ScienceDaily: Top News

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• Relief for epilepsy at the scale of a single cell
• '4-D printing' a new dimension for additive manufacturing
• New class of fuel cells offer increased flexibility, lower cost
• Fossilized rivers suggest warm, wet ancient Mars
• Why are we so afraid to leave children alone?
• Silicon nanoparticles trained to juggle light
• Warbler genomes look to be 99.97 percent alike
• Analog DNA circuit does math in a test tube
• Early exposure to too much manganese causes attention deficits in rats
• Mutational tug of war over HIV's disease-inducing potential
• Portable atomic gyroscope for navigation
• How sleep deprivation harms memory
• New report details pre- and postnatal brain defects from Zika virus
• Human footprint surprisingly outpaced by population and economic growth
• Study reveals surprising role of haze in the warming of Chinese cities
• Chaos could provide the key to enhanced wireless communications
• Tech issues cause most drone accidents, study finds
• Reproducing spots and stripes of a furry animal: Understanding nature's patterns with plasmas
• Osteoporosis treatment: Systematic global review of intervention thresholds based on FRAX
• New approach to determining how atoms are arranged in materials
• Nanofiber scaffolds demonstrate new features in the behavior of stem and cancer cells
• Immune breakthrough: Unscratching poison ivy's rash
• Injected mix of bone-augmenting agents causes new bone growth in mouse jaws
• Researchers image roots in the ground
• Essential oils could counter lung and liver ailments caused by air pollution, research suggests
• The demise of the Maya civilization: Water shortage can destroy cultures
• Multivariate analysis improves on cognitive testing in Alzheimer's disease
• Rising temperatures could accelerate radiation induced DNA effects in marine mussels
• Drinking green tea to prevent artery explosion: Polyphenol intake reduces abdominal aneurysm expansion in rats
• Nanofur for oil spill cleanup
• The cave bear: A vegan gone extinct
• New insights into the relationship between erosion and tectonics in the Himalayas
• Surprise discovery in the blink of an eye
• Reef castaways: Can coral make it across Darwin's 'impassable' barrier?
• Biological invasions threaten developing countries
• For young football players, some tackling drills can pose higher injury risks than games
• Study finds changes to retirement savings system may exacerbate economic inequality
• Private detention of immigrants deters family visits, study finds
• Study examines families' journeys to accepting transgender children
• Study uses geo-mapping to identify 'hot spots' for use of fentanyl and other opiates
• Battery you can swallow could enable future ingestible medical devices
• Stretchy supercapacitors power wearable electronics
• Expecting the worst increases side-effects in breast cancer patients on hormone therapies
• 'Cyclops' beetles hint at solution to 'chicken-and-egg' problem in novel trait evolution
• New microchip demonstrates efficiency and scalable design
• Ancient air pockets changing the history of Earth’s oxygen
• Better understanding seismic hazards
• Chimpanzees choose cooperation over competition
• Light and matter merge in quantum coupling
• Soluble corn fiber can help young women build bone, and older women preserve bone
• In the ocean, clever camouflage beats super sight
• Novel molecular clues behind nocturnal behavior
• The science of diffusion and the spread of public policy
• Infants develop early understanding of social nature of food
• Researchers reduce expensive noble metals for fuel cell reactions
• Stroke-like brain damage is reduced in mice injected with omega-3s
• How melanoma spreads to other organs in the body
• How cell nuclei squeeze into tight spaces
• Monkeys protect against lethal Ebola Sudan infection four days after infection
• Scientists map migration paths of Arctic breeding birds

Relief for epilepsy at the scale of a single cell Posted: 23 Aug 2016 12:32 PM PDT Researchers have developed in collaboration with French colleagues a small device that both detects the initial signal of an epileptic attack and doses a substance that effectively stops it. All this takes place where the signal arises -- in an area of size 20chr('215')20 μm known as a 'neural pixel.'

'4-D printing' a new dimension for additive manufacturing Posted: 23 Aug 2016 11:18 AM PDT Researchers have demonstrated the 3-D printing of shape-shifting structures that can fold or unfold to reshape themselves when exposed to heat or electricity, an approach also known as '4-D printing.' The micro-architected structures, including boxes, conductive devices, and a stent, were fabricated from a conductive, environmentally responsive 'smart' ink.

New class of fuel cells offer increased flexibility, lower cost Posted: 23 Aug 2016 10:51 AM PDT A new class of fuel cells based on a newly discovered polymer-based material could bridge the gap between the operating temperature ranges of two existing types of polymer fuel cells, a breakthrough with the potential to accelerate the commercialization of low-cost fuel cells for automotive and stationary applications.

Fossilized rivers suggest warm, wet ancient Mars Posted: 23 Aug 2016 10:51 AM PDT Extensive systems of fossilized riverbeds have been discovered on an ancient region of the Martian surface, supporting the idea that the now cold and dry Red Planet had a warm and wet climate about 4 billion years ago, according to new research.

Why are we so afraid to leave children alone? Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:56 AM PDT Leaving a child unattended is considered taboo in today's intensive parenting atmosphere, despite evidence that American children are safer than ever. So why are parents denying their children the same freedom and independence that they themselves enjoyed as children? A new study by social scientists suggests that our fears of leaving children alone have become systematically exaggerated in recent decades – not because the practice has become more dangerous, but because it has become socially unacceptable.

Silicon nanoparticles trained to juggle light Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:54 AM PDT Silicon nanoparticles based devices would allow to transmit, reflect, or scatter incident light in a specified direction, depending on its intensity. They could be integrated into microchips that would enable ultrafast all-optical signal processing in optical communication lines and the next generation optical computers.

Warbler genomes look to be 99.97 percent alike Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:53 AM PDT New research shows that, genetically speaking, blue-winged and golden-winged warblers are almost identical. Scientists behind the research say the main differences between the two species are in feather color and pattern, in some cases just a simple matter of dominant or recessive pairings of gene variants, or alleles.

Analog DNA circuit does math in a test tube Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:53 AM PDT Researchers have created strands of synthetic DNA that, when mixed together in a test tube in the right concentrations, form an analog circuit that can add, subtract and multiply as the molecules form and break bonds. While most DNA circuits are digital, their device performs calculations in an analog fashion by measuring the varying concentrations of specific DNA molecules directly, without requiring special circuitry to convert them to zeroes and ones first.

Early exposure to too much manganese causes attention deficits in rats Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:53 AM PDT Too much manganese early in development causes lasting attention deficits and other impairments in rats. Studies of children and adolescents have associated excess manganese in the diet with attention deficits, but confounding factors in those studies have made it impossible to show a cause and effect relationship. The new study is the first to establish a causal link between exposure to elevated manganese in the diet and attentional dysfunction in an animal model.

Mutational tug of war over HIV's disease-inducing potential Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:53 AM PDT A study from AIDS researchers shows how the expected disease severity when someone is newly infected by HIV reflects a balance between the virus' invisibility to the host's immune system and its ability to reproduce.

Portable atomic gyroscope for navigation Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:53 AM PDT Researchers have demonstrated a compact atomic gyroscope design that could, with further development, be portable, low power, and accurate enough to be used for navigation.

How sleep deprivation harms memory Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:52 AM PDT Researchers have discovered a piece in the puzzle of how sleep deprivation negatively affects memory.

New report details pre- and postnatal brain defects from Zika virus Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:51 AM PDT Researchers from the epicenter of the current Zika virus outbreak have released a report on imaging findings in babies and fetuses infected with the Zika virus. Zika virus is most dangerous when transmitted from a pregnant mother to her fetus, increasing the likelihood of severe brain defects in the baby. In addition to microcephaly, the report identifies a wide array of brain defects, visible on CT, MRI and ultrasound.

Human footprint surprisingly outpaced by population and economic growth Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:51 AM PDT The global impact of human activities on the natural environment is extensive, but those impacts are expanding at a slower rate than the rate of economic and population growth.

Study reveals surprising role of haze in the warming of Chinese cities Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:51 AM PDT A new study suggests that regional variations may cause the phenomenon known as the urban heat island effect, and that the impacts of haze pollution in the US and China vary significantly.

Chaos could provide the key to enhanced wireless communications Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:51 AM PDT Scientists have demonstrated that chaos can be used to transmit information over a wireless physical channel offering wide-ranging advantages from enhanced communications security.

Tech issues cause most drone accidents, study finds Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:49 AM PDT Researchers have found that communications links and other technical problems were the cause of most reported drone accidents. This has led to a call for increased airworthiness regulations for drone safety and better reporting of accidents. Their world-first analysis covered more than 150 incidents across the world over a 10-year period.

Reproducing spots and stripes of a furry animal: Understanding nature's patterns with plasmas Posted: 23 Aug 2016 09:48 AM PDT Patterns abound in nature, from zebra stripes and leopard spots to honeycombs and bands of clouds. Somehow, these patterns form and organize all by themselves. To better understand how, researchers have now created a new device that may allow scientists to study patterns in 3-D like never before.

Osteoporosis treatment: Systematic global review of intervention thresholds based on FRAX Posted: 23 Aug 2016 08:20 AM PDT According to most current guidelines, treatment for osteoporosis is recommended in individuals with prior fragility fractures -- however for those without prior fractures, intervention thresholds using FRAX can be derived using different methods.

New approach to determining how atoms are arranged in materials Posted: 23 Aug 2016 08:20 AM PDT Researchers have developed a novel approach to characterizing how atoms are arranged in materials, using Bayesian statistical methods to glean new insights into the structure of materials. The work should inform the development of new materials for use in a variety of applications.

Nanofiber scaffolds demonstrate new features in the behavior of stem and cancer cells Posted: 23 Aug 2016 08:19 AM PDT A discovery in the field of biomaterials may open new frontiers in stem and cancer cell manipulation and associated advanced therapy development. Novel scaffolds are shown enabling cells to behave in a different but controlled way in vitro due to the presence of aligned, self-assembled ceramic nanofibers of an ultra-high anisotropy ratio augmented into graphene shells.

Immune breakthrough: Unscratching poison ivy's rash Posted: 23 Aug 2016 07:32 AM PDT We all know that a brush with poison ivy leaves us with an itchy painful rash. Now researchers have discovered the molecular cause of this irritation. The finding brings us a step closer to designing agents to block this mechanism and sheds light on other serious skin conditions, such as psoriasis.

Injected mix of bone-augmenting agents causes new bone growth in mouse jaws Posted: 23 Aug 2016 07:32 AM PDT A research team combined a protein that stimulates bone formation with a peptide that promotes osteoblast differentiation, and delivered them into mouse jawbones by injection within a gelatin carrier. The technique induced formation of new bone, suggesting its potential as a non-invasive means of replacing lost jawbone.

Researchers image roots in the ground Posted: 23 Aug 2016 07:32 AM PDT It's a familiar hazard of vacation time: While you're conspicuously absent, your colleagues in the office forget to water and fertilize the plants -- often leaving behind nothing but a brownish skeleton. Whether a plant thrives or wastes away depends above all on whether its roots get enough water and nutrients. Geophysicists have now visualized such processes for the first time using electrical impedance tomography.

Essential oils could counter lung and liver ailments caused by air pollution, research suggests Posted: 23 Aug 2016 07:32 AM PDT Certain ingredients in essential oils made from plants such as cloves, anise, fennel and ylang-ylang could serve as a natural treatment of lung and liver conditions caused by air pollution, according to a new study.

The demise of the Maya civilization: Water shortage can destroy cultures Posted: 23 Aug 2016 07:32 AM PDT Water reservoirs provide relief during short periods of drought. They can, however, make a society even more vulnerable to major catastrophes, if the population keeps growing without changing their habits. New models suggest that this could have caused the demise of the Maya civilization.

Multivariate analysis improves on cognitive testing in Alzheimer's disease Posted: 23 Aug 2016 07:32 AM PDT Multivariate analysis of cognitive tests in Alzheimer's disease identifies five distinct groups of Alzheimer's disease patients, and suggests that multivitamins might slow progression only in certain groups.

Rising temperatures could accelerate radiation induced DNA effects in marine mussels Posted: 23 Aug 2016 07:32 AM PDT Increased sea temperatures could have a dramatic effect on radiation-induced damage in marine invertebrates, a new study suggests.

Drinking green tea to prevent artery explosion: Polyphenol intake reduces abdominal aneurysm expansion in rats Posted: 23 Aug 2016 07:31 AM PDT Green tea could prevent a deadly condition in the body's main artery. A team has found that abdominal aortic aneurysm -- a condition in which the main artery becomes overstretched and bloated -- developed less frequently in rats that drank green tea polyphenol, a major component of green tea.

Nanofur for oil spill cleanup Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:35 AM PDT Some water ferns can absorb large volumes of oil within a short time, because their leaves are strongly water-repellent and, at the same time, highly oil-absorbing. Researchers have found that the oil-binding capacity of the water plant results from the hairy microstructure of its leaves. It is now used as a model to further develop the new Nanofur material for the environmentally friendly cleanup of oil spills.

The cave bear: A vegan gone extinct Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:35 AM PDT Scientists have studied the feeding habits of the extinct Cave Bear. Based on the isotope composition in the collagen of the bears' bones, they were able to show that the large mammals subsisted on a purely vegan diet. The team proposes that it was this inflexible diet that led to the Cave Bear's extinction approximately 25,000 years ago.

New insights into the relationship between erosion and tectonics in the Himalayas Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:35 AM PDT Earth's climate interacts with so called surface processes -- such as landslides or river erosion -- and tectonics to shape the landscape that we see. In some regions, the sheer force of these processes has led scientists to believe that they may even influence the development of tectonics. Scientists have now disproved this assumption.

Surprise discovery in the blink of an eye Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:33 AM PDT The scientists have discovered a new type of eye movement which they have called blink-associated resetting movement.

Reef castaways: Can coral make it across Darwin's 'impassable' barrier? Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:33 AM PDT An international team of researchers have shown that vulnerable coral populations in the eastern tropical Pacific have been completely isolated from the rest of the Pacific Ocean for at least the past two decades.

Biological invasions threaten developing countries Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:32 AM PDT Invasions from alien species such as Japanese knotweed and grey squirrels threaten the economies and livelihoods of residents of some of the world's poorest nations, new research shows.

For young football players, some tackling drills can pose higher injury risks than games Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:32 AM PDT Researchers used biomechanical sensors to investigate exposure to head impacts during practice sessions and games in 9- to 11-year-olds engaged in a youth football program. A higher proportion of head impacts greater than 60g occurred in tackling drills than in games. The findings may influence the structure of training for youth football teams.

Study finds changes to retirement savings system may exacerbate economic inequality Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:32 AM PDT A shift to defined-contribution retirement plans, such as 401(k) plans, has led to an income and education gap in pension savings that could exacerbate future economic inequality, according to a study.

Private detention of immigrants deters family visits, study finds Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:32 AM PDT Immigrants detained in a privately run detention facility while awaiting deportation decisions are far less likely than those held in county or city jails to receive visits from their children, a new study finds.

Study examines families' journeys to accepting transgender children Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:32 AM PDT A tiny hair barrette and an anguished moment marked the turning point for one mother in coming to fully accept that her child, who was born a boy, was a transgender girl.

Study uses geo-mapping to identify 'hot spots' for use of fentanyl and other opiates Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:32 AM PDT As the US experiences sharp increases in drug overdoses, researchers are using geo-mapping to look at the state, neighborhood by neighborhood, to identify 'hot spots' where the use of prescription fentanyl -- an extremely powerful synthetic opiate, which recently attracted national attention as the drug that caused Prince's death -- and other opiates is especially prevalent.

Battery you can swallow could enable future ingestible medical devices Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:32 AM PDT Non-toxic, edible batteries could one day power ingestible devices for diagnosing and treating disease. One team reports new progress toward that goal with their batteries made with melanin pigments, naturally found in the skin, hair and eyes.

Stretchy supercapacitors power wearable electronics Posted: 23 Aug 2016 05:32 AM PDT A future of soft robots or smart T-shirts may depend on the development of stretchy power sources. But traditional batteries are thick and rigid -- not ideal properties for materials that would be used in tiny malleable devices. In a step toward wearable electronics, a team of researchers has produced a stretchy micro-supercapacitor using ribbons of graphene.

Expecting the worst increases side-effects in breast cancer patients on hormone therapies Posted: 22 Aug 2016 06:52 PM PDT A study of women receiving hormone therapies such as tamoxifen as part of their treatment for breast cancer has found that the number and seriousness of side effects they experienced were influenced by their expectations. The study found that women who had higher expectations of suffering more and worse side-effects before their treatment began did, in fact, experience more after two years of adjuvant hormone therapy.

'Cyclops' beetles hint at solution to 'chicken-and-egg' problem in novel trait evolution Posted: 22 Aug 2016 03:18 PM PDT Beetles with cyclops eyes have given scientists insight into how new traits may evolve through the recruitment of existing genes -- even if these genes are already carrying out critical functions.

New microchip demonstrates efficiency and scalable design Posted: 22 Aug 2016 03:18 PM PDT The Piton chip's architecture is scalable; designs can be built which go from a dozen processing units (called cores) to several thousand.

Ancient air pockets changing the history of Earth’s oxygen Posted: 22 Aug 2016 02:42 PM PDT Geologists are using new direct methods to measure the Earth's oxygenation. They identified, for the first time, exactly how much oxygen was in Earth's atmosphere 813 million years ago -- 10.9 percent. This finding, they say, demonstrates that oxygenation on Earth occurred 300 million years earlier than previously concluded from indirect measurements.

Better understanding seismic hazards Posted: 22 Aug 2016 02:41 PM PDT The April 2015 Gorkha earthquake in Nepal killed more than 8,000 people and injured more than 21,000. With a magnitude of 7.8, it was the worst natural disaster to strike Nepal since the 1934 Nepal-Bihar earthquake. Researchers have now discovered complex relationship between major earthquake faulting and mountain building in the Himalayas.

Chimpanzees choose cooperation over competition Posted: 22 Aug 2016 12:59 PM PDT Tasks that require chimpanzees to work together preferred five-fold, despite opportunities for competition, aggression and freeloading.

Light and matter merge in quantum coupling Posted: 22 Aug 2016 12:26 PM PDT Physicists probe the boundaries of light-matter interactions as they bridge traditional condensed matter physics and cavity-based quantum optics.

Soluble corn fiber can help young women build bone, and older women preserve bone Posted: 22 Aug 2016 12:26 PM PDT Supplementing with soluble corn fiber at two critical times in a woman's life -- adolescence and post-menopause -- can help build and retain calcium in bone, according to new research.

In the ocean, clever camouflage beats super sight Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:42 AM PDT Some fish blend seamlessly into their watery surroundings with help from their silvery reflective skin. Researchers have long assumed that squid, shrimp and other ocean animals could see through this disguise, thanks to an ability to detect a property of light -- called polarization -- that humans can't see. But a new study finds that not even polarization vision helps animals spot silvery fish from afar.

Novel molecular clues behind nocturnal behavior Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:42 AM PDT Scientists offer new insights into why many animals sleep at night and are active during the day, while others do the reverse.

The science of diffusion and the spread of public policy Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:42 AM PDT Scientists merged the domains of health policy with network science and dynamical systems to help understand the mechanisms of policy diffusion in the same way we understand the diffusion of one substance into another.

Infants develop early understanding of social nature of food Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:07 AM PDT A new study finds infants develop expectations about what people prefer to eat, providing early evidence of the social nature through which humans understand food.

Researchers reduce expensive noble metals for fuel cell reactions Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:05 AM PDT Researchers have developed a novel nanomaterial that could improve the performance and lower the costs of fuel cells by using fewer precious metals like platinum or palladium.

Stroke-like brain damage is reduced in mice injected with omega-3s Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:05 AM PDT Researchers have found that omega-3 fatty acids reduced brain damage in a neonatal mouse model of stroke.

How melanoma spreads to other organs in the body Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:05 AM PDT In a landmark discovery, researchers have unraveled the metastatic mechanism of melanoma, the most aggressive of all skin cancers. Their work may lead to a cure for the deadly disease.

How cell nuclei squeeze into tight spaces Posted: 22 Aug 2016 11:05 AM PDT As cells move throughout our bodies, they often have to squeeze through tight nooks and crannies in their environment, reliably springing back to their original shape. The structures involved in this process are still a mystery, but now a research team reports one protein responsible for giving a cell's nucleus its durable, deformable nature. These results, the authors say, may explain the invasiveness of certain cancer cells.

Monkeys protect against lethal Ebola Sudan infection four days after infection Posted: 22 Aug 2016 09:55 AM PDT Researchers have protected nonhuman primates against Ebola Sudan four days following exposure to the virus.

Scientists map migration paths of Arctic breeding birds Posted: 22 Aug 2016 09:54 AM PDT Conservation of intertidal habitat -- 65 percent of which has been lost over the last 50 years -- is critical to the survival of countless birds during migration on the East Asian Australasian Flyway.

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