How the brain’s motor system can support vocabulary learning. The motor cortex is a brain region known to control the body’s voluntary movements. However, the team of neuroscientists have now shown that it can also help translating foreign language words into one’s native language. Their study has been published recently in the renowned Journal of Neuroscience. The study Participants in the study learned foreign language words by performing semantically-related gestures over four days of training. After the training, the participants…
The National Institutes of Health has begun a clinical trial to assess the antibody response to an extra dose of an authorized or approved COVID-19 vaccine in people with autoimmune disease who did not respond to an original COVID-19 vaccine regimen. The trial also will investigate whether pausing immunosuppressive therapy for autoimmune disease improves the antibody response to an extra dose of a COVID-19 vaccine in this population. The Phase 2 trial is sponsored and funded by the National Institute…
UCLA study suggests researchers could analyze neurological disorders in a stem cell–derived model. Researchers at the Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at UCLA have developed brain organoids — 3D, brain-like structures grown from human stem cells — that show organized waves of activity similar to those found in living human brains. Then, while studying organoids grown from stem cells derived from patients with the neurological disorder Rett syndrome, the scientists were able to observe patterns…
International study provides new insights into the basis of the marine ecosystem. All life starts at a small scale, also in the ocean. Microscopic organisms, phytoplankton, form an important basis for the entire marine ecosystem, which ultimately determines how fish stocks develop and how much atmospheric carbon dioxide is taken up by the ocean. In this respect, understanding the basis of the marine ecosystem is important for two elementary questions for the future of our human population: nutrition and climate….
Scientists uncover switching system used in information processing and memory. Findings Reveal Coordination Used to Avoid Neurological Clashes. A team of scientists has uncovered a system in the brain used in the processing of information and in the storing of memories–akin to how railroad switches control a train’s destination. The findings offer new insights into how the brain functions. “Researchers have sought to identify neural circuits that have specialized functions, but there are simply too many tasks the brain performs…
We fixate slightly away from the retinal optimum. When we fixate an object, its image does not appear at the place where photoreceptors are packed most densely. Instead, its position is shifted slightly nasally and upwards from the cellular peak. This is shown in a recent study conducted at the University of Bonn, published in the journal Current Biology. The researchers observed such offsets in both eyes of 20 healthy subjects, and speculate that the underlying fixation behavior improves overall…
International Study… The discovery is groundbreaking: Previously unknown viruses live in the subsurface of our planet; they infect unicellular microorganisms, the so-called Altiarchaea. The remarkable thing: They start the food chain in an ecosystem that is actually hidden from our eyes. An international team led by Professor Dr. Alexander J. Probst from the University of Duisburg-Essen (UDE) made the respective discovery. The results were published in the scientific journal “Nature Communications” *. Some Archaea live in the deep subsurface without…
A new study by a Swansea University academic has announced a new mathematical formula that will help engineers assess the point at which cellular materials, which are used a wide range of applications ranging from aerospace to the construction industry, will bend and buckle. Professor Sondipon Adhikari, of the College of Engineering has published his findings in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A. The study details a formula that can calculate the elastic instability of cellular material, in this…
The ability of mangroves to store large amounts of CO2 and other climate gases as organic material has sparked increasing interest in this ecosystem. But what must mangrove forests be like to be particularly effective as carbon stores? A new study in Nature Communications provides an answer to this question. High concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere and the associated global warming are making us increasingly aware of how imperative it is to conserve our Earth’s carbon stores. The ability…
Study uncovers stem cells’ ability to restore immunity and repair gut damage caused by HIV. In a groundbreaking study, a team of UC Davis researchers has discovered a special type of stem cell that can reduce the amount of the virus causing AIDS, boosting the body’s antiviral immunity and repairing and restoring the gut’s lymphoid follicles damaged by the simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV), the equivalent of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) in non-human primates. The study, published June 22 in…
A study coordinated by Luís Graça, principal investigator at the Instituto de Medicina Molecular João Lobo Antunes (iMM; Portugal) and Professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Lisbon (FMUL) used lymph nodes, tonsils and blood, to show how the cells that control production of antibodies are formed and act. The results published now in the scientific journal Science Immunology* unveiled key aspects about the regulation of antibody production, with significant importance for diseases where antibody production is…
New study suggests old rules on how ice breaks may not always hold up. Researchers at Aalto University in Finland have found strong evidence that warm ice – that is, ice very close in temperature to zero degrees Celsius – may fracture differently than the kinds of ice typically studied in laboratories or nature. A new study published in The Cryosphere takes a closer look at the phenomenon, studied at the world’s largest indoor ice tank on Aalto’s campus. Understanding…
Life expectancy of tapeworm-infected worker ants is significantly higher than that of their uninfected nest-mates and resembles that of ant queens. Ant workers that are infected with a tapeworm live much longer than their uninfected nest-mates. Parasitic infections are usually harmful to their hosts, but there are some exceptions. According to the results of a multi-year scientific study, ants of the species Temnothorax nylanderi show exceptionally high survival rates when infected with a tapeworm. “The lifespan of the infected ants…
Where do you find inspiration? New research suggests that a good place to look is in an art museum. Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics in Frankfurt, Germany, have found that appealing visual art can increase moments of inspiration. In a new article published in the journal Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, the authors report several experiments in which participants were asked to write short creative stories in response to different prompts. People reported feeling…
At the University Hospital of Tübingen, a clinical trial led by Professor Dr. Peter Kremsner, Director of the Institute for Tropical Medicine, Travel Medicine and Human Parasitology and Dr. Rolf Fendel, Research Group Leader at the Institute of Tropical Medicine partnered with the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF), was able to show that the vaccine, “Sanaria PfSPZ-CVac”, which is being developed in Tübingen together with the biotechnology company Sanara Inc., provides 77 percent cross-train protection against malaria parasites. The…
New study collects data on pollutants in the atmosphere … One consequence of the coronavirus pandemic has been global restrictions on mobility. This, in turn, has had an effect on pollution levels in the atmosphere. Researchers from across the world are using this unique opportunity to take measurements, collect data, and publish studies. An international team led by Forschungszentrum Jülich’s Institute of Climate and Energy Research – Troposphere has now published a comprehensive review providing an overview of results up…
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