Articles by News Staff

Researchers Identify Genetic Variant Responsible for Tuberculosis Vulnerability

Jan 3, 2019 by News Staff

A research team led by Rockefeller University scientists has discovered a genetic variant that makes people more vulnerable to tuberculosis, a disease...

Ultima Thule. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Returns First Clear Photo of Ultima Thule

Jan 2, 2019 by News Staff

NASA has released the first image from the historic Ultima Thule flyby taken with New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) camera. Ultima...

An artist’s impression of a warped disk around a protostar. Image credit: RIKEN.

ALMA Spots Warped Disk around Infant Protostar

Jan 2, 2019 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) have observed a warped disk around a recently-formed protostar. An artist’s...

Located just off Regent’s Park, the subterranean ice-well would have been one of the largest of its kind when first built -- measuring an impressive 24.6 foot (7.5 m) wide and 31.2 foot (9.5 m) deep. The structure survives in good condition, with an intact brickwork interior and retains its circular plan and principal features including a ventilation hole or opening, a red brick lined chamber, an entrance-passage, an ante-chamber and evidence of internal chambers. Image credit: MOLA.

Archaeologists Rediscover 18th Century Ice-Well in London

Jan 2, 2019 by News Staff

A team of archaeologists from Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA) has rediscovered a large, well-preserved subterranean ice-well dating from 1780. Located...

Thanarajah et al combined functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and positron emission tomography (PET) to assess the brain’s response to food intake and discovered immediate and delayed dopamine release in distinct areas of the human brain; the study authors also identified areas where dopamine release reflected subjective wanting to eat, shedding light on how the brain transforms energetic signals into the desire to eat. Image credit: Thanaraja et al, doi: 10.1016/j.cmet.2018.12.006.

Study: Our Brain Rewards Us Twice Per Meal

Jan 2, 2019 by News Staff

Our brain rewards us for every meal by releasing dopamine, a neurotransmitter that plays a starring role in motivating behavior. According to a new study,...

Just over 24 hours before its closest approach to Ultima Thule, New Horizons has sent back the first images that begin to reveal Ultima Thule’s shape. Image-sharpening techniques combining multiple images show that Ultima Thule is elongated, perhaps twice as long as it is wide. The spacecraft was approximately 1.2 million miles (1.9 million km) from Ultima Thule when this image was taken on December 30, 2018. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Arrives at Ultima Thule

Jan 1, 2019 by News Staff

After a journey of 13 years and 4 billion miles (6.4 billion km), NASA’s New Horizons probe had a close encounter with a Kuiper Belt object known as...

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows the reflection nebula NGC 1333 and associated Herbig-Haro objects. The picture was snapped by Hubble’s Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS). The image was made through two filters. The color results from assigning different hues to each monochromatic image associated with an individual filter. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / K. Stapelfeldt.

Hubble Finds Group of Herbig-Haro Objects within NGC 1333

Jan 1, 2019 by News Staff

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has spotted a group of five Herbig-Haro objects — tiny patches of nebulosity associated with newborn stars —...

Artist’s impression of New Horizons encountering a Pluto-like object in the distant Kuiper Belt. Image credit: NASA / JHUAPL / SwRI / Alex Parker.

New Horizons to Reach Ultima Thule on New Year’s Day: Watch Live

Dec 31, 2018 by News Staff

On January 1st, 2019, at 12:33 a.m. EST (5:33 a.m. GMT), NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft will fly past a Kuiper Belt object known as 2014 MU69 (nicknamed...

Wedell-Neergaard et al show that in abdominally obese people, exercise-mediated loss of visceral adipose tissue mass requires interleukin-6 (IL-6) receptor signaling. Given that abdominal fat is metabolically harmful to health, the study raises a potentially important side effect of IL-6 receptor antibodies, such as tocilizumab. Image credit: Wedell-Neergaar et al.

New Study Shows How Exercise Reduces Abdominal Fat Mass

Dec 31, 2018 by News Staff

Abdominal (belly) fat is harmful to metabolic health. Exercise training reduces abdominal fat mass, but the underlying mechanisms have not been clear....

Multicellular organisms eliminate abnormal but viable cells based on their fitness status through cell competition to maintain tissue integrity. Coelho et al report that fitness-based neuronal selection occurs in the course of neurodegeneration. Death of unfit neurons is beneficial, protecting against disease progression by restoring motor and cognitive functions. Image credit: Coelho et al, doi: 10.1016/j.celrep.2018.11.098.

Neuronal Loss May Have Beneficial Effect in Alzheimer’s Disease

Dec 28, 2018 by News Staff

Neuronal loss in Alzheimer’s disease may be the result of a cell quality control mechanism trying to protect the brain from the accumulation of malfunctioning...

Klobiodon rochei. Image credit: Mark Witton.

New Jurassic-Era Pterosaur Discovered in England

Dec 28, 2018 by News Staff

Paleontologists from the University of Portsmouth have discovered the fossilized remains of a new species of ancient flying reptile. Klobiodon rochei....

Banerjee et al propose a new model with dark energy and our Universe riding on an expanding bubble in an extra dimension. Image credit: Suvendu Giri.

Universe May Be Riding on Expanding Bubble in Extra Dimension

Dec 28, 2018 by News Staff

A team of theoretical physicists at Uppsala University, Sweden, has devised a new model for our Universe — one that may solve the mystery of dark...

The Himalayan marmot (Marmota himalayana). Image credit: Shauryankar Lingwal / CC BY-SA 4.0.

Scientists Sequence Genome of Himalayan Marmot

Dec 28, 2018 by News Staff

Researchers have for the first time mapped the genome of the Himalayan marmot (Marmota himalayana), a hibernating mammal that inhabits the high-elevation...

This image taken by ESO’s Very Large Telescope shows the binary system R Aquarii and the jets of material spewing from the stellar couple. Image credit: ESO / Schmid et al.

Astronomers Obtain Sharpest Ever Image of R Aquarii

Dec 27, 2018 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet Research (SPHERE) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope have captured dramatic...

Histochemical staining of Arabidopsis thaliana: (i) 7-day-old seedling primary root tip, (ii) rosette leaf, (iii) cauline leaf and (iv) inflorescence of Col-0 and prt6-1 lines expressing wild type VRN2-GUS. Scale bar in (i) - 500 μm. Image credit: Gibbs et al, doi: 10.1038/s41467-018-07875-7.

Biologists Unravel Memory Mechanism in Flowering Plants

Dec 27, 2018 by News Staff

A team of researchers from the United Kingdom and the Netherlands has identified a mechanism that enables angiosperms (flowering plants) to sense and remember...

Blyth et al analyzed the gamma rays emitted during the NPDGamma Experiment and found parity-violating asymmetry, which is a specific change in behavior in the force between a neutron and a proton. They measured a 30 parts per billion preference for gamma rays to be emitted antiparallel to the neutron spin when neutrons are captured by protons in liquid hydrogen. After observing that more gammas go down than up, the experiment resolved for the first time a mirror-asymmetric component or handedness of the weak force. Image credit: Andy Sproles / Oak Ridge National Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy.

Experimental Physicists Measure Weak Force between Protons and Neutrons in Atom’s Nucleus

Dec 27, 2018 by News Staff

Physicists from the NPDGamma Experiment at the DoE’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) have measured the weak interaction between protons and neutrons...

Andesite blocks at Pumpapunku. Image credit: Brattarb / CC BY-SA 3.0.

Pumapunku: Researchers Reconstruct Enigmatic Pre-Columbian Monument

Dec 27, 2018 by News Staff

The Pumapunku (Gateway of the Puma or Jaguar), a highly damaged pre-Columbian monument at the ancient archaeological site of Tiwanaku, Bolivia, has been...

Genetically modified pothos ivy (Epipremnum aureum). Image credit: Mark Stone / University of Washington.

Genetically Modified Houseplant Can Clean Indoor Air

Dec 27, 2018 by News Staff

A team of scientists at the University of Washington has genetically modified a common houseplant, the pothos ivy (Epipremnum aureum), to efficiently remove...

An artist’s impression of the infant bow shock detected by ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft at Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Image credit: ESA.

Rosetta Detects Signs of Infant ‘Bow Shock’ at Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko

Dec 26, 2018 by News Staff

The ‘bow shock’ is the first boundary the solar wind encounters as it approaches planets or comets. From 2014 to 2016, ESA’s Rosetta orbiter studied...

An artist’s depiction of loop quantum gravity effects in a black hole. The bottom half of the image depicts the black hole which, according to general relativity, traps everything including light. Loop quantum gravity overcomes this tremendous pull and liberates everything shown in the top half of image, thus solving the fundamental problem of black hole singularity. Image credit: A. Corichi & J.P. Ruiz.

Loop Quantum Gravity Theory Could Answer Fundamental Questions about Black Holes

Dec 26, 2018 by News Staff

Loop quantum gravity is a theory that uses quantum mechanics to extend gravitational physics beyond Einstein’s theory of general relativity. Previous...

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