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In the 'war' that the world has been fighting against COVID-19, scientists have been scanning their arsenals of previously used drugs in hopes of finding any that can be used to treat the disease. One of the contenders under scrutiny, an anti-malarial drug called mefloquine shows great promise, according to a new breakthrough study by a team of Japanese scientists, perhaps giving us a better fighting chance.

Metal additive manufacturing (AM) experiments are slow and expensive. Engineers from the University of Illinois are using physics-informed neural networks to predict the outcomes of complex processes involved in AM. The team trained the model on supercomputers at the Texas Advanced Computing Center using experimental and simulated data. They recreated the dynamics of two benchmark experiments in metal AM. The method could lead to fast prediction tools for AM in the future.

Earth-historical events such as ice ages or the shifting of continental plates are mainly responsible for the evolutionary success of proboscideans, but also for their decline. This is the main conclusion of a study published this week in Nature Ecology & Evolution by an international research team from Spain, Finland, Great Britain, Germany and Argentina with the participation of the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin.

The study, published in the American Economic Review, found that a relatively simple intervention directed to poor women -- providing them access to their own bank accounts and direct deposit for their earnings from a federal workfare program, along with basic training on how to use local bank kiosks -- increased the amount they worked, both in the government program and for other employers.

resurrected the genus Philozoon by using modern technologies to thoroughly characterize two of the species of algae that biologist Patrick Geddes had investigated in the mid-to-late 19th century, along with six new related ones.

Mayo Clinic researchers have discovered that genetic variants in a neuro-associated gene called SPTBN1 are responsible for causing a neurodevelopmental disorder. The study, published in Nature Genetics, is a first step in finding a potential therapeutic strategy for this disorder, and it increases the number of genes known to be associated with conditions that affect how the brain functions.

The adult brain is more malleable than previously thought, according to researchers from IDC Herzliya. They trained a 50-year-old man, blind from birth, to "see" by ear, and found that neural circuits in his brain formed so-called topographic maps - a brain organization previously thought to emerge only in infancy. This finding, reported in Neuroimage, sheds new light on the brain's ability for change and holds promise to restore lost functions, for example, after a stroke

Patients with Type 2 diabetes who were prescribed SGLT2 inhibitors lost more weight than patients who received GLP-1 receptor agonists, according to a University at Buffalo-led study.

By studying T cells, a team of scientists at Gladstone Institutes has uncovered fundamental differences between patients who overcome severe COVID-19 and those who succumb to it. The team also found that dying patients harbor relatively large numbers of T cells able to infiltrate the lung, which may contribute to the extensive lung deterioration that is a hallmark of fatal COVID-19.

What if a microscope allowed us to explore the 3D microcosm of blood vessels, nerves, and cancer cells instantaneously in virtual reality? What if it could provide views from multiple directions in real time without physically moving the specimen and worked up to 100 times faster than current technology?

Reducing levels of a hormone prevented metastasis and prolonged survival in mice with pancreatic cancer, a study from Columbia has found, which could lead to new treatments for patients.

A team of scientists has devised a more accurate way to predict the effects of climate change on plants and animals -- and whether some will survive at all.

Not only animals and humans host a complex community of microorganisms -- plants do this as well. Researchers at ETH Zurich have recently published two new studies that shed light on fundamental aspects of these close -- and often overlooked -- relationships.

Researchers at Aalto University have harnessed the power of chatbots to help designers and developers develop new apps and allow end users to find information on the apps on their devices. The chatbot 'Hey GUI' can answer questions by showing images and screenshots of apps, or through simple text phrases.

Extreme differences in flight altitude between day and night may have been an undetected pattern amongst migratory birds -- until now. The observation was made by researchers at Lund University in Sweden in a study of great snipes, where they also measured a new altitude record for migratory birds, irrespective of the species, reaching 8,700 meters.

New research from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King's College London, in collaboration with the University of Liverpool and the Karolinska Institute, has shown that many of the symptoms in fibromyalgia syndrome (FMS) are caused by antibodies that increase the activity of pain-sensing nerves throughout the body.The results show that fibromyalgia is a disease of the immune system, rather than the currently held view that it originates in the brain.

SARS-CoV-2 replication targets nasal ciliated cells early in COVID-19 infection. The establishment of nasal mucosal immunity against SARS-CoV-2 through a nasal vaccine could be the most efficient way to combat COVID-19 infection.

New research published today in the journal Blood Advances finds that certain factors, such as a history of severe pain episodes and coexisting organ conditions, increase the risk of severe COVID-19 illness, including hospitalization, in individuals living with sickle cell disease (SCD). According to researchers, the study results underscore the need for COVID-19 risk reduction strategies and vaccination for this medically vulnerable population.

Zeolites are extremely porous materials: Ten grams can have an internal surface area the size of a soccer field. Their cavities make them useful in catalyzing chemical reactions and thus saving energy. An international research team has now made new findings regarding the role of water molecules in these processes. One important application is the conversion of biomass into biofuel.

A collaboration led by Distinguished Professor Dr. Kazunori Ikebukuro from Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology (TUAT), Japan, discovered that G-quadruplex (G4)-forming DNA binds myoglobin through a parallel-type G4 structure. Through the G4 binding, the enzymatic activity of myoglobin increases over 300-fold compared to that of myoglobin alone (Figure). This finding indicates that DNA may work as a carrier of genetic information in living organisms and act as a regulator of unknown biological phenomena.