Countries may be under-reporting greenhouse gas emissions – this could help

Pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions are very welcome – but accurate monitoring across the globe is crucial if we are to meet targets and combat the devastating consequences of global warming.

During COP26 in Glasgow, many countries have set out their targets to reach net-zero by the middle of this century.

Predicting when an adolescent will become suicidal

One common thing said by friends and family of people who commit suicide is that they didn't see the signs. A new algorithm can, with 91% accuracy.

 

Ethical Guidelines for Ancient DNA Research

In 2009, published genome-wide DNA data was not available for a single ancient human individual. Today, there is genome-wide data available for more than 6,000 ancient humans. This rapid expansion of ancient DNA (aDNA) research enables scientists to uncover more information than ever on past human populations, including their genetic adaptations, patterns of migration and mixing, and even clues about our species’ deep past. But this wide availability of aDNA brings ethical questions on how the data is gathered and used to the forefront.

There have long been school vaccination mandates - they were just casually enforced

The ongoing battles over COVID-19 vaccination in the U.S. are likely to get more heated when the Food and Drug Administration authorizes emergency use of a vaccine for children ages 5 to 11, expected later this fall.

For those without severe pain, acupuncture may replace medicine after knee surgery

41 patients undergoing primary total knee replacement at the Hospital for Special Surgery still had access to opioids, with the addition of electroacupuncture - small electric current to thin needles that are inserted - at eight specific points in the ear, And the majority of patients said acupuncture in their ear led to less opiod use. Sixty-five percent of patients maintained a low-dose opioid regimen of 15 oxycodone pills or less (57.5%) or remained completely opioid-free (7.5%) from induction of anesthesia to 30 days after surgery.

Radiotherapy repairs irregular rhythms by reprogramming heart muscle cells to younger state

New research from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis suggests that radiation therapy can reprogram heart muscle cells to what appears to be a younger state, fixing electrical problems that cause a life-threatening arrhythmia without the need for a long-used, invasive procedure.

New analysis says race predicts income better than job

In the period during the housing crisis recession and the economic malaise that lasted until 2017, black households lost much more wealth than white families, regardless of class or profession, according to a new political science paper.

Vaping is linked to eating disorder risk among U.S. college students

A new study published in the journal Eating Behaviors found that vaping or e-cigarette use is associated with a heighted risk of developing an eating disorder among US college students. This finding is particularly important given the common use of vape pens and e-cigarettes and an increase in the prevalence of eating disorders amidst the COVID-19 pandemic among young people.

How humanoid robots confuse humans during a competition - by looking at them

Gaze is an extremely powerful and important signal during human-human communication and interaction, conveying intentions and informing about other’s decisions. What happens when a robot and a human interact looking at each other? Researchers at IIT-Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (Italian Institute of Technology) investigated whether a humanoid robot’s gaze influences the way people reason in a social decision-making context.

Coronavirus Epidemics began over 21,000 years ago

Sarbecoviruses have crossed into humans twice in the last decade, leading to the deadly SARS-CoV-1 outbreak in 2002-04 and the current COVID-19 pandemic, caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus. A new study, published today, shows that the most recent common ancestor of these viruses existed more than 21,000 years ago, nearly 30 times older than previous estimates.

 

Large Pandemics Are More Likely Than Thought

The COVID-19 pandemic may be the deadliest viral outbreak the world has seen in more than a century. But statistically, such extreme events aren’t as rare as we may think, asserts a new analysis of novel disease outbreaks over the past 400 years.

The study, appearing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the week of Aug. 23, used a newly assembled record of past outbreaks to estimate the intensity of those events and the yearly probability of them recurring.

Making skin crawl: using cellular motion to help wound healing

With a technique that overcomes cells’ innate social behaviors, researchers have taken an important step in directing skin cells to migrate en masse to close wounds _ “literally making skin crawl,” said principal investigator Daniel Cohen.

Assigned seats in classes promote unpredictable friendships

A study conducted in Hungarian schools showed that seating students next to each other boosted their tendency to become friends—both for pairs of similar students and pairs of students who differed in their educational achievement, gender, or ethnicity, according to the University of Leipzig, Germany, and colleagues.

AI Baby Steps: Letting your car detect potholes

An 'AI-based automatic pothole detection system' is designed to be installed on the windshield of a vehicle to detect potholes on the road surface in real-time. Potholes can damage cars and may even lead to life-threatening accidents.

Spotting — and hearing — heart attacks before they happen

If heart attacks blared a warning signal, patients would have a better chance of avoiding them. That’s the idea behind a new imaging technique developed by a Spartan-led team of researchers.

“We shine light into an artery where we’ve delivered certain types of particles that can absorb that light,” said Bryan Smith, an associate professor in Michigan State University’s College of Engineering. “As a product of the release of that energy, they can literally shout back at us in ways that we can detect and use to create 3D images.”