Новости за 04.10.2021

Our genetic code is millions of times more efficient at storing data than existing solutions, which are costly and use immense amounts of energy and space. In fact, we could get rid of hard drives and store all the digital data on the planet within a couple hundred pounds of DNA.

During summer 2020, heavy precipitation affected a significant portion of China and East and South Asia. The Yangtze River basin bore the brunt of extensive flooding, which caused loss of lives, considerable property damage and prompted millions of people to move to higher ground. To better understand why annual "mei-yu" conditions began earlier and ended later than normal, Dr. Ambrogio Volonté and his team from the University of Reading focused on specific atmospheric dynamics throughout China's... Читать дальше...

Trained dogs are well known to use their acute sense of smell to identify explosives, contraband and even certain types of disease. Being able to automate such detection skills could be useful in a range of settings, from airports to public buildings.

The Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol Building gave two South Dakota State University School of Communication and Journalism faculty members an opportunity to examine what motivates compulsive social media use during a breaking news event. However, they had to move fast.

The massive oil spill in Orange County is linked to an oil complex off the coast of Southern California that has amassed a long record of federal noncompliance incidents and violations.

California's distaste for offshore drilling dates back to 1969, when a devastating oil spill off the coast of Santa Barbara shocked the public and galvanized the modern environmental movement.

Using supercomputer-driven dynamic modeling based on experimental data, researchers can now probe the process that turns off one X chromosome in female mammal embryos. This new capability is helping biologists understand the role of RNA and the chromosome's structure in the X inactivation process, leading to a deeper understanding of gene expression and opening new pathways to drug treatments for gene-based disorders and diseases.

Animal cells get their structural integrity from their cytoskeleton, a shapeshifting mesh of filaments inside a cell that helps the cell organize its structure and communicate with its environment. A few years ago, scientists noticed that parts of the cytoskeleton would occasionally rearrange very rapidly, causing an earthquake-like disturbance in part of the cell. They named these disturbances cytoquakes, but no one understood how or why they happened.

The chemical industry consumes a lot of energy, not only to initiate reactions but also to separate products from by-products. In a promising emerging field of research, scientists worldwide are trying to use nanoscale antennas to capture and concentrate light into tiny volumes in order to initiate chemical reactions more efficiently and sustainably.

An Oak Ridge National Laboratory team has successfully introduced a poplar gene into switchgrass, an important biofuel source, that allows switchgrass to interact with a beneficial fungus, ultimately boosting the grass's growth and viability in changing environments.

Over a 36-hour period in August, Hurricane Henri delivered record rainfall in New York City, where an aging storm-sewer system was not built to handle the deluge, resulting in street flooding. Meanwhile, an ongoing drought in California continued to overburden aquifers and extend statewide water restrictions. As climate change amplifies the frequency and intensity of extreme events in the United States and around the world, and the populations and economies they threaten grow and change, there is... Читать дальше...

New research by the Wales Violence Prevention Unit and the University of Exeter indicates people are more likely to take action against domestic abuse and its warning signs if they feel connected to their community.

Equiangular lines are lines in space that pass through a single point, and whose pairwise angles are all equal. Picture in 2D the three diagonals of a regular hexagon, and in 3D, the six lines connecting opposite vertices of a regular icosahedron. Mathematicians are not limited to three dimensions, however.

Biologists at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) are using a mathematical approach developed in CSHL Assistant Professor David McCandlish's lab to find solutions to a diverse set of biological problems. Originally created as a way to understand interactions between different mutations in proteins, the tool is now being used by McCandlish and his collaborators to learn about the complexities of gene expression and the chromosomal mutations associated with cancer. McCandlish says, "This is one of... Читать дальше...

Set to launch next year, NASA's Psyche mission marks the first time the agency has set out to explore an asteroid richer in metal than rock or ice.

The newest known example of a rare type of object in the Solar System—a comet hidden among the main-belt asteroids—has been found and studied, according to a new paper by Planetary Science Institute Senior Scientist Henry Hsieh.

While most of the largest U.S. wildfires occur in the Western U.S., almost three-quarters of the smoke-related deaths and visits to the emergency room for asthma occur east of the Rocky Mountains.

Scientist use superconducting detectors (MKIDs) to capture single photons coming from exoplanets. MKIDs constantly monitor their own kinetic inductance, which changes proportionally to the energy of an incoming photon. Researchers from SRON Netherlands Institute for Space Research have now more than doubled their spectral resolution by re-trapping most of the leaked energy. The research was published in Physical Review Applied.

When Pluto passed in front of a star on the night of August 15, 2018, a Southwest Research Institute-led team of astronomers had deployed telescopes at numerous sites in the U.S. and Mexico to observe Pluto's atmosphere as it was briefly backlit by the well-placed star. Scientists used this occultation event to measure the overall abundance of Pluto's tenuous atmosphere and found compelling evidence that it is beginning to disappear, refreezing back onto its surface as it moves farther away from the Sun.

Scientists at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science have sequenced the genome of the blue crab. The best way to understand an organism is to understand its genetic makeup, also known as its genome. Once the code is understood, it reveals many secrets of how the organism works. Researchers plan to investigate the genetics of growth and reproduction, and the genome will be made publicly available so that scientists anywhere can study different aspects of the blue crab.

For several years now, large investment firms have used public proclamations, like BlackRock's "Dear CEO" letters, to signal their commitment to corporate social responsibility. New research shows the companies these firms invest in are picking up the signal and repeating the message.

JILA scientists have boosted the sensitivity of their decade-old frequency comb breathalyzer a thousandfold and can detect additional biomarkers of disease—four now, with the potential for six more. When validated and engineered into a portable design, the comb system could offer real-time, noninvasive analysis of human breath to detect and monitor diseases. JILA is jointly operated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Colorado Boulder.

In what should be a win-win-win for the environment, a process developed at Rice University to extract valuable metals from electronic waste would also use up to 500 times less energy than current lab methods and produce a byproduct clean enough for agricultural land.

As the Supreme Court's fall term begins, a new survey from the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania finds that more than a third of Americans say they might be willing to abolish the Supreme Court or have Congress limit its jurisdiction if the court were to make decisions they or Congress disagreed with.

Researchers in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Hong Kong (HKU) have made a key breakthrough in droplet manipulation. They have discovered an innovative way to navigate liquids on a surface in the absence of external force or energy.