Brain

WASHINGTON--Female eggs exposed to THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana, have an impaired ability to produce viable embryos, and are significantly less likely to result in a viable pregnancy, according to an animal study accepted for presentation at ENDO 2020, the Endocrine Society's annual meeting. The abstract will be published in the Journal of the Endocrine Society.

Marijuana, or cannabis, is the most commonly used recreational drug by people of reproductive age. The rise in marijuana use has occurred at the same time that THC percentages in the drug have increased. "Currently, patients seeking infertility treatments are advised against cannabis use, but the scientific evidence backing this statement is weak," said Master student Megan Misner, part of the research laboratory led by Laura Favetta, Ph.D., in the Department of Biomedical Sciences at the University of Guelph in Canada. "This makes it difficult for physicians to properly advise patients undergoing in vitro fertilization."

In the new study, researchers treated cow oocytes, or female eggs, with concentrations of THC equivalent to therapeutic and recreational doses. The oocytes were collected and matured into five groups: untreated, control, low THC, mid THC and high THC.

The eggs' developmental rates and gene expression were measured. The researchers evaluated the ability of embryos to reach critical stages of development at specific time points. With higher concentrations of THC, they found a significant decrease and delay in the ability of the treated oocytes to reach these checkpoints. "This is a key indicator in determining the quality and developmental potential of the egg," Misner said.

THC exposure led to a significant decrease in the expression of genes called connexins, which are present at increased levels in higher quality oocytes. Poorer quality oocytes, with lower connexin expression levels, have been shown to lead to a poorer embryo development. "This embryo would be less likely to proceed past the first week of development, and thus lead to infertility," Misner said.

Preliminary data also showed THC affected the activity of a total of 62 genes in the treatment groups compared with the non-treated groups. "This implies lower quality and lower fertilization capability, therefore lower fertility in the end," she said.

The Endocrine Society canceled its annual meeting, ENDO 2020, amid concerns about COVID-19. Visit our online newsroom for more information on accepted abstracts, which will be published in a special supplemental section of the Journal of the Endocrine Society.

In California, a changing climate has made autumn feel more like summer, with hotter, drier weather that increases the risk of longer, more dangerous wildfire seasons, according to a new Stanford-led study.

The paper, published in Environmental Research Letters, provides insights that could inform more effective risk mitigation, land management and resource allocation.

"Many factors influence wildfire risk, but this study shows that long-term warming, coupled with decreasing autumn precipitation, is already increasing the odds of the kinds of extreme fire weather conditions that have proved so destructive in both northern and southern California in recent years," said study senior author Noah Diffenbaugh, the Kara J Foundation professor at Stanford's School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences.

Since the early 1980s, the frequency of autumn days with extreme fire weather conditions has more than doubled in California. Rainfall during the season has dropped off by about 30 percent, while average temperatures have increased by more than 2 degrees Fahrenheit or more than 1 degree Celsius. The most pronounced warming has occurred in the late summer and early autumn, causing tinder-dry conditions in forests and grasslands to coincide with the strong, dry "Diablo" and "Santa Ana" winds that typically occur during the autumn in northern and southern California.

These conditions have fed large, fast-spreading wildfires across California in recent years. The region's single deadliest wildfire, two largest wildfires, and two most destructive wildfires all occurred during 2017 and 2018, killing more than 150 people and causing more than $50 billion in damage.

Conspiring conditions

The paper includes analysis of the conditions surrounding the November 2018 Camp Fire in the Northern Sierra Nevada foothills and the Woolsey Fire around the same time near Los Angeles. In both cases, seasonal strong winds conspired with landscapes dried out following the state's hottest summer on record, stretching limited emergency response resources across the state.

The study analyzed historical weather observations from thermometers and rain gauges, and found that the risk of extreme wildfire conditions during autumn has more than doubled across California over the past four decades. In addition, using a large suite of climate model simulations archived by government research centers around the world, the authors revealed evidence that human-caused global warming has made the observed increases in these meteorological preconditions more likely.

"Autumn is of particular concern since warmer, drier conditions may coincide with the strong offshore wind events which tend to occur in the September to November period," said Michael Goss, the study's lead author and a postdoctoral scholar in Diffenbaugh's Climate and Earth System Dynamics Group.

The authors emphasize that there are a number of opportunities for managing the intensifying risk of wildfires in California and other regions. They show that the reduced emissions target identified in the United Nations' Paris agreement would likely slow the increase in wildfire risk. However, even with those reductions, much of California is still likely to experience rising risk of extreme wildfire weather in the future.

"It's striking just how strong of an influence climate change has already had on extreme fire weather conditions throughout the state," said study coauthor Daniel Swain, a research fellow at UCLA, the National Center for Atmospheric Research and The Nature Conservancy, and a former PhD student with Diffenbaugh at Stanford. "It represents yet another piece of evidence that climate change is already having a discernable influence on day-to-day life in California."

Strained resources

The findings come at a time when California's firefighters are facing significant pressures. Because firefighting resources and funding have been traditionally concentrated during the peak summertime fire season, the recent spate of autumn fires burning in both northern and southern California has put particular strain on the response. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic could further strain emergency resources, including impeding efforts to prepare for the upcoming summer and autumn seasons that are likely to be intensified by low spring snowpack and a dry winter in northern California.

The consequences are not restricted to California. In particular, fire-prone regions have historically shared wildfire-fighting resources throughout the year, including movement of people and equipment between the northern and southern hemispheres between the respective summer seasons. Recent autumn wildfires in California have coincided with the onset of wildfires in Australia, creating strain on limited global resources.

The authors emphasize that there are many steps California and other regions can take to increase resilience to the rising risks of wildfire. In addition to curbing the trajectory of global warming, risk management options include prescribed burning to reduce fuel loads and improve ecosystem health, upgrades to emergency communications and response systems, community-level development of protective fire breaks and defensible space, and the adoption of new zoning rules and building codes to promote fire resilient construction, according to the researchers.

It's not too late to rescue global marine life, according to a study outlining the steps needed for marine ecosystems to recover from damage by 2050.

University of Queensland scientist Professor Catherine Lovelock said the study found many components of marine ecosystems could be rebuilt if we try harder to address the causes of their decline.

"People depend on the oceans and coastal ecosystems as a source of food, livelihoods, carbon capture and, thanks to coral reefs, mangroves and other coastal ecosystems, for protection from storms," Professor Lovelock said.

"But people are having enormous impacts globally and it's time to do what we must to ensure our oceans are healthy and vibrant for generations to come."

The research revealed many examples of recovery of marine populations, habitats and ecosystems following conservation interventions.

"Despite humanity having greatly distorted our oceans, recent interventions have led to a number of remarkable success stories," Professor Lovelock said.

"The world has come together before to implement moratoriums on whaling, create a Law of the Sea, prevent pollution from ships, and limit industrialised fishing - all with positive outcomes.

"For the sake of our oceans, let's go further.

"The main issue we need to tackle is climate change and we can only rebuild the abundance of the world's marine if the most ambitious goals within the Paris Agreement are reached."

Professor Lovelock said the benefits of strong action are myriad.

"Conserving coastal wetlands could improve food security for the millions of people who depend on them, and reduce the dangers of storm damage and flooding - saving billions of dollars," she said.

"Mangroves, saltmarshes and seagrasses can store carbon in their soils and biomass which can help mitigate climate change.

"They provide so many benefits to coastal society that investing to rebuild them is a no-brainer."

Professor Carlos Duarte from Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah University of Science and Technology said the goal was not to recreate historical ecosystems.

"That's no longer possible - rather we should improve on the status quo by re-building stocks of depleted marine populations over coming decades," Professor Duarte said.

"The elephant in the room is climate change, especially for vulnerable ecosystems like coral reefs and kelp beds.

"There's no one silver bullet - we have to address the root causes of ecological collapses.

"It's not enough to reduce pollution or fishing pressure as the future of the ocean also depends on how rapidly greenhouse gas emissions are reduced."

An international study recently published in the journal Nature that was led by KAUST Professors Carlos Duarte and Susana Agustí lays out the essential roadmap of actions required for the planet's marine life to recover to full abundance by 2050.

The project brings together the world's leading marine scientists working across four continents, in 10 countries and from 16 universities, including KAUST, Aarhus University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Colorado State University, Boston University, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, Sorbonne Universite, James Cook University, The University of Queensland, Dalhousie University and the University of York.

"We are at a point where we can choose between a legacy of a resilient and vibrant ocean or an irreversibly disrupted ocean," said Carlos Duarte, KAUST professor of marine science and the Tarek Ahmed Juffali research chair in Red Sea ecology.

"Our study documents recovery of marine populations, habitats and ecosystems following past conservation interventions. It provides specific, evidence-based recommendations to scale proven solutions globally," Duarte added.

Although humans have greatly altered marine life to its detriment in the past, the researchers found evidence of the remarkable resilience of marine life and an emerging shift from steep losses of life throughout the 20th century to a slowing down of losses--and in some instances even recovery--over the first two decades of the 21st century.

The evidence--along with particularly spectacular cases of recovery, such as the example of humpback whales--highlights that the abundance of marine life can be restored, enabling a more sustainable, ocean-based economy.

The review states that the recovery rate of marine life can be accelerated to achieve substantial recovery within two to three decades for most components of marine ecosystems, provided that climate change is tackled and efficient interventions are deployed at large scale.

"Rebuilding marine life represents a doable grand challenge for humanity, an ethical obligation and a smart economic objective to achieve a sustainable future," said Susana Agusti, KAUST professor of marine science.

By studying the impact of previously successful ocean conservation interventions and recovery trends, the researchers identified nine components integral to rebuilding marine life, salt marshes, mangroves, seagrasses, coral reefs, kelp, oyster reefs, fisheries, megafauna and the deep sea.

By stacking a combination of six complementary interventions called "recovery wedges," the report identifies specific actions within the broad themes of protecting species, harvesting wisely, protecting spaces, restoring habitats, reducing pollution and the mitigation of climate change.

The actions recommended include opportunities, benefits, possible roadblocks and remedial actions, giving a tangible roadmap to deliver a healthy ocean that would provide huge benefits for people and the planet.

If all recovery wedges are activated at scale, recovery timescales of previously damaged marine life show that the abundance of marine life can be recovered within one human generation, or two to three decades, by 2050.

A key element identified for success is the mitigation of climate change by reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. Impacts from realized and unavoidable climate change already limit the scope for rebuilding tropical corals to a partial--rather than substantial--recovery. The goal of rebuilding the abundance of marine life can only succeed if the most ambitious goals within the Paris Agreement are reached.

Success largely depends on the support of a committed, resilient global partnership of governments and societies aligned with the goal. It will also require a substantial commitment of financial resources, but the new study reveals that the ecological, economic and social gains from rebuilding marine life will be far-reaching.

The review is timely, as nations consider their actions to conserve biodiversity beyond 2020 and as the Kingdom leads its G20 partners as the group's 2020 president into novel, pragmatic approaches to tackling the climate challenge and protecting coral reefs and other vulnerable marine ecosystems.

"We have a narrow window of opportunity to deliver a healthy ocean to our grandchildren's generation, and we have the knowledge and tools to do so. Failing to embrace this challenge--and in so doing condemning our grandchildren to a broken ocean unable to support high-quality livelihoods--is not an option," Duarte said.

In synchrotron radiation sources such as BESSY II, electron bunches orbit the storage ring at almost the speed of light. They are forced to emit extremely bright light pulses with special properties by periodic magnetic structures (undulators).

Elliptical undulators can be used to generate also circularly polarized light pulses, which display a feature called helicity: the polarisation goes either clockwise or counterclockwise. Magnetic structures in materials react differently to circularly polarized light: Depending on the helicity of the X-ray pulses, they more or less absorb this radiation.

Since the 1980s, this has been exploited in so-called XMCD (X-ray Circular Dichroism) experiments to investigate static and dynamic changes in magnetic materials or to image magnetic nanostructures on surfaces.

Especially for such imaging techniques, the user community at synchrotron radiation sources has long wished for the possibility to quickly switch the helicity of the light, mainly because this directly results in a magnetic image contrast that makes bits in magnetic data storage devices visible and quantifiable.

In the elliptical undulators typical for BESSY II (APPLE II), developed by the group around Johannes Bahrdt, the helicity of light is switched by a mechanical displacement of meter-long arrangements of strong permanent magnets, a process that sometimes takes up to minutes.

The new method, however, is based on the combination of such undulators with a special orbit of the electron beam in the storage ring - generated by the so-called TRIBs (transverse resonance island buckets). TRIBs have been experimentally explored by the accelerator expert Dr. Paul Goslawski at BESSY II. While the path of the electrons in the storage ring normally closes after one orbit, in the TRIBs mode the electrons run on different orbits during successive orbits and can thus emit X-ray pulses from different magnetic field configurations, suggested Dr. Karsten Holldack and Dr. Johannes Bahrdt.

They were recently able to show that their idea actually works with the help of the existing double undulator UE56-2 at BESSY II in a pilot experiment: When passing through a specially prepared magnet arrangement of this double undulator, the electron bunches from different orbits in TRIBs mode emitted X-ray photons with the same wavelength but opposite circular polarization.

Thus, in principle, XMCD signals from magnetic samples can now be studied at intervals of only 1 microsecond with right- and then left-circularly polarized light pulses. In the pilot experiment the XMCD signals from a magnetic sample (nickel in permalloy) were detected from revolution to revolution and the fast (MHz) helicity change could be clearly demonstrated. With new undulators tailored for this purpose, special beamlines with ultrafast helicity change could be offered at BESSY II in TRIBs mode. Ultimately switching times could shrink to nanoseconds.

Outlook: BESSY III

"We are really delighted that the Two-Orbit / TRIBs development allows now already new experiments at BESSY II", Goslawski says. This would also be an attractive option for BESSY III. The results have now been published in Nature Communications Physics.

Every picture tells a story... none more so than this detailed visualisation of a strain of the norovirus.

Created from 13,000 separate images taken by an electron microscope, it reveals in rich detail the structure of the virus. It shows bump-like protrusions on the outside of the virus capsid, the protein shell that holds the genome of the virus.

Joseph Snowden, a PhD researcher from the Astbury Centre for Structural Molecular Biology at the University of Leeds, said it revealed that the protein casing did not keep a fixed shape - as the protrusions on the surface would extend, retract and rotate.

This dynamic shape-shifting may hold clues as to why the noroviruses are such potent pathogens, responsible for over 200,000 deaths worldwide each year, mainly in low-to-middle-income countries. In the UK, noroviruses cause the winter vomiting bug that forces the closure of schools and hospitals.

To identify subtle changes to the structure of these protein shells, the scientists processed the data from the images with a super computer, using a method called "focussed classification".

The study, Dynamics in the murine norovirus capsid revealed by high-resolution cryo-EM, is reported in the online journal PLOS Biology. This link will go live when the paper is published:

https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.pbio.3000649

For safety reasons, the researchers used a mouse norovirus in their study, which closely resembles the human noroviruses.

Mr Snowden said: "The constant changing or morphing of the virus shell may enable it to confuse the body's defence systems.

"Immune systems work on the basis of molecular shape. The body's defences will produce proteins that bind to pathogens to prevent them from infecting host cells. But if the shape of the virus is constantly changing, the body's defence systems may be unable to act efficiently."

The protrusions seem able to move independently or in a co-ordinated fashion and the scientists believe this may enable the virus to prime itself ready for infection depending on where it is - i.e. if it is in the digestive tract of a host organism.

It is believed that this study is the first study to use the focussed classification computing tool to investigate the structure of a norovirus.

Structural insight to aid vaccine development

Dr Morgan Herod, one of the senior authors on this study, also from the University of Leeds, hopes that a greater understanding of the structure of the norovirus may help with vaccine development, which so far has been unsuccessful.

Dr Herod said "The University of Leeds has a strong track record in the use of virus like particles (VLPs) to create vaccine candidates, for example against polio. VLPs are harmless proteins modelled on the structure of a virus's casing and they fool the immune system into thinking the body is under attack, prompting an immune response. "

"Our research shows that the capsid or protein shell of norovirus is dynamic - and perhaps we have to look at VLPs that are better able to mimic this aspect of norovirus structure."

"That will make the vaccine development task a little harder."

Tsukuba, Japan - Metamorphosis, or a dramatic change in physical appearance, is a normal part of the life cycle of many animals, carried out to take advantage of different ecological niches. Yet the process of metamorphosis--how a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, or a tadpole transforms into a frog--is not well understood and has only been studied in a small number of species.

In a study published this week in Current Biology, a team led by researchers from the University of Tsukuba investigated the role of various neurotransmitters in the regulation of metamorphosis, identifying GABA as a key regulator in the model sea squirt Ciona intestinalis.

Ciona are some of the closest living relatives of vertebrates. Starting life as tadpole-like larvae, Ciona undergo a metamorphosis into vase-shaped adults that is triggered by their attachment to a solid surface.

"Ciona have organs called adhesive papillae that sense when the animal attaches to a surface, triggering metamorphosis," explains Professor Yasunori Sasakura, senior author. "The adhesive papillae contain sensory neurons that transmit signals to the rest of the body, suggesting that the nervous system plays an essential role in initiating metamorphosis."

To investigate the role of the nervous system in metamorphosis, the researchers treated Ciona larvae with various neurotransmitters, among which only GABA induced the physical changes associated with maturation. Upon blocking the genes required for GABA synthesis, transport, and maturation, the researchers observed decreased induction of metamorphosis, confirming they had found the right regulatory molecule.

GABA, or gamma aminobutyric acid, is one of the main neurotransmitters in mammals. It is usually thought of as an inhibitory molecule because it blocks certain signals in the brain, decreasing nervous system activity. Interestingly, however, the researchers found that this was not the case in Ciona metamorphosis.

"Using expression analysis and gene knockout/knockdown assays, we showed that GABA activates the neurons expressing gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH), which is essential for reproductive maturation in vertebrates," says Professor Sasakura. "Knocking out the genes encoding GnRH showed that it is essential for metamorphosis in Ciona larvae and confirmed its place as the downstream component of GABA-mediated regulation."

Further experimentation showed that while larvae lacking GnRH could not carry out the initial steps of metamorphosis, they did exhibit normal adult organ growth. In contrast, no adult organ growth was observed in GABA mutants, suggesting that GABA is essential for all metamorphic events.

The researchers now hope to understand how the GABA-GnRH pathway causes the dramatic physical changes that occur during Ciona metamorphosis and, given the wide conservation of these molecules among animals, to explore whether the GABA-GnRH mechanism plays a role in the metamorphosis of other animal species.

COLUMBUS, Ohio - There's a price to pay when you get your news and political information from the same place you find funny memes and cat pictures, new research suggests.

The study found that people viewing a blend of news and entertainment on a social media site tended to pay less attention to the source of content they consumed - meaning they could easily mistake satire or fiction for real news.

People who viewed content that was clearly separated into categories - such as current affairs and entertainment - didn't have the same issues evaluating the source and credibility of content they read.

The findings show the dangers of people getting their news from social media sites like Facebook or Twitter, said study author George Pearson, a senior lecturer and research associate in communication at The Ohio State University.

"We are drawn to these social media sites because they are one-stop shops for media content, updates from friends and family, and memes or cat pictures," Pearson said.

"But that jumbling of content makes everything seem the same to us. It makes it harder for us to distinguish what we need to take seriously from that which is only entertainment."

The study appears online in the journal New Media & Society.

For the study, Pearson created a fictional social media site called "Link Me." The 370 participants saw four webpages with either two or four posts each. Each post consisted of a headline and short paragraph summarizing the story, as well as information on the source of the post.

The sources were designed to be either high or low credibility, based on their name and description. (The sources' credibility was tested in a previous study to make sure people understood.)

For example, one high-credibility source was called "Washington Daily News" and was described as a "professional news organization renowned for high-quality and objective journalism."

One low-credibility source in the study was called "Hot Moon" and described as "a collective of nonprofessional writers."

All posts were based on real articles or public social media posts taken from Reddit or Tumblr.

After viewing the site, participants were asked a variety of questions. Pearson was most interested in whether they paid more attention to the posts about current affairs topics than those in other categories, such as entertainment.

"That would suggest that they were paying attention to the sources of the posts and understanding what was news and what was not," Pearson said.

The results showed that when the content was not grouped by distinct topics - in other words, news posts appeared on the same page with entertainment posts - participants reported paying less attention to the source of the content.

"They were less likely to verify source information to ensure that it was a credible source," he said.

That may be one reason why satirical and other types of fake news get shared by people who evidently think it is real, Pearson said.

For example, in 2018 the website React365 posted an article about a cruise ship disaster in Mexico that killed at least 32 people. The article generated more than 350,000 engagements on Facebook.

The misinformation was quickly debunked by Snopes.com, which noted that react365's homepage clearly showed it was a prank website where people could upload their own fictious stories.

Pearson said one of the problems is that many social media sites present content in the exact same way, no matter the source.

"There is no visual distinction on Facebook between something from the New York Times and something from a random blog. They all have the same color scheme, same font," he said.

One solution would be for social media companies to develop tools to distinguish content.

But until that happens, it is up to users to pay more attention to where their news is coming from - as difficult as that may be, Pearson said.

"Right now, the structure of information platforms - especially social media - may be reducing positive media literacy behaviors."

From health care to education to media, social distancing across the globe due to coronavirus (COVID-19) has created the need to conduct business "virtually" using Skype, web conferencing, FaceTime and any other means available. With this expansive use of mobile and video devices, now more than ever, it is important to understand how the use of these technologies may impact communication. But are all forms of online communication alike?

In a first-of-its-kind study, neuroscientists from Florida Atlantic University demonstrate that a person's gaze is altered during tele-communication if they think that the person on the other end of the conversation can see them. People are very sensitive to the gaze direction of others and even 2-day-old infants prefer faces where the eyes are looking directly back at them. The phenomenon known as "gaze cueing," a powerful signal for orienting attention, is a mechanism that likely plays a role in the developmentally and socially important wonder of "shared" or "joint" attention where a number of people attend to the same object or location. The ability to do this is what makes humans unique among primates.

Throughout almost all of human history, conversations were generally conducted face-to-face, so people knew where their conversational partner was looking and vice versa. Now, with virtual communication, that assumption no longer holds - sometimes people communicate with both cameras on while other times only the speaker may be visible. The researchers set out to determine whether being observed affects people's behavior during online communication.

For the study, published in the journal Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, co-authors Elan Barenholtz, Ph.D., an associate professor of psychology, a member of the Center for Complex Systems and Brain Sciences in FAU's Charles E. Schmidt College of Science and a member of FAU's Brain Institute (I-BRAIN), and Michael J. Kleiman, Ph.D., a postdoctoral researcher at FAU, compared fixation behavior in 173 participants under two conditions: one in which the participants believed they were engaging in a real-time interaction and one in which they knew they were watching a pre-recorded video.

The researchers wanted to know if face fixation would increase in the real-time condition based on the social expectation of facing one's speaker in order to get attention or if it would lead to greater face avoidance, based on social norms as well as the cognitive demands of encoding the conversation.

Similarly, they wanted to know where participants would fixate on the face. Would it be the eyes more in the real-time condition because of social demands to make eye contact with one's speaker? Or, in the pre-recorded condition, where the social demands to make eye contact are eliminated, would participants spend more time looking at the mouth in order to encode the conversation, which is consistent with previous studies showing greater mouth fixations during an encoding task.

Results of the study showed that participants fixated on the whole face in the real-time condition and significantly less in the pre-recorded condition. In the pre-recorded condition, time spent fixating on the mouth was significantly greater compared to the real-time condition.

There were no significant differences in time spent fixating on the eyes between the real-time and the pre-recorded conditions. These findings may suggest that participants are more comfortable looking directly at the mouth of a speaker - which has previously been found to be optimal for encoding speech - when they think that no one is watching them.

To simulate a live interaction, the researchers convinced participants that they were engaging in a real-time, two-way video interaction (it was actually pre-recorded) where they could been seen and heard by the speaker, as well as a pre-recorded interaction where they knew the video was previously recorded and therefore the speaker could not see their behavior.

"Because gaze direction conveys so much socially relevant information, one's own gaze behavior is likely to be affected by whether one's eyes are visible to a speaker," said Kleiman, first author. "For example, people may intend to signal that they are paying more attention to a speaker by fixating their face or eyes during a conversation. Conversely, extended eye contact also can be perceived as aggressive and therefore noticing one's eyes could lead to reduced direct fixation of another's face or eyes. Indeed, people engage in avoidant eye movements by periodically breaking and reforming eye contact during conversations."

There was a highly significant tendency for participants engaging in perceived real-time interaction to display greater avoidant fixation behavior, which supports the idea that social contexts draw fixations away from the face compared to when social context is not a factor. When the face was fixated, attention was directed toward the mouth for the greater percentage of time in the pre-recorded condition versus the real-time condition. The lack of difference in time spent fixating the eyes suggests that the additional mouth fixations in the pre-recorded condition did not come at the cost of reduced eye fixation and must have derived from reduced fixations elsewhere on the face.

Comparisons between total fixation durations of the eyes versus the mouth were calculated for both the real-time and pre-recorded conditions, with the eyes of both conditions being significantly more fixated than the mouth. Gender, age, cultural background, and native language did not have an influence on fixation behavior across conditions.

"Regardless of the specific mechanisms underlying the observed differences in fixation patterns, results from our study suggest participants were taking social and attentional considerations into account in the real-time condition," said Barenholtz. "Given that encoding and memory have been found to be optimized by fixating the mouth, which was reduced overall in the real-time condition, this suggests that people do not fully optimize for speech encoding in a live interaction."

Understanding the brain's many functions requires knowing its architecture. Polarized light imaging is a powerful method for characterizing the architecture of nerve fibers in the brain. Researchers have used tissue scattering to improve this imaging method and recreate an accurate three-dimensional image of brain connectivity, in particular nerve fiber crossings. Menzel et al. used biophysical models and experimental tests on a variety of post-mortem brain tissue samples. They found specific differences in how light traveled through tissue regions with different nerve fiber organizations. Their results could enhance scientists' ability to conceptualize the brain's architecture by allowing them to build three-dimensional images of brain nerve fiber arrangements.

How much spring and summer affect the COVID-19 pandemic may depend not only on the effectiveness of social distancing measures, but also on the environment inside our buildings, according to a review of Yale scientists of their own work and that of colleagues on how respiratory viruses are transmitted.

The cold, dry air of winter clearly helps SARS-CoV2 -- the virus that causes COVID-19 -- spread among people, Yale research has shown. But as humidity increases during spring and summer, the risk of transmission of the virus through airborne particles decreases both outside and indoors in places such as offices.

While viruses can still be transmitted through direct contact or through contaminated surfaces as humidity rises, researchers suggest that, in addition to social distancing and handwashing, the seasonal moderation of relative humidity - the difference between outside humidity and temperatures and indoor humidity - could be an ally in slowing rates of viral transmission.

The review was published online the week of March 23 in the Annual Review of Virology.

"Ninety percent of our lives in the developed world are spent indoors in close proximity to each other," said Yale immunobiologist and senior author Akiko Iwasaki. "What has not been talked about is the relationship of temperature and humidity in the air indoors and outdoors and aerial transmission of the virus."

Iwasaki is the Waldemar Von Zedtwitz Professor of Immunobiology and professor of molecular, cellular, and developmental biology at Yale, and an investigator for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Iwasaki said the seasonal nature of respiratory illnesses have been chronicled since the times of the ancient Greeks, who noted such illnesses rose in winter and fell during spring and summer. Modern science has been able to identify cold, dry air as a factor in spread of viruses such as the novel coronavirus causing COVID-19. Research by Iwasaki's lab and others explains why.

Winter's cold, dry air makes such viruses a triple threat, Iwasaki said: When cold outdoor air with little moisture is heated indoors, the air's relative humidity drops to about 20%. This comparitively moisture-free air provides a clear path for airborne viral particles of viruses such as COVID-19..

Warm, dry air also dampens the ability of cilia, the hair-like projections on cells lining airways, to expel viral particles. And lastly, the immune system's ability to respond to pathogens is suppressed in drier environments, Iwasaki has found.

Iwasaki was interested in the effects of relative humidity During the winter, relative humidity remains low in most indoor environments; the cold, dry outside air is simply reheated and circulated throughout homes and offices.

Iwasaki's review cites experiments that show rodents infected with respiratory viruses can easily transmit viral particles through the air to non-infected neighbors in low-humidity environments.

"That's why I recommend humidifiers during the winter in buildings," Iwasaki said.

However, in areas of high relative humidity such as the tropics, airborne infectious droplets fall onto surfaces indoors and can survive for extended periods, she said.

"Many homes and buildings are poorly ventilated and people often live in close proximity, and in these cases, the benefits of higher humidity are mitigated," Iwasaki said.

There is a sweet spot in relative humidity for indoor environments, review found. Mice in environments of between 40% and 60% relative humidity show substantially less ability to transmit viruses to non-infected mice than those in environments of low or high relative humidity. Mice kept at 50% relative humidity were also able to clear an inhaled virus and mount robust immune responses, she found.

Iwasaki stresses that these studies only apply to aerosol transmission: the virus still can be shared at any time of year between people in close proximity and through contact with surfaces containing sufficient amounts of virus. That is why people living in warm countries and people working close to each other are still susceptible to infection, she said.

"It doesn't matter if you live in Singapore, India, or the Arctic, you still need to wash your hands and practice social distancing," Iwasaki said.

Nearly a millennium and a half ago, red light streaked the night sky over Japan. Witnesses compared it to the tail of a pheasant -- it appeared as a fan of beautiful red feathers stretched across the sky. Since the event, scientists have studied the witness accounts written in the year 620 A.D. and speculated about what the cosmic phenomenon could have actually been. Now, researchers from The Graduate University for Advanced Studies may have found the answer.

They published their results on March 31, 2020 in the Sokendai Review of Culture and Social Studies.

"It is the oldest Japanese astronomical record of a 'red sign,'" said Ryuho Kataoka, a researcher with the Department of Polar Science in the School of Multidisciplinary Sciences at The Graduate University for Advanced Studies and the National Institute of Polar Research. "It could be a red aurora produced during magnetic storms. However, convincing reasons have not been provided, although the description has been very famous among Japanese people for a long time."

The problem with the aurora hypothesis, according to Kataoka, is that auroras do not look like pheasant tails. Instead, they are ribbon-esque, waving across the sky. It could have been a comet, some researchers speculated, but comets do not often appear red.

To better understand the phenomenon, Kataoka and his team adjusted their view -- literally. The magnetic latitude of Japan was 33 degrees in 620, compared to 25 degrees today. The pheasant tail appeared to be about 10 degrees long, placing it well within the area that would be affected by a strong magnetic storm.

"Recent findings have shown that auroras can be 'pheasant tail' shaped specifically during great magnetic storms," Kataoka said. "This means that the 620 A.D. phenomenon was likely an aurora."

The researchers plan to continue examining literary references for modern scientific relevance.

"This is an interesting and successful example that modern science can benefit from the ancient Japanese emotion evoked when the surprising appearance of heaven reminded them of a familiar bird," Kataoka said.

Pheasants are culturally significant in Japan and have been for generations. They were considered messengers of the heaven in traditional Japanese folklore. According to Kataoka, it is likely meaningful that the historical records used the shape of a pheasant's tail to describe the "heavenly" phenomenon of the fan-shaped auroras.

"We hope to continue exploring this collaboration between science and literature," Kataoka said.

Human stem cells have been regarded as one of the promising cell sources for cardiac regeneration therapy. But their clinical use is hampered due to the poor performance after transplantation into failing hearts. Recently a stem cell biologist from City University of Hong Kong (CityU), together with his collaborators, has developed a novel strategy, called in vivo priming, to "train" the stem cells to stay strong after implantation to the damaged heart via the 3D-printed bandage-like patch. The positive results of the study show that an in vivo priming strategy can be an effective means to enhance cardiac repair.

Dr Ban Kiwon, Assistant Professor of CityU's Department of Biomedical Sciences, collaborated with cardiologist and experts in 3D printing from South Korea in achieving this breakthrough. Their findings were published in the latest issue of the scientific journal Science Advances, titled "In vivo priming of human mesenchymal stem cells with hepatocyte growth factor-engineered mesenchymal stem cells promotes therapeutic potential for cardiac repair".

Harsh environment in failing hearts hinders stem cell survival

One of the proposed approaches to treat myocardial infarction, commonly known as heart attack, with regeneration therapy is to inject the human stem cells directly into the failing hearts. In particular, human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) have been considered as a competitive agent for clinical uses for their proven safety and significant paracrine effects supporting new blood vessel formation and inhibiting cell death. However, "the clinical trial results are disappointing as the micro-environment of a failing heart is very harsh for the injected hMSCs to stay alive," said Dr Ban.

Therefore researchers have been exploring ways to increase the survival rate of hMSCs in failing hearts. "Priming, or called preconditioning, is a common strategy to empower the cells. The cells are educated through certain stimulations, and when they are relocated to tough environments, they are much stronger against bad condition and they will know how to react because of their previous experiences," explained Dr Ban.

Conventionally, priming is performed in vitro (outside a living organism) before the cells are transplanted into the heart. "But the effects of priming done in this way usually last for two or three days only. To extend the duration of the priming effect, I have come up with an idea of 'in vivo priming', which means the hMSCs are primed directly on the failing hearts," said Dr Ban.

Novel strategy: in vivo priming of hMSCs

To prove the concept, the research team loaded two types of MSCs into a tailor-made 3D-printed patch, namely the human bone marrow-derived MSCs, and the genetically engineered MSCs which have human hepatocyte growth factor protein. Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) is involved in multiple biological activities, such as cell survival, blood vessel formation, anti-fibrotic activities, and important in adult organ regeneration and wound healing.

The patch, like a bandage, was then implanted on the top of the infarct area of the myocardial-infarction-induced heart of rats. "The genetically engineered MSCs can continuously secret human HGF protein to prime the hMSCs within the patch and make them 'stronger'," said Dr Ban.

Instead of directly injecting the genetically engineered cells into the heart, he added that encapsulating the cells in the patch for putting on the surface of the heart can help prevent mutation or other undesirable outcomes. And the patch is fabricated by 3D-printing of pig heart-derived extracellular matrix hydrogel, simulating the cardiac tissue-specific micro-environment.

It was found that the primed hMSCs had a higher survival rate compared with unprimed ones in the patches attached to the failing hearts. Those empowered hMSCs released greater amounts of paracrine factors beneficial for repairing damaged cardiac muscle tissues and regenerating vasculatures.

"We found that the primed cells can survive even after 8 weeks in the patch after implantation to the heart. Also, there is a significant improvement in cardiac function as well as vessel regeneration comparing to the unprimed cells," said Dr Ban.

Great improvement of the priming effect

"Our team is the very first to achieve priming in hearts in vivo. But more importantly, by showing that in vivo priming of hMSCs can enhance the therapeutic potential for cardiac repair, we hope our study can bring significant implications for related stem cell therapy in future," concluded Dr Ban. It took the team over two years to achieve these remarkable results. The team will explore the possibility of conducting the experiments on bigger animals and even clinical trials, as well as modifying the structure of the patch.

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- In uncertain times, supporting your friends and family can help them make it through. But your comforting words can have different effects based on how you phrase them, according to new Penn State research.

The researchers studied how people responded to a variety of different messages offering emotional support. They found that messages that validated a person's feelings were more effective and helpful than ones that were critical or diminished emotions.

The findings were recently published in the keystone paper of a virtual special issue of the Journal of Communication. The researchers said the results could help people provide better support to their friends and families.

"One recommendation is for people to avoid using language that conveys control or uses arguments without sound justification," said Xi Tian, a graduate assistant in communication arts and sciences. "For example, instead of telling a distressed person how to feel, like 'don't take it so hard' or 'don't think about it,' you could encourage them to talk about their thoughts or feelings so that person can come to their own conclusions about how to change their feelings or behaviors."

Tian said that previous research has shown that social support can help alleviate emotional distress, increase physical and psychological well-being, and improve personal relationships. But -- depending on how support is phrased or worded -- it could be counterproductive, such as actually increasing stress or reducing a person's confidence that they can manage their stressful situation.

Denise Solomon, department head and professor of communication arts and sciences, said they were trying to learn more about why well-intentioned attempts to comfort others are sometimes seen as insensitive or unhelpful.

"We wanted to examine the underlying mechanism that explains why some supportive messages may produce unintended consequences," Solomon said. "We also wanted to understand how people cognitively and emotionally respond to insensitive social support."

For the study, the researchers recruited 478 married adults who had recently experienced an argument with their spouse. Before completing an online questionnaire, participants were asked to think about someone with whom they had previously discussed their marriage or spouse. Then, they were presented with one of six possible supportive messages and were asked to imagine that person giving them that message.

Lastly, the participants were asked to rate their given message on a variety of characteristics.

"We manipulated the messages based on how well the support message validates, recognizes, or acknowledges the support recipients' emotions, feelings, and experiences," Tian said. "Essentially, the messages were manipulated to exhibit low, moderate, or high levels of person-centeredness, and we created two messages for each level of person-centeredness."

According to the researchers, a highly person-centered message recognizes the other person's feelings and helps the person explore why they might be feeling that way. For example, "Disagreeing with someone you care about is always hard. It makes sense that you would be upset about this." Meanwhile, a low person-centered message is critical and challenges the person's feelings. For example, "Nobody is worth getting so worked up about. Stop being so depressed."

After analyzing the data, the researchers found that low person-centered support messages did not help people manage their marital disagreement in a way that reduced emotional distress.

"In fact, those messages were perceived as dominating and lacking argument strength," Tian said. "Those messages induced more resistance to social support, such that the participants reported feeling angry after receiving the message. They also reported actually criticizing the message while reading it."

In contrast, high person-centered messages produced more emotional improvement and circumvented reactance to social support.

"Another recommendation that can be taken from this research is that people may want to use moderately to highly person-centered messages when helping others cope with everyday stressors," said Solomon.

The researchers said people can try using language that expresses sympathy, care and concern. For example, "I'm sorry you are going through this. I'm worried about you and how you must be feeling right now." Acknowledging the other person's feelings or offering perspective -- like saying "It's understandable that you are stressed out since it's something you really care about" -- may also be helpful.

We've all seen the documentaries that feature scenes of mass migrations on land. Those videos are pretty impressive showing all sorts of animals - birds, mammals and other creatures - on the move. What wasn't known was to what extent this was taking place in the deepest parts of our oceans.

That was until now.

Scientists have, for the first time, documented seasonal migrations of fish across the seafloor in deep-sea fish, revealing an important insight that will further scientific understanding of the nature of our planet.

"We are extremely excited about our findings, which demonstrate a previously unobserved level of dynamism in fishes living on the deep sea floor, potentially mirroring the great migrations which are so well characterised in animal systems on land," said Rosanna Milligan, Assistant Professor at Nova Southeastern University, who started the work at the University of Glasgow.

The study - published today in the Journal of Animal Ecology and led by Nova Southeastern University (NSU) and the University of Glasgow - analysed more than seven years of deep-sea photographic data from West Africa, linking seasonal patterns in surface-ocean productivity with observed behavioural patterns of fishes at 1,500 metres.

The deep sea - greater than 200-meters water depth - covers most of the world's surface. Recent advances in technology and computational power have hugely improved our ability to access and study deep sea ecosystems, but there are still many basic questions that we simply don't have answers to.

This study now provides evidence of cycles of movement across the seafloor in deep-sea fish, with the study authors believing these movements could be happening in other locations across the world's sea floor too.

This work was only possible because of an international collaboration between industry, academia and government, involving more than 10 organisations across Angola, UK and US. It was done using the Deep-ocean Environmental Long-term Observatory System (DELOS).

The DELOS observatories are permanently left in place on the seafloor (1,400 m depth) and house separate instrumentation "modules" containing oceanographic sensors, cameras and more. The modules are periodically recovered for data download and servicing using a remotely-operated vehicle (ROV).

You can learn more about the DELOS project ONLINE.

"The work really adds to our understanding of movement patterns in deep-sea fishes and suggests reasons for their behaviours, Milligan said. "Because we were able to link the abundances of fish observed at the seafloor to satellite-derived estimates of primary productivity, our results suggest that even top-level predators and scavengers in the deep oceans could be affected by changes filtering down from the surface of the ocean."

Dr. David Bailey, Senior Lecturer in Marine Biology at the University of Glasgow's Institute of Biodiversity, Animal Health and Comparative Medicine, said: "Animal migrations are really important in nature, because when animals move from place to place, they transport energy, carbon and nutrients. We were only able to discover this behaviour because of the collective expertise and decade-long commitment of the Universities and industry partners. These kinds of long-term projects and the datasets they generate are vital to understanding ongoing change in the oceans and how they may be impacted in the future."