Earth

CHAPEL HILL, N.C.--University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers have identified a new and evolutionarily conserved pathway responsible for "closing down" gene activity in the mammalian cell. The finding is closely related to the Polycomb pathway defined decades ago by a set of classic genetic experiments carried out in fruit flies.

UNC Lineberger's Greg Wang, PhD, associate professor in the UNC School of Medicine Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, and his colleagues reported in the journal Nature Genetics that the BAHCC1 protein is critically involved in silencing genes and acts as an integral component of the Polycomb gene-repressive pathway in mammalian cells.

In cells, the Polycomb pathway generates a small chemical tag, H3K27me3, to silence genes. Molecular players related to Polycomb and H3K27me3 are frequently found to be associated with pathogenesis, notably cancer and developmental syndromes.

"H3K27me3 is sort of like a gene 'tag' for silencing. Our initial interest towards BAHCC1 actually stems from a connection to cancer, in particular, leukemia. And previously, BAHCC1 was little studied," said Wang, the study's senior author. "Work on BAHCC1 turns out to be a very interesting journey leading to fundamental understanding of Polycomb and gene silencing in general."

Huitao Fan, PhD, UNC Lineberger and UNC School of Medicine Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, and Jiuwei Lu, PhD, University of California, Riverside, were the study's first authors.

Leukemia is a cancer that affects the blood and bone marrow. The American Cancer Society estimated that more than 60,000 people will be diagnosed with leukemia in the United States this year, and the disease will cause more than 23,000 deaths.

In their study, researchers in Wang's lab discovered in retrospective analysis of published data that high expression of the BAHCC1 gene was found in different types of leukemia. Using CRISPR-cas9-based state-of-the-art gene loss-of-function techniques, Wang and his team demonstrated the dependence of various acute leukemia models on BAHCC1 in progression of the disease. They determined BAHCC1 inhibits tumor suppressors to help drive acute leukemia. This function of BAHCC1 relies on an ability harbored within its protein module BAH to scan and directly bind the silencing-related tag, H3K27me3, found on the genes to be silenced

The team led by the other senior author of the paper, Jikui Song, PhD, University of California, Riverside, generated an atomic view of how the BAH module in BAHCC1 binds to the H3K27me3 tag.

Wang said this study challenges the current norm that tends to emphasize the previously known CBX proteins as the main effector of H3K27me3 and Polycomb silencing in mammals.

"We now realize that there exists a previously unexplored chapter of important mechanisms that animal cells use for silencing genes," Wang said. "And based on recent research of others, we believe the BAH module and related pathways are evolutionarily ancient and conserved among fungi, plants and animals. In leukemia, BAHCC1 is co-opted to silence tumor suppressive genes and to promote a cancerous program."

Whether a Trump triumph or a Biden victory, millions of Americans may expect a decline in their mental health if they live in states that favor the losing candidate. And the higher the margin of victory for the losing candidate, the greater the number of days of stress and depression for residents in those states.

In a study led by UC San Francisco and Duke University, researchers combed data from close to 500,000 adults, looking at mental health indicators during the 2016 general election. They found that residents who lived in states with a Hillary Clinton majority experienced on average an additional half-day of poor mental health in the month following election (December) compared with the month before (October).

This translated to 54.6 million more days of stress and depression in December 2016 alone for the 109.2 million adults living in Clinton states, the authors reported in their study, which published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine on Oct. 31, 2020.

"Clinicians should consider that elections could cause at least transitory increases in poor mental health and tailor patient care accordingly," said author Renee Y. Hsia, MD, of the UCSF Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies and the Department of Emergency Medicine.

Hsia pointed to two surveys, taken before and after November 2016, that found approximately 50 percent of Americans reported that the election was a significant source of stress.

The researchers used the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, a joint state and federal annual household survey of 499,201 adults, to compare the impact of the election. Respondents in the 20 Clinton states said that during the past 30 days, they had experienced "stress, depression and problems with emotion" on average 3.35 days in October 2016 compared with 3.85 days in December 2016.

For voters in the 30 Trump states, poor mental health occurred for an average of 3.94 days and 3.78 days in the month before and the month after the election, a difference that was statistically unchanged, the authors stated. In contrast, researchers noted a 2-percentage point uptick in the number of respondents in Clinton states who reported 14 or more days in one month of poor mental health - a marker for major depressive disorder - during the same period. No such increase was found in Trump states.

'Unexpected Nature of Loss' May Have Worsened Mental Health After Clinton Defeat

"It's possible the mental health worsening in the Clinton states had been exacerbated by the largely unexpected nature of the loss - at least according to pre-election polls," said first author Brandon Yan, a third-year medical student at UCSF.

The researchers found that Clinton's margin of victory in each state was predictive of the degree of mental health change from October 2016 to December 2016. A 10-percentage point higher margin predicted 0.41 more days of poor mental health. Conversely, a 10- percentage point higher margin of victory for Trump predicted 0.41 fewer days of poor mental health.

By April 2017, the number of residents of Clinton states who reported that their health care providers said they had depression had risen by 3.2 percentage points since October 2016. However, residents in Trump states were not immune to increased depression. By April 2017, it had inched up by 2.8 percentage points - a jump that may partially reflect the opioid epidemic that claimed more than 47,000 lives that year, many of them in red states, the authors noted.

According to Hsia, Americans may be at even higher risk for stress and depression with the upcoming election. "The situation is worsened by the pandemic; the usual approaches to depression screening and mental health care may fail to reach those patients who are not seeing their primary care providers," she said. "The pandemic, as well as the economic downturn, are resulting in more isolation and loneliness. Americans are worried about disease spread, and they have heightened fears about job security, keeping a roof over their heads and ensuring their children are keeping up at school."

In 2017, while browsing the fossil collections of Yale's Peabody Museum of Natural History, University of Texas at Austin graduate student Simon Scarpetta came across a small lizard skull, just under an inch long.

The skull was beautifully preserved, with a mouth full of sharp teeth - including some with a distinctive curve.

Much to Scarpetta's surprise, no one had studied it. Since being discovered in 1971 on a museum fossil hunting trip to Wyoming, the 52 million-year-old skull had sat in the specimen drawer.

"Lizards are small and prone to breaking apart, so you mostly get these individual, isolated fragmented bones," said Scarpetta, who is studying paleontology at the UT Jackson School of Geosciences. "Anytime you find a skull, especially when you're trying to figure out how things are related to each other, it's always an exciting find."

Scarpetta decided to bring the skull back to the Jackson School for a closer look. And on September 2020, the journal Scientific Reports published a study authored by Scarpetta describing the lizard as a new species, which he named Kopidosaurus perplexus.

The first part of the name references the lizard's distinct teeth; a "kopis" is a curved blade used in ancient Greece. But the second part is a nod to the "perplexing" matter of just where the extinct lizard should be placed on the tree of life. According to an analysis conducted by Scarpetta, the evidence points to a number of plausible spots.

The spots can be divided into two groups of lizards, representing two general hypotheses of where the new species belongs. But adding to the uncertainty is that how those two groups relate to one another can shift depending on the particular evolutionary tree that's examined. Scarpetta examined three of these trees - each one built by other researchers studying the evolutionary connections of different reptile groups using DNA - and suggests that there could be a forest of possibilities where the ancient lizard could fit.

The case of where exactly to put the perplexing lizard highlights an important lesson for paleontologists: just because a specimen fits in one place doesn't mean that it won't fit equally well into another.

"The hypothesis that you have about how different lizards are related to each other is going to influence what you think this one is," Scarpetta said.

Paleontologists use anatomical details present in bones to discern the evolutionary relationships of long-dead animals. To get a close look at the lizard skull, Scarpetta created a digital scan of it in the Jackson School's High-Resolution X-Ray CT Lab. However, while certain details helped identify the lizard as a new species, other details overlapped with features from a number of different evolutionary groups.

All of these groups belonged to a larger category known as Iguania, which includes a number of diverse species, including chameleons, anoles and iguanas. To get a better idea of where the new species might fit into the larger Iguania tree, Scarpetta compared the skull data to evolutionary trees for Iguania that were compiled by other researchers based on DNA evidence from living reptiles.

On each tree, the fossil fit equally well into two general spots. What's more, the lizard groupings in each spot varied from tree to tree. If Scarpetta had just stopped at one spot or one tree, he would have missed alternative explanations that appear just as plausible as the others.

Scarpetta said that Kopidosaurus perplexus is far from the only fossil that could easily fit onto multiple branches on the tree of life. Paleontologist Joshua Lively, a curator at the Utah State University Eastern Prehistoric Museum, agrees and said that this study epitomizes why embracing uncertainty can lead to better, more accurate science.

"Something that I think the broader scientific community should pull from this is that you have to be realistic about your data and acknowledge what we can actually pull from our results and conclude and where there are still uncertainties," Lively said. "Simon's approach is the high bar, taking the high road. It's acknowledging what we don't know and really embracing that."

New Rochelle, NY, November 2, 2020--Depression symptoms and social anxiety are associated with greater use of mobile dating applications among women. The extent to which these are associated with dating app use is reported in the peer-reviewed journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking. Click here to read the article now.

"With increased symptoms of social anxiety and depression, women may be even more likely to turn to technology for social connection, especially if alternative forms of social contact are reduced due to social avoidance," states Martin Antony and coauthors from Ryerson University.

Among men, the greater their social anxiety and depression symptoms, the less likely they were to initiate contact with matches on mobile dating apps.

"With mobile dating apps increasingly figuring into today's dating landscape, research studies such as Professor Antony's are vital to understanding their merits as well as their shortcomings," says Editor-in-Chief Brenda K. Wiederhold, PhD, MBA, BCB, BCN, Interactive Media Institute, San Diego, California and Virtual Reality Medical Institute, Brussels, Belgium.

Five million years ago, dangerous carnivores - such as giant wolverines and otters, bears, sabertooth cats, and large hyaenids - prowled the West Coast of South Africa. Today we can confirm that, among them, fearlessly roamed a smaller relative of the living honey badger.

New research published in Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology by palaeontologists Alberto Valenciano Vaquero (Iziko Museums of South Africa, the University of Cape Town, South Africa, and University of Zaragoza, Spain) and Romala Govender (Iziko Museums of South Africa, Research and Exhibitions) report on the discovery of a relative of the living honey badger from the early Pliocene locality of Langebaanweg (West Coast Fossil Park, South Africa). Besides this honey badger-like animal, this 5.2 million years locality has yielded one of the world's richest and best-preserved mammal assemblages of this time period, including saber-toothed cats, bears, hyaenas, jackals, mongoose, as well as relatives of the living giraffes, elephants, rhinoceroses, wild pigs, and a variety of birds, fishes and marine mammals.

Living honey badger (also known as ratel) (Mellivora capensis) belong to the mustelid family which includes weasels, otters and badgers. They live in most of sub-Saharan Africa and East Asia, including India. Despite its relatively small size (9-14 kg), honey badgers are one of the most aggressive and fierce animals in the world. "Even large carnivores, such as leopards, hyenas, and lions stay out of their way" says Valenciano, lead author of this research. Honey badgers are equipped with sharp teeth and long claws to help capture prey, but they also feed on berries, roots and bulbs, insects and small vertebrates.

The extinct honey badger from Langebaanweg (Mellivora benfieldi) was originally described by Brett Hendey more than 40 years ago and was based on a few fragmented mandibles. "The new honey badger fossils we describe triple the number of known fossils and gives us a unique glimpse into its lifestyle and relationship to other similar mustelids. These new fossils demonstrate that this South African species is distinct from the late Miocene forms from Central Africa (Howellictis) and East Africa (Erokomellivora), as well as from the extant honey badger" says Valenciano.

This work deals with the evolution of this fascinating group of mustelids in Africa during the last seven million years and confirm the existence of a unique group named Eomellivorini. Although the ratel represents the single living member of its subfamily of mustelids, they were much more diverse in the past. In fact, Valenciano and Govender suggest the existence of two distinct groups of mustelids: the mellivorini (comprising the living ratel, the one from Langebaanweg and several others ratel-like relatives), as well as the Eomellivorini which are characterized by gigantic proportions.

"Identification of the Eomellivorini, which include Eomellivora (from the northern continents) and Ekorus (from Africa), identifies a group of giant mustelids related to the living ratel that were adapted for pursuit unlike any mustelids seen today, and may have evolved at a time when cats of this size were rare or non-existent" says Prof. Lars Werdelin (Swedish Museum of Natural History), a leading expert on carnivores who was not involved in the research.

This research also shows that the Langebaanweg honey badger was slightly smaller than the ratel, but that like its modern relative, it was also an opportunistic carnivore with digging abilities.

"The Langebaanweg fossils are at a crossroads of climate and environmental change giving us insight into how animals adapted to these changes as well as insight into carnivore evolution in southern Africa," Dr. Govender says. UCT Palaeontologist Anusuya Chinsamy-Turan, who was not involved in the research, says "This is an incredible discovery! Can you imagine, if it were not for the fossils at Langebaanweg we would have absolutely no idea of the rich biodiversity that once existed along the West Coast of South Africa."

Ongoing research in the other carnivore mammals from Langebaanweg will expand our knowledge on these awesome extinct animals.

SPOKANE, Wash. - Very rural areas in the United States have fewer mental health services for young people, yet that's where the help is needed the most, says a study led by Janessa Graves of the Washington State University College of Nursing, published in JAMA Network Open.

Previous studies have shown that the suicide rate among young people in rural areas is higher than for urban youth and is also growing faster, said Graves, associate professor and assistant dean for undergraduate and community research.

Yet by one measure, using ZIP Codes, only 3.9 percent of rural areas have a mental health facility that serves young people, the study found, compared with 12.1 percent of urban (metropolitan) and 15 percent of small-town ZIP Code Tabulation Areas.

Measured by county type, 63.7 percent of all counties had a mental health facility serving young people, while only 29.8 percent of "highly rural" counties did.

"Youth mental health is something that seems to be getting worse, not better, because of COVID-19," said Graves. "We really need these resources to serve these kids."

While Graves' study focused on suicide prevention services offered in mental health facilities, "even less intensive services like school mental health therapists are lacking in rural areas," she said.

Concluded the study, "Given the higher rates of suicide deaths among rural youth, it is imperative that the distribution of and access to mental health services correspond to community needs."

Canada should integrate self-testing for HIV into the health system to help reduce the burden of the disease, argues a commentary published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal.

Self-testing for HIV (HIVST) -- taking a saliva, urine or blood sample and interpreting the result, similar to a home pregnancy test -- is available in the United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands, United States, Latvia, Spain, Kenya and South Africa, but not in Canada.

"In Canada, we need rapid approvals of many HIV self-tests, alongside deployment of diverse, culturally sensitive HIVST strategies and development of HIVST-specific provincial or federal guidelines. Lack of funding, political will and widespread availability of conventional HIV testing through public health laboratories perhaps delayed introduction of HIV self-tests. It's 2020, and the time to invest in HIVST is now," says Dr. Nitika Pant Pai, Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre, and McGill University, with co-author, Dr. Rejean Thomas, Clinique médicale l'Actuel, Montreal, Quebec.

The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends HIV self-testing as an alternative to regular laboratory testing. More than 250 studies indicate HIVST increases access to, and frequency of, testing by the tester as well as by partners and family members.

The authors outline 4 factors for successful introduction:

Rapidly approve HIV self-tests that are already approved by the WHO

Establish methods to easily link positive self-testers to HIV treatment, perhaps through clinics, mobile programs, pharmacies, apps and other means

Address the costs of integrating HIVST into the health system to ensure sustainability

Conduct large Canadian trials and cost-effectiveness studies

"Introduction of HIVST in Canada should lead to better detection of HIV in underdiagnosed populations who currently face barriers to testing and improve HIV management, bringing us closer to the UNAIDS 95-95-95 targets. This would be a historic milestone in the long journey toward controlling and ending the HIV epidemic in Canada," write the authors.

"Time for HIV self-testing in Canada: a vision and an action plan" is published November 2, 2020.

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (NOVEMBER 1, 2020). We live in a litigious world. With respect to medicine, this manifests in medical malpractice suits. Patients sue doctors for unexpected adverse outcomes. One field prone to litigation is neurosurgery, which "treats acute pathology and refractory pain." Patient's dissatisfaction with the outcomes of neurosurgical procedures sometimes shifts over into the legal world where it forms the basis of medical malpractice suits.

To determine the frequency of medical malpractice suits among neurosurgeons and neurosurgeons' reactions when faced with the prospect of such lawsuits, three researchers from The Netherlands surveyed members of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons. The results of the survey can be found in the article, "Experiences of neurological surgeons with malpractice lawsuits" by Pravesh S. Gadjradj, MD, Julian B. Ghobrial, and Biswadjiet S. Harhangi, MD, PhD, MSc (published today in Neurosurgical Focus; https://thejns.org/doi/abs/10.3171/2020.8.FOCUS20250).

The survey consisted of 24 questions distributed across four topics: 1) survey respondent demographics; 2) how fear of lawsuits may affect the manner in which the respondents practice medicine and view patients; 3) personal experiences with medical lawsuits; and 4) the impact of the medical malpractice environment on the respondents' personal practice of medicine.

The authors received 490 responses to the survey (an 8% response rate). The survey respondents had a mean clinical experience of 25 years and most (84%) practiced in the United States. The top subspecialties represented were spine surgery, neuro-oncology, and neurotrauma. Survey responses showed that the subspecialty with the greatest number of medical malpractice suits was spine surgery.

When asked about fear of being sued for malpractice, 40% of respondents stated that they were frequently or always concerned about being sued and 77% stated that this fear changed how they practiced medicine. The practice of defensive medicine was frequently cited (58%) in response to fear of being sued. There are two types of defensive medicine: positive defensive medicine, in which physicians order additional, unnecessary diagnostic tests or therapies, or may demand excessive documentation during consultations; and negative defensive medicine, in which physicians drop complex cases or refer high-risk patients elsewhere.

Of the respondents who stated that fear of being sued affected their practice of medicine, 73% cited ordering more tests or increased documentation, and 12% cited referral of patients to other physicians or dropping complex cases. Twenty-five percent of these respondents noted that these actions resulted in increased costs for patients, and 7% mentioned a changed physician-patient relationship.

More than 80% of survey respondents reported having been named in one or more medical malpractice lawsuits; 26% of respondents had been involved in one lawsuit and 12% in more than 10 lawsuits. Respondents reported that the majority of medical malpractice suits had been dropped (35%) or settled out of court to the benefit of the plaintiff (22%). Fifteen percent of survey respondents reported having been involved in lawsuits that proceeded through the courts and resulted in plaintiffs receiving more than $1 million in damages.

Regarding the effect of the medical malpractice environment on the practice of medicine, 59% of survey respondents stated that they considered referring difficult cases, 61% considered limiting the scope of their practices, and 36% considered leaving medical practice altogether.

Given the negative effects of the medical malpractice environment on neurosurgeons and their practice of medicine, the authors suggest some remedies, including transparent communication between healthcare facilities and patients, better informed consent forms, rapid investigation into adverse effects and fair compensation to patients when appropriate, and the implementation of health courts, in which judges have medical backgrounds.

In addition to offering numbered responses to each survey question, the article offers quotes from several of the survey respondents.

When asked about the study and its findings, Dr. Gadjradj stated,

"Primum non nocere is a fundamental principle that all medical doctors know. Adverse events experienced by patients may lead to medical malpractice suits. The results of the current study show to what extent malpractice suits may influence neurosurgeons emotionally, professionally, and financially. Since almost half of the survey respondents are frequently concerned with the risk of being sued, a change in the legal landscape is needed."

The paper is accompanied by an editorial by Richard N. W. Wohns, MD, JD, MBA, titled, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." In this editorial, Dr. Wohns advocates that neurosurgeons face the possibility of medical malpractice lawsuits head on, internalizing Nietzsche's words "what doesn't kill me makes me stronger" and turning a negative experience into a positive one. Dr. Wohns suggests that physicians "turn the malpractice case against us into an educational experience from which we learn to be even better neurosurgeons." He encourages neurosurgeons to be proactive rather than reactive in the face of malpractice suits.

LUGANO, 31 October, 2020 - Research presented today at EADV's 29th Congress, EADV Virtual, shows hope that a form of vitamin B3 could protect skin cells from the effects of ultraviolet (UV) exposure: the main risk factor for non-melanoma skin cancers (1).

Researchers in Italy isolated cells (human primary keratinocytes) from the skin of patients with non-melanoma skin cancers. These cells were treated with three different concentrations of nicotinamide (NAM), a form of vitamin B3, for 18, 24, and 48 hours and then exposed to UVB.

Results show that pre-treatment with 25μM of NAM 24 hours before UV irradiation protected the skin cells from the effects of UV-induced oxidative stress, including DNA damage. NAM enhanced DNA repair, demonstrated by decreased expression of the DNA repair enzyme OGG1. Furthermore, it decreased antioxidant expression and blocked local inflammation by showing decreased nitric oxide (NO) release and reactive oxygen species (ROS) production, and reduced iNOS protein expression.

Lara Camillo, a research student from the Dermatological Unit of AOU Maggiore della Carità, Novara, Italy says: "Our study indicates that increasing the consumption of vitamin B3, which is readily available in the daily diet, will protect the skin from some of the effects of UV exposure, potentially reducing the incidence of non-melanoma skin cancers. However, the protective effect of vitamin B3 is short-acting, so it should be consumed no later than 24 to 48 hours before sun exposure."

Non-melanoma skin cancers are the most common malignancies in the Caucasian population and incidence is increasing worldwide. The main risk factor is UV radiation exposure, which damages the DNA, increases ROS production, activates local inflammation, and depletes cellular energy, leading to genomic instability and cell death.

EVANSTON, Ill. --- We've long been warned of the risks of dyeing hair at home and in salons. Products used can cause allergies and skin irritation -- an estimated 1% of people have an allergy to dye. Furthermore, repeated use of some dyes has been linked to cancer.

But there soon may be a solution for the growing list of salons and hair color enthusiasts searching for natural alternatives to dyes and cosmetics.

Northwestern University researchers have developed a new way to create a spectrum of natural-looking hair colors, ranging from blond to black, by using enzymes to catalyze synthetic melanin.

The research will be published Oct. 30 in the journal Chemistry of Materials.

Melanin is an enigmatic and ubiquitous material often found in the form of brown or black pigment. Northwestern's Nathan Gianneschi, the research lead and associate director for the International Institute for Nanotechnology, said every type of organism produces melanin, making it a readily available and versatile material to use in the lab.

"In humans, it's in the back of our eye to help with vision, it's in our skin to help with protecting skin cells from UV damage," Gianneschi said. "But birds also use it as a spectacular color display -- peacock feathers are made of melanin entirely."

Gianneschi is the Jacob and Rosalind Cohn Professor of Chemistry in Northwestern's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and a professor of materials science and engineering and biomedical engineering in the McCormick School of Engineering. Claudia Battistella, a postdoctoral fellow in Gianneschi's lab, is the paper's first author.

In the typical process of coloring hair, stylists use bleach to strip melanin from hair, then add ammonia and dye to open and penetrate the hair cuticles for permanent color. Work being done with melanin in other parts of the lab inspired Battistella to see how it applied to hair dye.

Battistella thought by replacing melanin instead of removing it and depositing color on the surface of hair instead of within it, she could create a more sustainable way to create lasting color. In this process, researchers dye hair by combining mushroom enzymes with an amino acid, causing a process that mimics reactions that naturally occur in the body. Preliminary studies revealed potential for the colored layer to persist through several washes.

"The dyeing process is similar from a stylist's point of view, but these conditions are milder, so they take a little longer," Battistella said. "Though it could be combined with a base, it's not necessary to use one, and there is no need for chemical pigments. Because we already have melanin in our bodies, we believe we won't have allergic reactions to it."

Because melanin also fades in hair due to sun exposure and aging, researchers also wondered about the sun's impact on the dye. Along with being a milder process than traditional dye, coating hair in synthetic melanin holds potential to protect hair from sun damage that can cause whitening. Studies showed that compared to untreated hair, hair treated with melanin pigment was damaged less when exposed to ultraviolet rays.

The paper identifies four key advantages to using synthetic melanin instead of traditional dyes:

Synthetic melanin avoids the use of ammonia as a base layer.

The precursors to treating hair with melanin are less toxic.

The process uses safer, more scalable chemicals.

There is vast potential in future cosmetic translations of synthetic melanin.

Given the industry's desire to move away from carcinogens and other toxic chemicals, Gianneschi believes his lab will be able to break through the regulatory industry. The team then hopes to find a partner willing to develop the dye on a larger scale. From Gianneschi's perspective, the main motivation for the research isn't just excitement over melanin's potentially vast commercial use.

"From a biomedical perspective, there's a huge market of people with a hair dye allergy," Gianneschi said. "Our first thought was it would be great to have a solution to help those people."

Australian bees are known for pollinating plants on beautiful sunny days, but a new study has identified two species that have adapted their vision for night-time conditions for the first time.

The study by a team of ecology researchers has observed night time foraging behaviour by a nomiine (Reepenia bituberculata) and masked (Meroglossa gemmata) bee species, with both developing enlarged compound and simple eyes which allow more light to be gathered when compared to their daytime kin.

Published in the Journal of Hymenoptera Research, the researchers explain that this improved low-light ability could potentially also exist in other Australian species secretly active at night, with their image processing ability best observed through high-resolution close-up images.

Lead author PhD Candidate James Dorey, in the College of Science & Engineering at Flinders University, says the two Australian bee species active at night and during twilight hours are mostly found in Australia's tropical north, but there could potentially more in arid, subtropical and maybe even temperate conditions across the continent.

"We have confirmed the existence of at least two crepuscular bee species in Australia and there are likely to be many more that can forage both during the day and into the early morning or evening under low light conditions. It's true that bees aren't generally known to be very capable when it comes to using their eyes at night, but it turns out that low-light foraging is more common than currently thought," says Mr Dorey.

"Before this study, the only way to show that a bee had adapted to low-light was by using difficult-to-obtain behavioural observations, but we have found that you should be able to figure this out by using high-quality images of a specific bee."

Mr Dorey says bees that forage during dim-light conditions aren't studied enough with no previously reliable published records for any Australian species.

"Our study provides a framework to help identify low-light-adapted bees and the data that is needed to determine the behavioural traits of other species. This is important as we need to increase efforts to collect bee species outside of normal hours and publish new observations to better understand the role that they play in maintaining ecosystems."

The researchers outline why more needs to be understood about the behaviour of bee species to help protect them from the potential impacts of climate change.

"Global weather patterns are changing and temperatures in many parts of Australia are rising along with the risk of prolonged droughts and fires. So, we have to improve our understanding about insects pollinating at night or in milder parts of the day to avoid potential extinction risks or to mitigate loss of pollination services."

"This also means we have to highlight the species that operate in a narrow window of time and could be sensitive to climatic changes, so conservation becomes an important concern. Because quite frankly, we have ignored these species up until now."

Specially-adapted drones developed by a UCL-led international team have been gathering data from never-before-explored volcanoes that will enable local communities to better forecast future eruptions.

The cutting-edge research at Manam volcano in Papua New Guinea is improving scientists' understanding of how volcanoes contribute to the global carbon cycle, key to sustaining life on Earth.

The team's findings, published in Science Advances, show for the first time how it is possible to combine measurements from the air, earth and space to learn more about the most inaccessible, highly active volcanoes on the planet.

The ABOVE project involved specialists from the UK, USA, Canada, Italy, Sweden, Germany, Costa Rica, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea, spanning volcanology and aerospace engineering.

They co-created solutions to the challenges of measuring gas emissions from active volcanoes, through using modified long-range drones.

By combining in situ aerial measurements with results from satellites and ground-based remote sensors, researchers can gather a much richer data set than previously possible. This enables them to monitor active volcanoes remotely, improving understanding of how much carbon dioxide (CO2) is being released by volcanoes globally and, importantly, where this carbon is coming from.

With a diameter of 10km, Manam volcano is located on an island 13km off the northeast coast of the mainland, at 1,800m above sea level.

Previous studies have shown it is among the world's biggest emitters of sulphur dioxide, but nothing was known of its CO2 output.

Volcanic CO2 emissions are challenging to measure due to high concentrations in the background atmosphere. Measurements need to be collected very close to active vents and, at hazardous volcanoes like Manam, drones are the only way to obtain samples safely. Yet beyond-line-of-sight drone flights have rarely been attempted in volcanic environments.

Adding miniaturised gas sensors, spectrometers and sampling devices that are automatically triggered to open and close, the team was able to fly the drone 2km high and 6km away to reach Manam's summit, where they captured gas samples to be analysed within hours.

Calculating the ratio between sulphur and carbon dioxide levels in a volcano's emissions is critical to determining how likely an eruption is to take place, as it helps volcanologists establish the location of its magma.

Manam's last major eruptions between 2004 and 2006 devastated large parts of the island and displaced the population of some 4,000 people to the mainland; their crops destroyed and water supplies contaminated.

Project lead Dr Emma Liu (UCL Earth Sciences) said: "Manam hasn't been studied in detail but we could see from satellite data that it was producing strong emissions. The resources of the in-country volcano monitoring institute are small and the team has an incredible workload, but they really helped us make the links with the community living on Manam island."

Following the fieldwork, the researchers raised funds to buy computers, solar panels and other technology to enable the local community - who have since put together a disaster preparedness group - to communicate via satellite from the island, and to provide drone operations training to Rabaul Volcanological Observatory staff to assist in their monitoring efforts.

ABOVE was part of the Deep Carbon Observatory (DCO), a global community of scientists on a ten-year quest to understand more about carbon in Earth.

Volcanic emissions are a critical stage of the Earth's carbon cycle - the movement of carbon between land, atmosphere, and ocean - but CO2 measurements have so far been limited to a relatively small number of the world's estimated 500 degassing volcanoes.

Understanding the factors that control volcanic carbon emissions in the present day will reveal how the climate has changed in the past and therefore how it may respond in the future to current human impacts.

Co-author Professor Alessandro Aiuppa (University of Palermo) described the findings as 'a real advance in our field', adding: "Ten years ago you could have only stared and guessed what Manam's CO2 emissions were.

"If you take into account all the carbon released by global volcanism, it's less than a per cent of the total emission budget, which is dominated by human activity. In a few centuries, humans are acting like thousands of volcanoes. If we continue to pump carbon into the atmosphere, it will make monitoring and forecasting eruptions using aerial gas observations even harder."

Co-author Professor Tobias Fischer (University of New Mexico), added: "In order to understand the drivers of climate change you need to understand the carbon cycle in the earth.

"We wanted to quantify the carbon emission from this very large carbon dioxide emitter. We had very few data in terms of carbon isotope composition, which would identify the source of the carbon and whether it is the mantle, crust or sediment. We wanted to know where that carbon comes from."

Specially-adapted drones developed by an international team have been gathering data from never-before-explored volcanoes that will enable local communities to better forecast future eruptions.

The cutting-edge research at Manam volcano in Papua New Guinea is also improving scientists' understanding of how volcanoes contribute to the global carbon cycle, key to sustaining life on Earth.

The ABOVE project was an international endeavour, bringing together leading experts from Bristol with others across the world, all with previous hands-on experience of using aerial robotics to study volcanic emissions.

The team included researchers from Earth Sciences, Aerospace Engineering and Geographical Sciences at Bristol, as well as specialists from the USA, Canada, Italy, Sweden, Germany, Costa Rica, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea, led by Dr Emma Liu at UCL. Together they co-created solutions to the challenges of measuring gas emissions from active volcanoes, using modified long-range drones.

Volcanic emissions are a critical stage of the Earth's carbon cycle - the movement of carbon between land, atmosphere, and ocean - but CO2 measurements have so far been limited to a relatively small number of the world's estimated 500 degassing volcanoes. Measurements need to be collected very close to active vents and, at hazardous volcanoes like Manam, drones are the only way to obtain samples safely.

The team's findings, published in Science Advances, show for the first time how it is possible to combine measurements from the air, earth, and space to learn more about the most inaccessible, highly active volcanoes on the planet.

By adding miniaturised gas sensors, spectrometers and direct sampling devices, the team was able to fly the drone 2km high and 6km away to reach Manam's summit, where they captured gas samples to be analysed within hours.

Calculating the ratio between sulphur and carbon dioxide levels in a volcano's emissions is critical to determining how likely an eruption is to take place, as it helps volcanologists establish the source of its magma.

Project lead Dr Emma Liu (UCL Earth Sciences) said: "Manam hasn't been studied in detail but we could see from satellite data that it was producing strong emissions. The resources of the in-country volcano monitoring institute are small and the team has an incredible workload, but they really helped us make the links with the community living on Manam island."

Dr Kieran Wood, from the Bristol's Department of Aerospace Engineering, worked closely with Dr Liu, to plan and organise the expedition. The trip in May 2019 was Dr Wood's third to PNG, where he was involved in co-ordinating logistics, building cooperation with the other teams, and providing training for staff at the Rabaul Volcanological Observatory.

"The ABOVE campaign was the successful culmination of several years of development and planning. This was a rare and exciting opportunity to have so many leading researchers from around the globe, all with previous field-work experience, focused on the same goals. It was very important that we were as ready as possible for this one, hence we had refined the technology over several prior expeditions," said Dr Wood, who served as technical expert and pilot for the Bristol team.

As well as being co-author of this study, Dr Wood is lead author of a complimentary paper: BVLOS UAS Operations in Highly-Turbulent Volcanic Plumes, published this week in Frontiers in Robotics & AI, which focuses on the flight mechanics and the drone used by the Bristol team.

Dr Matthew Watson, a volcanologist from Bristol's School of Earth Sciences added: "This was a really great project with a number of key outcomes. We learnt a lot about little studied volcanic systems using a suite of state-of-the-art measuring systems"

"Unoccupied Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are changing the way volcanologists gather data. They facilitate safer, closer and more consistent measurement and are becoming a key part of the suite of instruments scientists use to monitor volcanoes."

Understanding the factors that control volcanic carbon emissions in the present day will reveal how the climate has changed in the past and therefore how it may respond in the future to current human impacts.

Co-author Professor Alessandro Aiuppa (University of Palermo) described the findings as 'a real advance in our field', adding: "Ten years ago you could have only stared and guessed what Manam's CO2 emissions were.

"If you take into account all the carbon released by global volcanism, it's less than a per cent of the total emission budget, which is dominated by human activity. In a few centuries, humans are acting like thousands of volcanoes. If we continue to pump carbon into the atmosphere, it will make monitoring and forecasting eruptions using aerial gas observations even harder."

Co-author Professor Tobias Fischer (University of New Mexico), added: "In order to understand the drivers of climate change you need to understand the carbon cycle in the earth.

"We wanted to quantify the carbon emission from this very large carbon dioxide emitter. We had very few data in terms of carbon isotope composition, which would identify the source of the carbon and whether it is the mantle, crust or sediment. We wanted to know where that carbon comes from."

Following the fieldwork, the researchers raised funds to buy computers, solar panels and other technology to enable the local community - who have since put together a disaster preparedness group - to communicate via satellite from the island, and to provide drone operations training to Rabaul Volcanological Observatory staff to assist in their monitoring efforts.

Tiny, seemingly harmless ocean plants survived the darkness of the asteroid strike that killed the dinosaurs by learning a ghoulish behavior -- eating other living creatures.

Vast amounts of debris, soot, and aerosols shot into the atmosphere when an asteroid slammed into Earth 66 million years ago, plunging the planet into darkness, cooling the climate, and acidifying the oceans. Along with the dinosaurs on the land and giant reptiles in the ocean, the dominant species of marine algae were instantly wiped out -- except for one rare type.

A team of scientists, including researchers at UC Riverside, wanted to understand how these algae managed to thrive while the mass extinction rippled throughout the rest of the global food chain.

"This event came closest to wiping out all multicellular life on this planet, at least in the ocean," said UCR geologist and study co-author Andrew Ridgwell. "If you remove algae, which form the base of the food chain, everything else should die. We wanted to know how Earth's oceans avoided that fate, and how our modern marine ecosystem re-evolved after such a catastrophe."

To answer their questions, the team examined well-preserved fossils of the surviving algae and created detailed computer models to simulate the likely evolution of the algae's feeding habits over time. Their findings are now published in the journal Science Advances.

According to Ridgwell, scientists were a bit lucky to find the nano-sized fossils in the first place. They were located in fast accumulating and high-clay-content sediments, which helped preserved them in the same way the La Brea tar pits provide a special environment to help preserve mammoths.

Most of the fossils had shields made of calcium carbonate, as well as holes in their shields. The holes indicate the presence of flagella -- thin, tail-like structures that allow tiny organisms to swim.

"The only reason you need to move is to get your prey," Ridgwell explained.

Modern relatives of the ancient algae also have chloroplasts, which enable them to use sunlight to make food from carbon dioxide and water. This ability to survive both by feeding on other organisms and through photosynthesis is called mixotrophy. Examples of the few land plants with this ability include Venus flytraps and sundews.

Researchers found that once the post-asteroid darkness cleared, these mixotrophic algae expanded from coastal shelf areas into the open ocean where they became a dominant life form for the next million years, helping to quickly rebuild the food chain. It also helped that larger creatures who would normally feed on these algae were initially absent in the post-extinction oceans.

"The results illustrate both the extreme adaptability of ocean plankton and their capacity to rapidly evolve, yet also, for plants with a generation time of just a single day, that you are always only a year of darkness away from extinction," Ridgwell said.

Only much later did the algae evolve, losing the ability to eat other creatures and re-establishing themselves to become one of the dominant species of algae in today's ocean.

"Mixotrophy was both the means of initial survival and then an advantage after the post-asteroid darkness lifted because of the abundant small pretty cells, likely survivor cyanobacteria," Ridgwell said. "It is the ultimate Halloween story -- when the lights go out, everyone starts eating each other."

San Juan Capistrano, Calif. -- A new case report published in the Journal of Vascular Surgery provides one of the first known opportunities to directly visualize the permanent and fused connection (anastomosis) that is created with the minimally invasive Ellipsys® Vascular Access System. The Ellipsys System, made by Avenu Medical, creates a type of dialysis access known as a percutaneous arteriovenous fistula (pAVF) for patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) who require hemodialysis.

"This is the first published report of direct visualization of a matured pAVF created with the Ellipsys System," said lead author Alexandros Mallios, MD, a vascular surgeon at Paris Saint-Joseph Hospital in Paris, France. "It was an amazing opportunity that provided first hand proof of the permanent, fused vessel anastomosis made possible by this revolutionary technology."

Hemodialysis requires access to the patient's bloodstream, which is often created by establishing a permanent connection between an artery and a vein in the arm known as an arteriovenous fistula (AVF). Traditionally, fistulas are created during an open surgical procedure by suturing the artery and vein together. In contrast, the Ellipsys System uses a small needle puncture and catheter to percutaneously establish an AVF without an implant or suture, leaving the vessels and tissue around the fistula undisturbed.

The subject of the case report was an 80-year-old male diabetic ESRD patient who had a pAVF created with the Ellipsys System 6 months prior. He was evaluated for decreasing blood flow (unrelated to his fistula) and required surgical intervention, which provided the opportunity to visualize the matured Ellipsys pAVF up close. According to Dr. Mallios, the lack of sutures or other foreign bodies made the fusion look "remarkably natural."

Dr. Mallios has published numerous studies showing the ability of the Ellipsys System to easily and safely create durable vascular access for ESRD patients. In July 2020, he reported one-year follow-up results of 234 Ellipsys patients, the largest study of any pAVF technique to date. Published in JVS, the study reported no adverse events and 96 percent of patients still had fully functioning fistulas with strong blood flow after a year. That "patency rate" is higher than published rates for surgically created fistulas, which average about 60% after one year.

In April 2020, JVS published a case report by Dr. Mallios that featured a 3-D rendering of the Ellipsys pAVF on the cover of the publication. Dr. Mallios also co-authored two recent papers in the Journal of Vascular Access that discussed patient eligibility for Ellipsys and the similarities between an Ellipsys pAVF and a surgical AVF, the current standard of care.

Recently published long-term Ellipsys data showed a functional patency rate of 92 percent at two years. The study also found high levels of patient satisfaction with the procedure.

Cleared by the FDA in 2018 for patients with end-stage renal disease, Ellipsys is the first significant innovation in AVF creation in over 50 years. It transforms a complex surgery into a minimally invasive procedure that can be performed in a hospital outpatient setting, ambulatory surgery center or physician's office. Since 2015, nearly 3,000 patients worldwide have undergone the Ellipsys procedure.

Medtronic recently announced its plan to acquire Avenu Medical for the Ellipsys percutaneous fistula creation technology. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.