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Astronauts' mental health risks tested in the Antarctic

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
Astronauts who spend prolonged time alone in space face mental health stressors like loneliness, isolation and more. A University of Houston psychologist developed the Mental Health Checklist, a self-reporting instrument for detecting mental health changes in isolated, confined, extreme environments. She's reporting results that show significant declines in positive emotions.
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Gold digger: Neural networks at the nexus of data science and electron microscopy

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
Researchers at the Max Planck Florida Institute for Neuroscience used machine learning to develop a new, fully automated way to search and identify gold particles markers in electron micrographs with near human-level accuracy
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Explanations in online symptom checkers could improve user trust

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
Researchers at Penn State augmented online symptom checkers by offering explanations of how the system generated its probable diagnoses and suggestions -- while also studying users' perceptions of those recommendations.
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Body mass index, age can affect your risk for neck pain

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
With roughly 80% of jobs being sedentary, often requiring several hours of sitting stooped in front of a computer screen, neck pain is a growing occupational hazard. Smartphones and other devices have also caused people to bend their necks for prolonged periods. But is bad posture solely to blame?
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Study highlights role of physical, mental health in cognitive impairment

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
A recent study suggests that preserving physical and mental health helps older adults experiencing cognitive impairment stave off declines in cognitive engagement.
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Patients with traumatic brain injuries face challenges navigating healthcare system

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
One of the first studies to analyze how much care traumatic brain injury (TBI) patients use and identify areas of unmet need found that many needed extensive healthcare services in the year after injury, and a quarter were super-utilizers, having three or more emergency department visits or inpatient encounters or more than 26 outpatient visits during the year.
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Combining light, superconductors could boost AI capabilities

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
As artificial intelligence has attracted interest, researchers are focused on understanding how the brain accomplishes cognition so they can construct systems with general intelligence comparable to humans' intelligence. In Applied Physics Letters, researchers propose an approach to AI that focuses on integrating photonic components with superconducting electronics; using light for communication and complex electronic circuits for computation could enable artificial cognitive systems of scale and functionality beyond what can be achieved with either light or electronics alone.
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Researchers raise alarm over stalled adoption of biotechnology to improve food security

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
The worldwide adoption of biotechnologies to improve crop production has stalled, putting global food security at risk, according to an international team of researchers led by the University of Birmingham.
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Examining clinician burnout

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
What The Study Did: Researchers investigated the association of burnout at an academic medical center with clinician type, sex, work culture and use of electronic health records.
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Stone skipping techniques can improve reentry of space vehicles

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
In Physics of Fluids, scientists reveal several key factors that influence the number of bounces a skipping stone will undergo when hitting the water. The study involved theoretical modeling and an experimental setup using a model stone to gather data in real time and that allowed a motor to apply a controlled spin to the disk prior to launch. The investigators found that vertical acceleration and the spin direction influence the result.
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Certain gut microbes make mosquitoes more prone to carry malaria parasite

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
Dietary sugars and gut microbes play a key role in promoting malaria parasite infection in mosquitoes. Researchers in China have uncovered evidence that mosquitoes fed a sugar diet show an increased abundance of the bacterial species Asaia bogorensis, which enhances parasite infection by raising the gut pH level. The study appears April 20 in the journal Cell Reports.
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Forensics puzzle cracked via fluid mechanical principles

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
A real-life forensic puzzle inspired University of Illinois at Chicago and Iowa State University researchers to explore the physics involved, and in Physics of Fluids, they present theoretical results revealing an interaction of the incoming vortex ring of propellant muzzle gases with backward blood spatter. A detailed analytical theory of such turbulent self-similar vortex rings was given by this group in earlier work and is linked mathematically to the theory of quantum oscillators.
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Reversal of blood droplet flight predicted, captured in experiments

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
To search for answers about how blood droplets from a gunshot wound can reverse direction while in flight, researchers explored the influence of propellant gases on blood backspatter. In Physics of Fluids, they report using numeric modeling to capture the behavior of gun muzzle gases and predict the reversal of blood droplet flight, which was captured experimentally. Their experiments also show the breakup of blood droplets, a future extension of their modeling efforts.
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Newly discovered airway cells may shed light on SIDS and other conditions

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
Pulmonary neuroendocrine cells, found in the human airway, are more varied than previously thought. Higher levels of certain types of pulmonary neuroendocrine cells are linked to sudden infant death syndrome and other breathing-related conditions.
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Chaperone protein imbalance promotes toxic tau buildup in the aging brain

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
A new University of South Florida Health (USF Health) study suggests that disruption of chaperone proteins in the aging brain may tip the balance to promote toxic tau accumulation, leading to neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's.
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Fearsome tyrannosaurs were social animals, study suggests

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
A new report by a scientists including University of Arkansas paleontologist Celina Suarez indicates the fearsome tyrannosaur dinosaurs may not have been solitary predators as popularly envisioned, but social carnivores with complex hunting strategies like wolves.
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New infrastructure approach could save millions

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
As President Biden's $2 trillion American Jobs Plan places the nation's infrastructure in the spotlight, new research from the University of Georgia suggests states can save money and extend the life of their bridges by taking a fresh approach to how they prioritize maintenance.
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Probiotic Lactobacillus acidophilus shows promise for treating inflammatory bowel disease and other

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
A defective intestinal tight junction barrier, sometimes known as "leaky gut," plays an important role in exacerbating and prolonging intestinal inflammation. New research reported in The American Journal of Pathology, published by Elsevier, shows that the probiotic Lactobacillus acidophilus (L. acidophilus) strain known as LA1 can generate a rapid and sustained enhancement of this defective intestinal barrier and effectively treat intestinal inflammation by preserving and restoring the intestinal barrier.
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Study could lead to production of more efficient optoelectronic devices

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
Resonant-tunneling diodes are used in high-frequency oscillators, wave emitters and detectors, logic gates, photodetectors, and optoelectronic circuits. The study was a collaboration between Brazilian and German researchers.
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Study reveals roadmap of muscle decline with age

Eurekalert - Apr 20 2021 - 00:04
Scientists have produced a comprehensive roadmap of muscle aging in mice that could be used to find treatments that prevent decline in muscle mobility and function.
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