DNA to cause health problems, does UV radiation also damage plant DNA? The answer is yes, but because plants can’t come in from the sun or slather on sunblock, they have a super robust DNA repair kit.

Research finds that this powerful DNA repair system in plants closely resembles a repair system found in humans and other animals.

The study, which appears in Nature Communications, is the first repair map of an entire multicellular organism. It revealed that the “nucleotide excision repair” system works much more efficiently in the active genes of plants as compared to humans. And this efficiency depends on the day/night cycle.

Excision repair,  is now widely viewed as the major mechanism of DNA repair—including repair of UV damage—in living organisms. 

The researchers performed XR-seq scans on cells from UV-exposed plants—Arabidopsis thaliana, the “lab rat” of plant research also known as thale cress or mouse-ear cress. The resulting repair maps revealed that excision repair in Arabidopsis works faster on genes that are active. Genes when active are transcribed into strands of RNA that may then be translated into proteins, the main machinery of cells. Prior studies from the Sancar lab showed that excision repair works more efficiently for actively transcribed genes in animals and bacteria. The phenomenon, called transcription-coupled repair, is thought to have evolved as a way to direct DNA repair where it is most acutely needed.

The researchers performed XR-seq on UV-exposed Arabidopsis over 24-hour periods to discover that the efficiency of transcription-coupled repair also varies according to the “circadian” day/night cycle for 10 to 30 percent of Arabidopsis‘s genes. This reflects the normal daily variations of transcription activity in these genes.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-03922-5

Thousands boycott new Nature journal about machine learning

More than two thousand researchers have signed a petitionto boycott a new Nature journal over the fact it will be available only by subscription.

Free and open access to knowledge is important in all fields. It is particularly important for students and faculty whose universities cannot afford the subscription fees for closed-access journals or cannot afford to pay (as authors) for their papers to be open access. Open access speeds up scientific progress by enabling anyone anywhere on earth to read the latest research and make their own contributions.

Source: Retraction Watch

We, the people associated with Sci-Art Lab, completely support this initiative. People in the developing countries cannot afford papers behind paywalls. Scientific Knowledge should be provided free of cost and should have open access. 

Einstein proved wrong!

Physicists announced on Wednesday (9th May, 2018) the results of their unique global experiment that appear to contradict a key worldview embraced by Albert Einstein, a universe independent of human observations in which nothing can travel faster than light.

The experiment, relying on over 100,000 participants with smartphones and other Internet-linked devices, put to test and detected strong violations of Einstein's principle of "local realism," as expected from quantum physics, the laws that govern the subatomic realm.

In the test, scientists generated pairs of "entangled" atoms and photons that were sent to different locations where their properties were measured. The participants contributed to the process of how these particles were measured in 12 laboratories around the world.

If the results of the measurements on the particles agree, scientists say, the implications would be that the measurement of one particle instantly affects the other particle, irrespective of their distance, thus appearing to violate Einstein's speed-of-light barrier.

The other way to explain the results would be to assume that the properties of the particles did not exist at all until the scientists actually measured them - a bizarre idea that challenges common-sensical notions of reality.

Either way, the results contradict Einstein's worldview. The findings were published in the journal Nature on Wednesday.

In the new test, conducted for 12 hours on November 30, 2016, Morgan and his colleagues recruited over 100,000 participants who produced a large supply or random number sequences through a browser-based game called the "Big Bell Quest."

The players were challenged to create unpredictable strings of zeroes and ones that were supplied to the scientists conducting measurements in the 12 labs. The measurements' results "strongly disagree" with Einstein's worldview and once again corroborate violations of local realism.

Physicists from Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Chile, China, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the US were part of the experimental consortium. Each of the 12 laboratories designed different experiments to test local realism in different ways.

In this experiment,  different people located at faraway places made random choices and fed them to a network connecting the experimental arrangements. "The choice of each human being ensures randomness, which was not possible earlier with instrumental detectors."

Edible water walls - eco-friendly replacement for plastic water bottles.

These biodegradable water balls are composed of algae (sea weed) and are edible materials. The preparation of edible water balls is very easy, and can be prepared at home. The preparation involves mixing of sodium alginate and calcium lactate with drinking water. This forms a gelatinous membrane structure and retains the drinking water in the middle of a gelatinous structure. Sodium alginate (NaAlg) coagulates when exposed to calcium chloride (CaCl2) and forms calcium alginate (CaAlg2 ) and sodium chloride (NaCl), according to the following reaction Eq.(1). The prepared calcium alginate ball with water is considered as a refreshing edible water drink and does not require a separate vessel like a bottle or a cup to hold water.

Currently, the edible water container is not available commercially, although the developers are working to bring it to market. The prototypes have been tested in several markets and certain limitations are associated to reach the market. Majorly, thin membrane is not strong enough to withstand shipping and handling on a large scale. This product is named “Ooho” the edible bottle. Drinking water from inside a soft edible membrane made from natural seaweed extract is considered as a sustainable product in the long run.

Cars can turn coffins even if you park them in shade during high temperatures. 

Don’t count on a shady parking spot to save a child left in the back seat on a hot day.

A new analysis of temperatures inside parked cars reveals that a toddler in a sunbathed vehicle would reach lethal body temperatures faster than one left in the shade. But even in a shaded car, a child could die from overheating within a few hours, researchers report online May 23 in Temperature.

Researchers tracked temps inside three cars — a sedan, economy car and minivan — that were parked in the sun, and another three parked in the shade. Each car started at the outdoor air temperature or 29.4° Celsius, whichever was cooler. On days hotter than 38° C (about 100° Fahrenheit), it took an hour for the average ambient temperature inside the shaded vehicles to reach 38.3° C. For cars in the sun, the inside temperature hit a scorching 46.7° C in an hour, with surfaces such as steering wheels, dashboards and seat covers getting even hotter.

The researchers then simulated how the body temperature of a 2-year-old would increase under those conditions. On average, a toddler’s body would reach the potentially lethal temperature of 40° C (104° F) after about 1.4 hours in the sun and about 2.4 hours in the shade. It happened faster in some cars than others — a child left in a sunbaked sedan could die from overheating in just an hour. 

J.K. Vanos et al. Evaluating the impact of solar radiation on pediatric heat balance .... Temperature. Published online May 23, 2018. doi: 10.1080/23328940.2018.1468205.

Bacteriophage link to parkinson's disease identified ... 

In the first study of its kind, researchers from the New York-based Human Microbiology Institute have discovered the role certain bacteriophages may play in the onset of Parkinson's disease (PD). The research is presented at ASM Microbe, the annual meeting of the American Society for Microbiology, held from June 7th to June 11th in Atlanta, Georgia.

The researchers, led by George, Tetz, M.D., Ph.D., Human Microbiology Institute, showed that the abundance of lytic Lactococcus phages was higher in PD patients when compared to healthy individuals. This abundance led to a 10-fold reduction in neurotransmitter-producing Lactococcus, suggesting the possible role of phages in neurodegeneration. Comparative analysis of the bacterial component also revealed significant decreases in Streptococcus spp. and Lactobacillus spp. in PD.

Lactococcus are regulators of gut permeability and are enteric dopamine producers, which plays a primary role in PD. "The depletion of lactococcus due to high numbers of strictly lytic phages in PD patients might be associated with PD development and directly linked to dopamine decrease as well as the development of gastrointestinal symptoms of PD," said Dr. Tetz.

To explore bacterial and bacteriophage community compositions associated with PD, the researchers used shotgun metagenomics sequencing data of fecal microbiome from 32 patients with PD and 28 controls.

The results indicate that the decrease in Lactococci in the PD patients was due to the appearance of strictly lytic, virulent lactococcal phages belonging to the c2-like and 936 groups that are frequently isolated from dairy products. These results open a discussion on the role of environmental phages and phagobiota composition in health and disease.

Bacteria survive in NASA's clean rooms by eating cleaning products
Even NASA clean rooms -- the squeaky-clean places where the agency assembles its spacecraft -- have their own microbiomes, a common community of super-hardy species that somehow withstand the rigorous disinfection procedures. The microbiomes in the clean rooms are dominated by Acinetobacter bacteria, which are typically found in soil and water. Scientists have isolated strains from the surface of the Mars Odyssey orbiter, from the floors on which the Mars Phoenix lander was assembled, from the exterior of the International Space Station and even from the station's drinking water. Now, a team of scientists led by Rakesh Mogul from California State Polytechnic University at Pomona has discovered one of Acinetobacter's survival tricks: these microbes can eat the very cleaning products that are meant to banish them. "You can clean the rooms out and sterilize them, but microbes are still there," says Mogul. "To be a bit Jurassic Park about it: life will find a way."

Chemical additives in food for kids are highly harmful

The American Academy of Pediatrics is cautioning parents and pediatricians to avoid exposing children to eight chemicals found in food and in plastic packaging. The chemicals may be especially harmful to kids due to their small size, says the report published July 23 in Pediatrics. Pregnant women should also avoid the chemicals. And lower-income families who eat a lot of prepackaged foods could be at greater risk for exposure.

The chemicals include nitrates and nitrites, often added to processed meats as a preservative, as well as bisphenol A, or BPA, which is used to make durable plastics and has been linked to cancer, obesity and cardiovascular disease . Also listed are phthalates, which help make plastic flexible, and perfluoroalkyl chemicals, or PFCs, which are resistant to stains, grease and water. These and other compounds have also been associated with endocrine disruption, obesity and insulin resistance, when cells don’t respond properly to insulin leading to an overproduction of the hormone .

Some of these chemicals may also have neurocognitive effects, such as increased hyperactivity in children, says study coauthor Sheela Sathyanarayana, a physician and epidemiologist at the University of Washington in Seattle.

Scientists are unable to test the effects of these chemicals directly in humans, so evidence shows only that there is correlation, not causation, between exposure and disease.

To avoid these chemicals, the report suggests that parents buy fresh or frozen produce and skip processed meats packaged in plastic or food in metal cans, which can be lined with BPA. People should also avoid putting plastic containers in the dishwasher or microwave, the team says, where heat can draw chemicals out of plastic.

The researchers say that they hope the report prompts more strict regulation of these additives.

L. Trasande, R.M. Shaffer and S. Sathyanarayana. Food additives and child health. Pediatrics. Published online July 23, 2018. doi:10.1542/peds.2018-1408.

New molecule with sneaky tactics to kill drug-resistant superbugs ...
A new molecule can kill deadly strains of common bacteria, such as Escherichia coli and Klebsiella pneumonia, that are resistant to most existing antibiotics. The drug works differently from currently available antibiotics, potentially making it harder for bacteria to develop resistance, researchers report September 12 in Nature.
Most antibiotics kill bacteria by weakening their cell wall or by preventing the production of certain proteins. But bacteria have, over time, evolved ways to circumvent these drugs.
The newly developed drug uses a different tactic. It inhibits a key enzyme in the cell membrane that helps the bacteria secrete proteins. That means that strategies that bacteria use to evade existing antibiotics won’t work here, giving the molecule an edge. When the enzyme is blocked, proteins build up in the cell membrane until the membrane bursts, ultimately killing the cell.
The molecule will need to go through additional testing and tweaking before it can be used in humans.
P. Smith et al. Optimized arylomycins are a new class of Gram-negative antibiotics. Nature. Published online September 12, 2018. doi: 10.1038/s41586-018-0483-6.

Alarming news! Microplastics found in 90% of table salt around the world. 

A paper published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology.

recently says those from Asian brands were especially high. In another indicator of the geographic density of plastic pollution, microplastics levels were highest in sea salt, followed by lake salt and then rock salt. The new study estimates that the average adult consumes approximately 2,000 microplastics per year through salt.

For more information read this article....

https://kkartlab.in/group/some-science/forum/topics/the-perils-of-p...

Microplastics have been found in the human food chain as particles made of polypropylene (PP), polyethylene-terephthalate (PET) and others were detected in human stools, research presented recently at the 26th UEG Week in Vienna reveals.

Researchers from the Medical University of Vienna and the Environment Agency Austria monitored a group of participants from countries across the world, including Finland, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Poland, Russia, the UK and Austria. The results show that every single stool sample tested positive for the presence of microplastic and up to nine different plastic types were identified.

Microplastics are small particles of plastic less than 5mm and are used in various products for specific purposes; as well as being created unintentionally by the breaking down of larger pieces of plastic through weathering, degradation, wear and tear. Microplastic may impact human health via the GI tract where it could affect the tolerance and immune response of the gut by bioaccumulation or aiding transmission of toxic chemicals and pathogens.
The stools were tested at the Environment Agency Austria for 10 types of plastics following a newly developed analytical procedure. Up to nine different plastics, sized between 50 and 500 micrometres, were found, with polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) being the most common. On average, the researchers found 20 microplastic particles per 10g of stool.
Schwabl, P. et al (2018), Assessment of microplastic concentrations in human stool - Preliminary results of a prospective study, Presented at UEG Week 2018 Vienna, October 24, 2018.

Brain-eating amoebae halted by silver nanoparticles

Researchers have developed silver nanoparticles coated with anti-seizure drugs that can kill brain-eating amoebae while sparing human cells. The researchers report their results in ACS Chemical Neuroscience.

Although infections with brain-eating amoebae (Naegleria fowleri) are rare, they are almost always deadly. Most cases result from inhaling warm, dirty water in ponds, hot springs or unchlorinated swimming pools. Another species, Acanthamoeba castellanii, can cause blindness by entering the eyes through dirty contact lenses. Common treatments include antimicrobial drugs, but they often cause severe side effects because of the high doses required for them to enter the brain. Ayaz Anwar and colleagues wondered if three anti-seizure drugs -- diazepam, phenobarbitone and phenytoin -- could kill amoebae, alone or in combination with silver nanoparticles. The drugs are already approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and are known to cross the blood-brain barrier. The researchers reasoned that they might be more effective when attached to silver nanoparticles, which can improve the delivery of some drugs and also have their own antimicrobial effects.

The team chemically attached the drugs to silver nanoparticles and examined their ability to kill amoebae. They found that each of the three drugs alone could kill N. fowleri and A. castellanii, but they worked much better when bound to silver nanoparticles. The drug-nanoparticle combos protected human cells from the microbes, increasing their survival rate compared with untreated infected human cells. The researchers propose that these repurposed drugs, aided by the nanoparticles, might kill amoebae by binding to protein receptors or ion channels on the single-celled organism's membrane.

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/acschemneuro.8b00484

60% of world's wildlife has been wiped out since 1970 says WWF

Well over half the world's population of vertebrates, from fish to birds to mammals, have been wiped out in the past four decades, says a new report from the World Wildlife Fund.

Between 1970 and 2014, there was 60 per cent decline, on average, among 16,700 wildlife populations around the world according to the 2018 edition of the Living Planet Report  released recently.

We've had a loss of nearly two-thirds, on average, of our wild species. The magnitude of that should be eye opening… We really are reaching a point where we're likely to see species go extinct.

The WWF says the biggest drivers of the declines are habitat loss and overexploitation, but says climate change is a growing threat. The results of the new report shows a trend in the wrong direction, and "there's a real urgency" to take action to protect wildlife.

Scientists are warning that if human beings continue to mine the world’s wildernesses for resources and convert them into cities and farms at the pace of the previous century, the planet’s few remaining wild places could disappear in decades.

Today, more than 77 percent of land on earth, excluding Antarctica, has been modified by human industry, according to a study published recently in the journal Nature, up from just 15 percent a century ago.

The study, led by researchers from the University of Queensland in Australia and the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York, paints the first global picture of the threat to the world’s remaining wildernesses — and the image is bleak.

Wilderness is defined as an area not subject to direct human use.

These areas are the only places on earth that have natural levels of biodiversity, and can continue to sustain plant and animal species on an evolutionary time scale.

Moreover, these spots often act as the world’s lungs, storing carbon dioxide that would otherwise be released into the atmosphere.

Policy experts, take note that even more aggressive action is needed to stop global resource extraction and industrial expansion. 

Healthy ecosystems are crucial in their own right for biodiversity and mitigating climate change, but more importantly, said the researchers, they are home for hundreds of millions of indigenous people, who rely on the wilderness to survive and thrive.

New technique to do biopsy on living cells
A new set of nanotweezers can extract DNA and other single molecules from a living cell without killing it.

Examining the molecular contents of a single cell has traditionally required killing the cell by bursting it open. But that process provides only a single snapshot of the cell’s molecular makeup at the time of its death. The new nanotweezers, reported online December 3 in Nature Nanotechnology, could enable long-term analysis of what’s going on inside individual cells to better understand how healthy cells work and where diseased cells go wrong.

The nanotweezers comprise a glass rod with a tip less than 100 nanometers across, capped with two carbon-based electrodes. Applying an electric voltage to the tweezers creates a powerful electric field in the immediate vicinity of the electrodes, which can attract and trap biomolecules within about 300 nanometers of the tweezer tip.

Once caught in this 300-nanometer net, molecules are stuck until the tweezer voltage turns off. By positioning the needlelike tweezers with extreme precision, researchers can puncture specific cell compartments and fish for particular molecules.
B.P. Nadappuram et al. Nanoscale tweezers for single-cell biopsies. Nature Nanotechnology. Published online December 3, 2018. 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41565-018-0315-8

It is not common but fathers too can pass mitochondrial DNA to their children!

Fathers in three unrelated families passed mitochondria — tiny energy factories found in cells — on to their children, researchers report.

Scientists have long thought that children inherited mitochondria exclusively from their mothers, since mitochondria from the father’s sperm are usually destroyed after fertilizing the egg. The new research, published online November 26, 2018 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, suggests that in rare cases dads can contribute mitochondria too. For now, the consequences of inheriting mitochondria from both parents aren’t known.

Mitochondrial disease researcher Paldeep Atwal spotted the paternal signature after examining DNA from a woman who came to the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Fla. DNA in a cell’s nucleus is inherited equally from both parents and contains all the genetic instructions for building a body. Mitochondria have their own DNA, too, that contains some of the genes needed for building and running the organelles. The woman’s cells weirdly contained two types of mitochondrial DNA, some from mom and some “from elsewhere”. 

Thinking the result was a mistake, Atwal and colleagues repeated the test. “The same thing came back the second time, and that’s when the researchers started to get a little bit suspicious”.

The researchers had DNA from both of the woman’s parents, so the team examined the father’s mitochondrial DNA, and found that he was the source of the mystery mitochondria. The woman’s brother also inherited mitochondria from their father. 

So Atwal got in touch with Taosheng Huang, a mitochondrial disease expert at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. It turns out that Huang had examined patients from two other families in which fathers had handed mitochondria down to their children. All together, the researchers found 17 people in the three families who inherited 24 percent to 76 percent of their mitochondria from dad.

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/11/21/1810946115