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

Hachimoji DNA and RNA : A genetic system with eight building blocks!

Expanding the genetic code

DNA and RNA are naturally composed of four nucleotide bases that form hydrogen bonds in order to pair. Hoshika et al. added an additional four synthetic nucleotides to produce an eight-letter genetic code and generate so-called hachimoji DNA. Coupled with an engineered T7 RNA polymerase, this expanded DNA alphabet could be transcribed into RNA. Thus, new forms of DNA that add information density to genetic biopolymers can be generated that may be useful for future synthetic biological applications.

Researchers reported DNA- and RNA-like systems built from eight nucleotide “letters” (hence the name “hachimoji”) that form four orthogonal pairs. These synthetic systems meet the structural requirements needed to support Darwinian evolution, including a polyelectrolyte backbone, predictable thermodynamic stability, and stereoregular building blocks that fit a Schrödinger aperiodic crystal. Measured thermodynamic parameters predict the stability of hachimoji duplexes, allowing hachimoji DNA to increase the information density of natural terran DNA. Three crystal structures show that the synthetic building blocks do not perturb the aperiodic crystal seen in the DNA double helix. Hachimoji DNA was then transcribed to give hachimoji RNA in the form of a functioning fluorescent hachimoji aptamer. These results expand the scope of molecular structures that might support life, including life throughout the cosmos.

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6429/884

Scientists turn carbon dioxide back into coal!

Scientists have harnessed liquid metals to turn carbon dioxide back into solid coal, in research that offers an alternative pathway for safely and permanently removing the greenhouse gas from our atmosphere. The new technique can convert CO2 back into carbon at room temperature, a process that's efficient and scalable. A side benefit is that the carbon can hold electrical charge, becoming a supercapacitor, so it could potentially be used as a component in future vehicles.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/02/190226112429.htm

Night-vision ‘super-mice’ created using light-converting nanoparticles

Scientists Watched  as Heat Moved at the Speed of Sound!

A rare phenomenon seen in just a handful of materials at forbidding temperatures has been detected within “warm” graphite—a finding that could aid future microelectronics.

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/early/2019/03/13/science.aav3548

A common food additive may make the flu vaccine less effective

A common food additive may make it more difficult to fight the flu.

Vaccinated mice that got food containing the additive, tert-butylhydroquinone (tBHQ), took three days longer to recover from the flu than mice that ate tBHQ-free food. The unpublished result suggests the common additive may make flu vaccines less effective, toxicologist Robert Freeborn of Michigan State University in East Lansing reported April 7 at the 2019 Experimental Biology meeting.  

The additive helps stabilize fats and is used as a preservative for a wide variety of foods, including some cooking oils, frozen meat products — especially fish fillets — and processed foods such as crackers, chips and other fried snacks. Food manufacturers aren’t required to put the ingredient on labels, so “it’s hard to know everything it’s in,” says Freeborn.

In separate experiments, unvaccinated mice eating tBHQ in their food had more virus RNA in their lungs than mice that didn’t eat it. The tBHQ eaters also had inflammation and increased mucus production deeper in their lungs than usual, Freeborn and colleagues found.  

The researchers don’t know exactly how the additive hampers flu fighting, but it may be because it increases activity of an immune system protein called Nrf2. Increased activity of that protein might reduce the number of virus-fighting immune cells in the mice. That possibility remains to be tested.

R. Freeborn et al. The immune response to influenza is suppressed by the synthetic food additive and Nrf2 activator, tert-butylhydroquinone (tBHQ). 2019 Experimental Biology, Orlando, April 7, 2019.

A Danish study of 657,461 children showed that children who were not vaccinated for MMR had a higher rate of autism than the children who were vaccinated with MMR. Large Danish Study: Autism Not Linked to MMR Vaccine

Scientists have discovered a powerful new strain of fact-resistant humans who are threatening the ability of Earth to sustain life, a sobering new study reports.

The research, conducted by the University of Minnesota, identifies a virulent strain of humans who are virtually immune to any form of verifiable knowledge, leaving scientists at a loss as to how to combat them.

“These humans appear to have all the faculties necessary to receive and process information. And yet, somehow, they have developed defenses that, for all intents and purposes, have rendered those faculties totally inactive. As facts have multiplied, their defenses against those facts have only grown more powerful.” Davis Logsdon, one of the scientists who contributed to the study, said.

While scientists have no clear understanding of the mechanisms that prevent the fact-resistant humans from absorbing data, they theorize that the strain may have developed the ability to intercept and discard information enroute from the auditory nerve to the brain.

“The normal functions of human consciousness have been completely nullified,” Logsdon said.

While reaffirming the gloomy assessments of the study, Logsdon held out hope that the threat of fact-resistant humans could be mitigated in the future.

“Our research is very preliminary, but it’s possible that they will become more receptive to facts once they are in an environment without food, water, or oxygen,” he said.

https://www.thescinewsreporter.com/2019/04/scientists-earth-endange...

Rice husks can remove microcystin toxins from water

Scientists at The University of Toledo have discovered that rice husks can effectively remove microcystin from water, a finding that could have far-reaching implications for communities along the Great Lakes and across the developing world.

An abundant and inexpensive agricultural byproduct, rice husks have been investigated as a water purification solution in the past. However, this is the first time they have been shown to remove microcystin, the toxin released by harmful algal blooms.

The results of the study were recently published in the journal Science of the Total Environment.

Researchers found the rice husks removed more than 95 percent of microcystin MC-LR -- the most common type found in Lake Erie -- in concentrations of up to 596 parts-per-billion (ppb). Even in concentrations approaching 3,000 ppb, more than 70 percent of the MC-LR was removed, and other types of MCs were removed as well.

Researchers from England’s Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology have successfully created E. coli bacteria with entirely human-made DNA, marking a milestone in the burgeoning field of synthetic biology and paving the way for future innovation built on so-called “designer” bacteria.
According to a new study published in the journal Nature, the synthetic genome is by far the largest of its kind. The product of a two-year research campaign, the redesigned DNA consists of four million segments—four times more than the previous record holder. Perhaps most impressively, the bacteria contain just 61 codons, as opposed to the 64 found in nearly all living creatures. Despite this seeming disparity, the synthetic bacteria appear to function much like normal E. coli. The main differences are a slower growth rate and longer length.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1192-5

Hypertension found in children exposed to flower pesticides

In Ecuador, roses for Mother's Day sold around the world is major export crop, but pesticides used to grow and treat those flowers may be affecting health of children living nearby

In a study published online May 21, 2019 in the journal Environmental Research, researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine found higher blood pressure and pesticide exposures in children associated with a heightened pesticide spraying period around the Mother's Day flower harvest. This study involved boys and girls living near flower crops in Ecuador.

Researchers assessed 313 boys and girls, ages 4 to 9, residing in floricultural communities in Ecuador. The children were examined up to 100 days after the Mother's Day harvest. The analyses are part of a long-term study of environmental pollutants and child development in Ecuador.

Researchers  observed that children examined sooner after the Mother's Day harvest had higher pesticide exposures and higher systolic and diastolic blood pressures compared to children examined later. In addition, children who were examined within 81 days after the harvest were three times more likely to have hypertension than children examined between 91 and 100 days.

There is some evidence that insecticides, such as organophosphates, can increase blood pressure. Organophosphates and several other classes of insecticides and fungicides are commonly used to treat flowers for pests before export.

In a previous study, the same people had reported that children examined sooner after the harvest displayed lower performances in tasks of attention, self-control, visuospatial processing and sensorimotor than children examined later.

"These new findings build upon a growing number of studies describing that pesticide spray seasons may be affecting the development of children living near agricultural spray sites. They highlight the importance of reducing the exposures to pesticides of children and families living near agriculture."

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0013935119302889

Measles erases the immune system’s memory

How Bacteria Become Drug-Resistant While Exposed to Antibiotics

Escherichia coli is capable of synthesizing drug-resistant proteins even in the presence of antibiotics designed to cripple cell growth. That’s the finding by a group of French researchers reporting on May 23 in Science. They also discovered how the bacteria manage this feat: a well-conserved membrane pump shuttles antibiotics out of the cell—just long enough to buy the cells time to receive DNA from neighbor cells that codes for a drug-resistant protein. 

Many bacterial membranes are known to harbor a multidrug efflux pump known as AcrAB-TolC, which is capable of shuttling a wide range of antibiotics out of cells. 

They found that the mutants, although they received the plasmid bearing the genetic code for TetA from neighboring cells, weren’t capable of synthesizing TetA protein. Without the functional efflux pump, the mutants can’t shuttle the tetracycline out of the cells. As levels of the antibiotic surged inside the cells, they could no longer make proteins or grow. 

When functional, the AcrAB-TolC pump buys the bacteria time by keeping antibiotic concentrations just low enough for the cells to synthesize the resistance proteins encoded in the plasmid DNA, according to the researchers. Ultimately, bacteria can become resistant while still under the influence of antibiotics. 

S. Nolivos et al., “Role of AcrAB-TolC multidrug efflux pump in drug-resistance acquisition by plasmid transfer,” Science, doi:10.1126/science.aax6620, 2019. 

Severe air pollution can cause birth defects, deaths

Researchers from Texas A&M University have determined that harmful particulate matter in the atmosphere can produce birth defects and even fatalities during pregnancy using the animal model.

The team of researchers from Texas A&M's Colleges of Agriculture and Life Sciences and Geosciences, the Texas A&M Health Science Center, and colleagues from the University of California-San Diego has had their findings published in the current issue of PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences).

Using female rats, the team examined the adverse health effects of exposure to fine particulate matter consisting of ammonium sulfate commonly found in many locations around the world. 

During winter months in China and India, where severe haze events frequently occur, fine particulate matter levels were especially high at several hundred micrograms per cubic meter, the team concluded.

Air pollution is a century-old problem for much of the world. According to the World Health Organization, 9 out of 10 people worldwide breathe air containing high level of pollutants, and 1 of every 9 global deaths can be attributed to exposure to air pollution, totaling over 7 million premature deaths a year.

Sulfate is mainly produced from coal burning, which is a major energy source for much of the world in both developed and developing countries. Ammonium is derived from ammonia, which is produced from agricultural, automobile, and animal emissions.

The results also show that prenatal exposure to air pollution may not dispose offspring to obesity in adulthood. Previous studies have shown such pollution to impair metabolic and immune systems in animal offspring, but this team's study shows definitive proof of decreased fetal survival rates, and also shortened gestation rates that can result in smaller body weight, in addition to damage to brains, hearts and other organs in the adult rat models.

Clinical Trials Involving Fecal Transplants have their own risks

The US Food and Drug Administration issued a safety alert for fecal transplant procedures after two immune-compromised patients contracted drug-resistant infections, according to a statement from the agency’s website. The patients received transplants from the same donor, and one of the patients died. As a result, the agency plans to suspend clinical trials involving the procedure.

Fecal matter transplants (FMT) are not yet officially approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). “While we support this area of scientific discovery, it’s important to note that FMT does not come without risk,” Peter Marks, director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, says in a brief statement on the agency’s website. Marks does not state how many clinical trials will be affected, but says it was “not just a few.”
The FDA warns that fecal matter should be tested for drug-resistant bacteria. Today’s safety communication underscores the importance of why new therapies are thoroughly studied to ensure the benefits of taking them outweigh the risks to patients, and they will continue to aggressively monitor clinical trials to ensure patients are protected when safety concerns arise.

Here is a heart-warming news:  In Science the world Still Trusts!  Despite pseudo-science's dirty dance! 
Roughly 7 in 10 people around the world say they trust scientists and want to learn more about science and health, an international survey shows

Alternative to plastics: Seafood shells

We are facing plastic pollution like hell. 

Some scientists think it’s possible to tackle the  problem at once. Crustaceans’ hardy shells contain chitin, a material that, along with its derivative chitosan, offers many of plastic’s desirable properties and takes only weeks or months to biodegrade, rather than centuries.

The challenge is getting enough pure chitin and chitosan from the shells to make bio-based “plastic” in cost-effective ways. 

Chitin is one of the most abundant organic materials in the world, after cellulose, which gives woody plants their structure. In addition to crustaceans, chitin is found in insects, fish scales, mollusks and fungi. Like plastic, chitin is a polymer, a molecular chain made from repeating units. The building block in chitin, N-acetyl-D-glucosamine, is a sugar related to glucose. Chitin and chitosan are antibacterial, nontoxic and used in cosmetics, wound dressings and pool-water treatments, among other applications.

Only thing that stands in between using it and plastic is viable and green technology to obtain chitin. Right now scientists are trying various methods - using microbes to obtain chitin is one of them.

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/seafood-shells-chitin-plastic-f...

Cleaning water and then producing electricity by using bacteria!

Sounds unbelievable but true!

Sewage treatment plants use bacteria to metabolise the organic material in waste water now.  At the end of the process, the microbes can make up a third by weight of the leftovers to be disposed of. Before being put in landfill, this “microbe cake” itself needs to be heat-sterilised and chemically treated, which uses a lot of energy.

Microbial fuel cells have long been touted as the way forward. The idea is that the biochemistry involved in metabolising the contaminants can yield electricity to help power the process. But fuel cells of this kind have been very difficult to scale up outside the lab.

Some companies use strains of Geobacter and another microbe called Shewanella oneidensis   to process the sludge. Its proprietary mix of organisms has one key advantage – the bacteria liberate some electrons as they respire, effectively turning the whole set-up into a battery. This has the added benefit of slowing bacterial growth, so that at the end of the process you have electricity and no microbe cake.

“The bacteria that purify the water also liberate electrons, turning the set-up into a battery“

A common gut virus that maps our travels

A San Diego State University researcher has found evidence that a virus nicknamed crAssphage, found in the guts of about 70 percent of the world's population, has a country-specific biomarker that changes rapidly as humans travel from one location to another.

Bioinformatics researcher and professor Rob Edwards' study is the first to examine the global similarity of viruses in the human microbiome. His research also suggests that a relative of this crAssphage was living in primates and may have evolved alongside humans for millions of years. The research will be published in Nature Microbiology July 8th.

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-07/sdsu-acg070519.php

Machine learning has helped scientists identify bat species which could host Nipah virus, the cause of lethal outbreaks afflicting people in South and Southeast Asia. These results, published in PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, also flagged four new bat species as surveillance priorities. Nipah virus is a highly lethal, emerging henipavirus that can be transmitted to people from the body fluids of infected bats. Eating fruit or drinking date palm sap that has been contaminated by bats has been flagged as a transmission pathway. Once infected, people can spread the virus directly to other people, sparking an outbreak. Domestic pigs are also bridging hosts that can infect people. There is no vaccine and the virus has a high mortality rate. 

India is home to an estimated 113 bat species. Just 31 of these species have been sampled for Nipah virus, with 11 found to have antibodies that signal host potential. The team compiled published data on bat species known to carry Nipah and other henipaviruses globally. Data included 48 traits of 523 bat species, including information on foraging methods, diet, migration behaviors, geographic ranges and reproduction. They also looked at the environmental conditions in which reported spillovers occurred. Then they applied a trait-based machine learning approach to a subset of species that occur in Asia, Australia, and Oceana. Their algorithm identified known Nipah-positive bat species with 83 percent accuracy. It also identified six bat species that occur in Asia, Australia and Oceana that have traits that could make them competent hosts and should be prioritized for surveillance. Four of these species occur in India, two of which are found in Kerala.

The study is a starting point for the research needed to contain Nipah at its source.

https://journals.plos.org/plosntds/article?id=10.1371/journal.pntd....

Combination Strategy Nearly Eliminates Invasive Mosquitoes in Field

Researchers use two techniques—Wolbachia infection and irradiation—to suppress reproduction in populations of Asian tiger mosquitoes at two study sites in China.

Asian tiger mosquitoes (Aedes albopictus) are among the world’s most invasive mosquito species and can spread dengue and Zika viruses. In a study published on July 17 in Nature, an international team of researchers has virtually eradicated populations of the insects from two residential areas in China.

The researchers infected the insects with the bacterium Wolbachia to limit embryo viability and, as an added precaution, irradiated mosquitoes to induce sterility, and then released millions of male mosquitoes, which don’t bite, at their test sites. The males mated with local females, resulting in a drastic reduction in the populations of A. albopictus. 

This work is promising for control of these mosquitoes in local populations.

In some of the world’s least-developed countries, spacing births two years apart, instead of one, can nearly halve infant mortality rates, a study finds.

Short birth intervals have been linked to poor health outcomes for moms and infants for decades, though the exact causes aren’t clear. Research has shown that the mothers’ bodies can struggle to recover and provide nutrients to children. In addition, siblings that are close in age may compete for the same resources, crucially breast milk, and are exposed to similar diseases.  

Babies born in the shortest birth intervals to uneducated mothers living in countries with high infant mortality — at least 100 babies dying for every 1,000 births — were in the greatest danger. (The researchers used infant mortality rate as a proxy for a country’s level of development.) In those circumstances, babies born within one year of an older sibling had around a 22 percent chance of dying before age 1. That chance dropped to about 13 percent when the birth interval increased to two years.

J. Molitoris, K. Barclay and M. Kolk. When and where birth intervals matter for child survival: An intern.... Demography. Published online July 3, 2019. doi: 10.1007%2Fs13524-019-00798-y.

E. Rogers and R. Stephenson. Examining temporal shifts in the proximate determinants of fertilit... Journal of Biosocial Science. Vol. 50, July 2018, p. 551. doi: 10.1017/S0021932017000529

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In sailing, rock climbing, construction, and any activity requiring the securing of ropes, certain knots are known to be stronger than others. A new mathematical model predicts a knot's stability.

https://phys.org/news/2020-01-mathematical-stability.html?utm_sourc...

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World's most efficient lithium-sulfur battery. A battery, which has the potential to power your phone for five continuous days, or enable an electric vehicle to drive more than 1000km without needing to "refuel".

https://techxplore.com/news/2020-01-supercharging-tomorrow-team-wor...

Scientists are worried about social media driven pseudo-science. Myths about the international climate crisis are part of a growing trend for 'pseudoscience' spread on social media sites like Youtube.

A new report from a German university academic has revealed that the algorithm which drives how people find content on the internet is spreading misinformation. It was found that d more than half (107) of the clips claimed climate change was a conspiracy or denied humans were causing it. Those videos received the highest number of views.

Youtube is an important information source for many people when they want to find information about science and research.

He explained that conspiracy theorists latched onto scientific-style language such as ‘climate engineering’, ‘geoengineering’ or in another example of pseudoscience, ‘chemtrails’.

This strategy could be identified as an attempt to manufacture internet bias in favour of the worldview of ‘chemtrail’ conspiracy theorists.

Dr Allgaier added that social media platforms which do not exercise editorial control provide fertile ground for opponents of mainstream science because there are no ‘gatekeepers and hence no quality control’.

The pseudoscience issue goes beyond the climate crisis and chemtrails. Infectios diseases and vaccines are a prominent area of misinformation both online and in print.

Perhaps the best-known example is the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine which some have claimed has harmful effects on children.

In another health conspiracy, rumours that chicken meat spread a bout of Nipah virus in the Indian state of Kerala in 2018 which killed 17 people were spread virally on WhatsApp.

Scientists believe the incident was sparked by fruit bats but the unfounded rumour chicken was to blame spread when one person duplicated the letterhead of the District Medical officer and spread the story online.

Diabetes can increase cancer risk
For years, scientists have been trying to solve a medical mystery: Why do people with type 1 or type 2 diabetes have an increased risk of developing some forms of cancer? Today, researchers report a possible explanation for this double whammy. They found that DNA sustains more damage and gets fixed less often when blood sugar levels are high compared to when blood sugar is at a normal, healthy level, thereby increasing one's cancer risk.

The researchers will present their results at the American Chemical Society (ACS) Fall 2019 National Meeting & Exposition.
According to researchers, "As the incidence of diabetes continues to rise, the cancer rate will likely increase, as well."Scientists have suspected that the elevated cancer risk for diabetics arises from hormonal dysregulation. "In people with type 2 diabetes, their insulin is not effectively carrying glucose into cells," they explain. "So the pancreas makes more and more insulin, and they get what's called hyperinsulinemia." In addition to controlling blood glucose levels, the hormone insulin can stimulate cell growth, possibly leading to cancer. Also, most people with type 2 diabetes are overweight, and their excess fat tissue produces higher levels of adipokines than those at a healthy weight. These hormones promote chronic inflammation, which is linked to cancer. "The most common idea is that the increased cancer risk has to do with hormones" . "That's probably part of it, but there hasn't been a lot of solid evidence."

Now they looked for a specific type of damage in the form of chemically modified DNA bases, known as adducts, in tissue culture and rodent models of diabetes. Indeed, they found a DNA adduct, called N^2-(1-carboxyethyl)-2'-deoxyguanosine, or CEdG, that occurred more frequently in the diabetic models than in normal cells or mice. What's more, high glucose levels interfered with the cells' process for fixing it. "Exposure to high glucose levels leads to both DNA adducts and the suppression of their repair, which in combination could cause genome instability and cancer". 

They even found evidence for it.  http://bit.ly/acs2019sandiego