Culture
The United States may have set itself up for the spread of a pandemic without even knowing it.
According to new research from the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis, pollution may bear part of the blame for the rapid proliferation in the United States of SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for the spread of COVID-19.
The research, from the lab of Rajan Chakrabarty, associate professor in the Department of Energy, Environmental & Chemical Engineering, was published online ahead of print in the journal Science of The Total Environment.
Inspired by work on infants, researchers at the Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE ) investigated whether dogs' behaviors are guided by human displays of preference or by the animals' own choices. They found that dogs' looking times, but not fetching behavior, were influenced by the owner's expression of preference. Although the studies did not demonstrate that dogs override their own preferences for an object, the results suggested that the owners' expressed preference was perceived by the dogs and guided their perceptual focus.
URBANA, Ill. - Food insecurity in America is reaching an all-time high during the COVID-19 pandemic. But large regional differences exist in the severity of the impact.
Experts project over 50 million Americans will be food insecure in 2020, including about 17 million children, says Craig Gundersen, ACES distinguished professor in the Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics at the University of Illinois.
LOS ANGELES (Nov. 12, 2020) -- Older adults who joined group exercise classes experienced decreased loneliness and social isolation, according to a new Cedars-Sinai study conducted before the COVID-19 pandemic. The classes have continued virtually since March, and early results suggest the online versions are also effective.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. - NOV. 12, 2020 - A new comprehensive study from UNC Charlotte's Urban Institute, College of Health and Human Services and School of Social Work shows an effective approach to ending chronic homelessness that helps those in need and benefits communities.
HOUSTON - (Nov. 12, 2020) - "Position 4" didn't seem important until researchers took a long look at a particular peptide.
That part of the peptide drawn from a SARS-CoV virus turned out to have an unexpected but significant influence on how it stably binds with a receptor central to the immune system's ability to attack diseased cells.
MADISON, Wis. -- Researchers have discovered a previously unknown way that pancreatic cells decide how much insulin to secrete. It could provide a promising new target to develop drugs for boosting insulin production in people with Type 2 diabetes.
In a pair of papers recently published in Cell Metabolism, scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and their colleagues point to an overlooked enzyme known as pyruvate kinase as the primary way pancreatic beta cells sense sugar levels and release the appropriate amount of insulin.
Little is understood about how cilia, the tiny hairlike organelles that in humans are often the first lines of defense against pathogens in our lungs and respiratory tracks and even help push sperm along, move in coordination. New research from USC scholars identifies the mechanisms in play for cilia to work effectively and productively to push particles and fluid along, which is especially important given their critical role in health and in even ensuring reproduction.
Current research and applications in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) include several key challenges. These include: (a) A priori estimation of the required dataset size to achieve a desired test accuracy. For example, how many handwritten digits does a machine have to learn before being able to predict a new one with a success rate of 99%? Similarly, how many specific types of circumstances does an autonomous vehicle have to learn before its reaction will not lead to an accident?
People of Black ethnicity are twice as likely to be infected with COVID-19 compared to those of White ethnicity, according to researchers at the Universities of Leicester and Nottingham, supported by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Leicester Biomedical Research Centre. The findings are published in EClinical Medicine by The Lancet today (Thursday 12 November 2020).
People from Asian backgrounds are also 1.5 times more likely to become infected with the virus compared to White individuals.
After six years of research, a team of scientists at the University of California, Santa Cruz has developed a cost-effective new aquaculture feed that eliminates conventional fish meal and fish oil ingredients while also providing better fish weight gain and higher nutritional value in the filet for humans. The new fish-free feed is the first to demonstrate across-the-board gains in sustainability, performance, economic viability, and human health.
A survey of over 5,000 people in Chinese cities affected by COVID-19 in early 2020 suggests that people who quarantined for a longer period of time generally experienced poorer well-being--but that experiencing the mental state of flow reduced or eliminated that link. Kate Sweeny and colleagues at the University of California, Riverside, U.S., Central China Normal University, China and Nanjing University, China and colleagues present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on November 11, 2020.
The environment provided by the mother during embryo development has major consequences on later-life health and lifespan. This can arise through effects on cellular ageing which is often estimated with the length of telomeres. Telomeres are the protective end caps of chromosomes and their length is a marker of 'biological age'.
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Gold foil, ornate labels and an intriguing backstory are product characteristics highly desired by premium chocolate consumers, according to research conducted by food scientists in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences.
The study is one of the first to thoroughly research what American premium chocolate consumers find to be desirable attributes in their chocolate bars. An additional focus was on these consumers' perceptions of craft chocolate, which is made from scratch -- bean to bar -- by small companies using fine flavor cocoa beans.
Liberalism and conservatism are associated with qualitatively different psychological concerns, notably those linked to morality, shows a new study that explores how political ideology and moral values are connected to motivated social cognition. The findings, which appear in the journal PLOS ONE, offer deeper psychological insights into the nature of political division in the United States.