Curated News: Staff Picks

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Sociologist Christopher Bail studies how anti-Muslim organizations use social media.

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While academic awareness of African peoples' hunting with poison-tipped arrows extends back for centuries, knowledge of the ingenious practice has been scattered among chemistry, entomology and anthropology texts.

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When an endangered orca is in hot pursuit of an endangered salmon, sending out clicks and listening for their echoes in the murky ocean near Seattle, does the noise from the nearby shipping lane interfere with them catching dinner? To find out scientists measured underwater noise as ships passed their study site 3,000 times. This unprecedented characterization of ship noise will aid in the understanding of the potential effects on marine life, and help with possible mitigation strategies.

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A multi-institution team of researchers has successfully mapped the genome of Cimex lectularius, the common bed bug. Among the findings, scientists discovered more than 800 instances of genes being transferred from bacteria to the bed bug’s chromosomes.

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An international group of physicists led by the University of Arkansas has created an artificial material with a structure comparable to graphene.

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Researchers at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, UCSF School of Medicine and other institutions have recently uncovered abnormalities in embryonic brain development in mice, including transient embryonic brain enlargement during neuron formation, that are responsible for abnormal adult brain structures and behavioral abnormalities.

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A newly upgraded camera that incorporates light sensors developed at Berkeley Lab is now one of the best cameras on the planet for studying outer space at red wavelengths that are too red for the human eye to see.

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A faculty member in the University of Georgia’s College of Family and Consumer Sciences found that adults going on a one- to three-week vacation gained an average of nearly 1 pound during their trips. With the average American reportedly gaining 1-2 pounds a year, the study’s findings suggest an alarming trend.

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Multinational American companies with significant operations in countries with low corporate taxes take on less debt than companies that face higher taxes, according to a new study from the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business. The finding helps to solve an academic mystery: A link between higher corporate taxes and debt levels is predicted by economic theory, but some recent studies have either failed to find such a connection or found it to be weaker than expected.

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Why do humans and dolphins evolve large brains relative to the size of their bodies while blue whales and hippos have brains that are relatively puny? While there has been much speculation regarding brain size and intelligence, a new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences confirms that species with brains that are large relative to their body are more intelligent.

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Researchers, including Carnegie Mellon University President Subra Suresh and collaborators Tony Jun Huang from the Pennsylvania State University and Ming Dao from MIT, have demonstrated that acoustic tweezers can be used to non-invasively move and manipulate single cells along three dimensions, providing a promising new method for 3-D bioprinting.

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People who are risk-takers in their youth also tend to take relatively more risks than their peers as they age, according to an analysis of more than 44,000 German citizens.

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An estimated 1 in 68 children in the United States has autism. The neurodevelopmental disorder, which impairs communication and social interaction skills, can be treated with medications and behavioral therapies, though there is no cure. Now, University of Missouri researchers have found that a medication commonly used to treat high blood pressure and irregular heartbeats may have the potential to improve some social functions of individuals with autism.

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Senior citizens would likely accept robots as helpers and entertainment providers, but are leery of giving up too much control to the machines, according to researchers.

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For the first time researchers have developed a process for altering the ingredients in a sunscreen that does not impact its sun protection factor (SPF), but does allow the body to produce vitamin D. The findings, published in the peer reviewed journal PLOS ONE, has led to the production of a new sunscreen called Solar D.

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A new UCLA study demonstrates that BPS, a common replacement for BPA, speeds up embryonic development and disrupts the reproductive system. The research is the first to examine the effects of BPA and BPS on key brain cells and genes that control organs involved in reproduction.

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The "Green Industry" has recovered from the recession. It includes sod, flowers, bedding plants, tropical foliage, trees and shrubs, among other types of plants as well as many businesses that provide services such as landscape design, installation and maintenance, plus firms -- such as lawn and garden stores -- for wholesale and retail distribution of horticultural products

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In a small pilot study, researchers at University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai determined that a simple swab to transfer vaginal microbes from a mother to her C-section-delivered newborn can alter the baby's microbial makeup (microbiome) in a way that more closely resembles the microbiome of a vaginally delivered baby.

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Sparring over immigration reform, ISIS and whether Trump should be in the White House can go quickly from casual to spirited to heated during water-cooler chats at work or in staff meetings.

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Researchers assumed that tiny objects would instantly blow up when hit by extremely intense light from the world’s most powerful X-ray laser at the Department of Energy’s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. But to their astonishment, these nanoparticles initially shrank instead – a finding that provides a glimpse of the unusual world of superheated nanomaterials that could eventually also help scientists further develop X-ray techniques for taking atomic images of individual molecules.

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Researchers at Oregon State University announced today that they have essentially stopped the progression of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or Lou Gehrig's disease, for nearly two years in one type of mouse model used to study the disease - allowing the mice to approach their normal lifespan.

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Promising new calibration tools, called laser frequency combs, could allow astronomers to take a major step in discovering and characterizing earthlike planets around other stars. These devices generate evenly spaced lines of light, much like the teeth on a comb for styling hair or the tick marks on a ruler—hence their nickname of "optical rulers."

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Building on nearly two decades’ worth of research, a multidisciplinary team at Cornell has blazed a new trail by creating a self-assembled, three-dimensional gyroidal superconductor.

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The finding by Stony Brook University researchers, published in Structure, may be a foundation to better understanding the cellular process and age-related disease.

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Researchers have successfully demonstrated how it is possible to interface graphene - a two-dimensional form of carbon - with neurons, or nerve cells, while maintaining the integrity of these vital cells. The work may be used to build graphene-based electrodes that can safely be implanted in the brain, offering promise for the restoration of sensory functions for amputee or paralysed patients, or for individuals with motor disorders such as epilepsy or Parkinson's disease.

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Groundbreaking work is the result of analytical ingenuity, fortuitous collaborations, and catalytic philanthropic funding.

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Computer simulations help ASU researchers see what works and what doesn’t for farming and ranching in the Mediterranean — and apply that to other regions in the future.

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Rice scientists: Blood serum proteins must find balance with therapeutic nanoparticles.

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Some of the most widely used commercial chemicals to kill bedbugs are not effective because the pesky insects have built up a tolerance to them, according to a team of researchers from Virginia Tech and New Mexico State University.

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UCLA-led research reconstructs massive crash, which took place 4.5 billion years ago.

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UCLA-led research team plans to test approach with post-9/11 veterans to heal 'the invisible wounds of war'.

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Children born to obese women with diabetes are more than four times as likely to be diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder than children of healthy weight mothers without diabetes, new Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health research suggests.

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University of Notre Dame astrophysicist Nicolas Lehner and his collaborators have now determined that the Smith Cloud, a giant gas cloud plummeting toward the Milky Way, contains elements similar to our sun, which means the cloud originated in the Milky Way’s outer edges and not in intergalactic space as some have speculated.

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Scientists discover a brain circuit that controls walking and identify a new target for treating Parkinson’s disease.

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Buck Institute/UCLA study finds that apolipoprotein E enters the nucleus and binds to promoter region of 1700 genes.

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An estimated 15 million Americans suffer from food allergies, many of them children. These are non-trivial concerns, as food allergy or intolerance can cause symptoms ranging from a harmless skin rash to a potentially lethal anaphylactic shock. The good news is that many affected children outgrow their allergy, presumably as the immune system learns to tolerate food initially mistaken as “foreign”.

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Imagine a polymer with removable parts that can deliver something to the environment and then be chemically regenerated to function again. Or a polymer that can contract and expand the way muscles do. These functions require polymers with both rigid and soft nano-sized compartments with extremely different properties. Northwestern University researchers have developed a hybrid polymer of this type that might one day be used in artificial muscles; for delivery of drugs or biomolecules; in self-repairing materials; and for replaceable energy sources.

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Oil and water famously don't mix, but finely dispersing one in the other produces a liquid mixture with many useful properties. An emulsion consisting of tiny droplets of one of those liquids immersed in the other is the most common form, found in everything from salad dressings, to cosmetics to industrial lubricants.

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What spurs creativity? A Columbia sociologist studied the teams behind 12,422 video games released worldwide from 1979, when the gaming industry started, to 2009, and found the most innovative teams were built around diverse experiences and knowledge.

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Award-winning researcher focuses on mental health challenges facing sexual and gender minority groups.

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Understanding and integrating patients’ cultural beliefs into cancer treatment plans may help improve their acceptance of and adherence to treatment in multicultural settings. Researchers examined traditional Maya healers’ understanding of cancer and published their findings online today in the Journal of Global Oncology.

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Large Latin American study links inactivity with hot flashes and more at midlife.

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Authors highlight concern that pharmaceutical companies use strategies to delay patient access to affordable generic drugs.

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NASA satellites obtained a number of different views of the great winter storm that left many snowfall records from Virginia to New York City from January 22 to 24, 2016. RapidScat provided a look at the strong winds that led to flooding in southern New Jersey, while NASA's Aqua satellite and NASA/USGS's Landsat satellite provided images of the post-storm snowy blanket.

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When fast-rising employees quit their jobs for better pay or more responsibility at another organization, the knee-jerk reaction may be to blame their leaving on a bad boss. Although the common perception is that workers join companies but leave managers, new research by a University of Illinois business professor shows that workers leave good bosses, too -- and for companies, there may be a silver lining to their departure.

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RNA sequencing could help predict future outbreaks.

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A newly published study of California’s overwintering monarch butterflies confirmed many previous migratory studies. But the findings also showed some unexpected and surprising patterns of movement, reports a research team led by the University of California, Davis.

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The world remains perilously close to a nuclear disaster or catastrophic climate change that could devastate humanity, according to Stanford experts and California Governor Jerry Brown, who were on hand to unveil the latest update to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists’ “doomsday clock” on Tuesday.

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Using observations by the Hubble Space Telescope, an international research team, including astronomers from the Kavli Institute for Astronomy and Astrophysics and Northwestern University, has for the first time found young populations of stars within globular clusters that have apparently developed courtesy of star-forming gas flowing in from outside of the clusters themselves. This method stands in contrast to the conventional idea of the clusters’ initial stars shedding gas as they age in order to spark future rounds of star birth.

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More than half of workers in New York who earned less than $15 an hour (in 2014 dollars) between 2011 and 2013 received public assistance ,or had a family member enrolled in such safety net programs, according to a study released today by the University of California, Berkeley’s Center for Labor Research and Education. The estimated annual cost of this support was found to be $9.1 billion.