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Forest fires have crept higher up mountains over the past few decades, scorching areas previously too wet to burn, according to researchers from McGill University. As wildfires advance uphill, a staggering 11% of all Western US forests are now at risk.

Patients with blood cancers who were hospitalized with COVID-19 fared better if they were given convalescent plasma, according to study findings from a consortium that included the Mays Cancer Center, home to UT Health San Antonio MD Anderson.

Geothermal energy systems have the potential to power the world and become the leading technology for reducing greenhouse gas emissions if we can drill down far enough into the Earth to access the conditions necessary for economic viability and release the heat beneath our feet. Quaise Inc. is developing a potentially disruptive drilling technology to make that happen. Matt Houde of Quaise presented the approach at the World Geothermal Congress on June 15.

Additive manufacturing offers an unprecedented level of design flexibility and expanded functionality, but the quality and process can drastically differ across production machines, according to Hui Yang, a professor of industrial engineering at Penn State. With applications in aerospace, health care and automotive industries with potential for mass customization, additive manufacturing needs quality management.

By cleverly combining complementary sequencing techniques, researchers of Ghent University, together with Baylor College of Medicine and the world's leading sequencing company, Illumina, have deepened our understanding of the function of known RNA molecules and discovered thousands of new RNAs. A better understanding of our transcriptome is essential to better understand disease processes and uncover novel genes that may serve as therapeutic targets or biomarkers.

With sorghum poised to become an important crop grown by Pennsylvania farmers, Penn State researchers, in a new study, tested more than 150 germplasm lines of the plant for resistance to a fungus likely to hamper its production.

In research published today in Nature Nanotechnology, a team of materials scientists and engineers, led by Jian Shi, an associate professor of materials science and engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, used a strain gradient in order to break inversion symmetry, creating a novel optoelectronic phenomenon in the promising material molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) -- for the first time.

Superconductors have tremendous appeal in power transmission applications due to their zero resistance. However, to bring classical metallic superconductors into superconducting state requires liquid helium as a coolant, which is costly. Now, scientists from Japan take things to the new level by demonstrating high temperature superconductivity in mixed rare-earth barium copper oxides fabricated using a popular technique, opening doors to their low-cost, industrial scale production for real-world applications.

The Scientists Advocate Shifting the Current Value System, which is Biased Against Women and Minorities, Towards a More Diverse and Inclusive Model of Science

Researchers from Bentley University, in partnership with Waltham Council on Aging in Massachusetts, and as part of a study funded by the National Science Foundation, have been exploring how the elderly use smart speakers at home.

KIYATEC announces clinical study data showing test accurately predicts brain cancer patient response to standard drug therapy prior to treatment.

Nanodecoys made from human lung spheroid cells (LSCs) can bind to and neutralize SARS-CoV-2, promoting viral clearance and reducing lung injury in a macaque model of COVID-19. By mimicking the receptor that the virus binds to rather than targeting the virus itself, nanodecoy therapy could remain effective against emerging variants of the virus.

A research team from Los Alamos National Laboratory and Purdue University have developed bio-inks for biosensors that could help localize critical regions in tissues and organs during surgical operations.

Scientists from The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio and collaborating institutions found no associations of depressive symptoms with amyloid beta protein deposition in a study of middle-aged Framingham Heart Study participants. They did, however, note an association of tau protein aggregates with depressive symptoms in subjects carrying a genetic variant called APOE e4.

Woodlands along streams and rivers are an important part of California's diverse ecology. They are biodiversity hotspots, providing various ecosystem services including carbon sequestration and critical habitat for threatened and endangered species. But our land and water use have significantly impacted these ecosystems, sometimes in unexpected ways.

Babies born by cesarean section don't have the same healthy bacteria as those born vaginally, but a Rutgers-led study for the first time finds that these natural bacteria can be restored.

The depths of the Black Sea store comparatively large amounts of organic carbon. A research team led by scientists from the University of Oldenburg, Germany, has now presented a new hypothesis as to why organic compounds accumulate in this semi-enclosed sea and other oxygen-depleted waters. Reactions with hydrogen sulfide play an important role in stabilizing carbon compounds, the researchers posit in the scientific journal Science Advances. This negative feedback in the climate system could counteract global warming over geological periods.

A new article, published as a Perspective in the journal Conservation Science and Practice, introduces a rapid assessment framework that can be used as a guide to make conservation and nature-based solutions more robust to future climate.

A large, retrospective, multicenter study involving Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis indicates that convalescent plasma from recovered COVID-19 patients can dramatically improve likelihood of survival among blood cancer patients hospitalized with the virus. The therapy involves transfusing plasma -- the pale yellow liquid in blood that is rich in antibodies -- from people who have recovered from COVID-19 into patients who have leukemia, lymphoma or other blood cancers and are hospitalized with the viral infection.

New in the Hastings Center Report: Racial justice and environmental toxins, gene editing, Covid, and more in the May-June 2021 issue.