Earth

Scientists of Kemerovo State University, within the framework of the Russian Scientific Foundation grant "Cultivation of isolated cells and organs of rare and endemic medicinal plants of Siberia and the Far East in vitro as a biotechnological method for obtaining biologically active substances", are investigating the fundamental principles of in vitro cultivation of isolated cells and organs of rare medicinal plants - producers of biologically active substances with cytotoxic, antioxidant and antimicrobial properties. One of the urgent problems of medicine and biology is the search and use of plant objects as medicines. The unfavorable environmental situation and the increasing need for medicinal raw materials create its shortage. A new solution was the use of an alternative source of raw materials - cultures of cells and organs of higher plants. The main advantages of this approach are the ecological purity of biomass production by biotechnological method, the possibility of obtaining plant biomass with specified characteristics regardless of the season, climate and weather conditions, high rates of biomass production, guaranteed purity of biomass from pesticides, herbicides, radioactive compounds and other pollutants. The presence of an effective industrial super-producer strain guarantees a higher content of the target product than in an intact plant.

Under the scope of the project, it has been possible to obtain the collection of callus, suspension cells and in vitro root cultures of medicinal plants of Siberia and the Far East since 2018. These cultures have cytotoxic, antioxidant and antimicrobial properties. Their growth characteristics have been successfully studied. Furthermore, scientists developed in vitro crops cultivation systems, as well as methodology for obtaining target biologically active substances by extraction.

Currently, the work is underway to optimize the secretion conditions and purification of biologically active substance from the callus extracts, suspension cultures of cells and root cultures in vitro. Scientists also selected the conditions for drying isolated BAS. On the completion of the research project, they plan to passport the received biotechnological objects of medicinal plants in Siberia and the Far East. Based on the results of the research project, a technology for creating root cultures in vitro will be presented. These cultivated plants are distinguished by higher content of biologically active substance, which remains the base of high-quality herbal raw materials for medicine and pharmaceutical industries.

Dry and cloudless weather was mainly responsible for the unusually high solar irradiance in western Europe during the spring of 2020, not the reduction in aerosol emissions due to the first lockdown. This was the result of an international meteorological study, in which scientists from the University of Cologne participated. The results have been published in the current issue of Nature Communications Earth & Environment.

A large part of western Europe experienced exceptionally sunny and dry weather from March 23 to the end of May 2020. New sunshine extremes were reported in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands, coupled with exceptionally deep blue skies. At the same time, these countries had gone into lockdown in response to the coronavirus pandemic. The hypothesis was that higher solar irradiance at the Earth's surface was caused by reduced emissions of aerosols from industry and traffic.

The research team's analyses show that the reduced aerosols and contrails due to COVID-19 measures were far less influential in the spring of 2020 than the dry and - more importantly - largely cloud-free weather. The study was conducted by an international team that included Professor Dr Stephanie Fiedler of the Institute of Geophysics and Meteorology at the University of Cologne. Also involved were researchers from the Netherlands from Wageningen University & Research and 'Koninklijk Nederlands Meteorologisch Instituut' (KNMI), as well as from Switzerland from the 'Physikalisch-Meteorologisches Observatorium Davos' of the World Radiation Center (PMOD-WRC).

Spring 2020 broke sunshine records across western Europe. The Netherlands recorded the highest solar irradiance since 1928, surpassing the previous extreme value of 2011 by 13 percent. The diffuse component of solar radiation reached a record low value (38 percent). The coincidence of the extreme value of solar irradiance with a reduction in pollution caused by humans due to COVID-19 measures led to the hypothesis that cleaner-than-usual air contributed to the record. Lower transportation and industrial activities led to reductions in nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide, and carbon dioxide emissions of several percent with corresponding changes in atmospheric composition and radiation. The objective of this study was therefore to quantify the respective contributions of weather and aerosols to extreme solar irradiance in Western Europe.

Based on analyses of ground- and satellite-based observations and experiments with a radiative transfer model, the researchers estimate a 1.3 percent increase in solar radiation from the 2010-2019 mean due to the lower mean aerosol optical depth, a measure of aerosol burden in the atmosphere, and a 17.6 percent increase due to some exceptionally dry days and very low cloud cover. 'The analyses show that the reduced aerosols and contrails due to COVID-19 measures are less important for the solar irradiation record than the dry and especially cloud-free weather,' explained Professor Stephanie Fiedler.

Rather, the main reasons for the increased solar irradiance are weather patterns with persistent northerly to easterly flow over western Europe and weak winds at the centre of high-pressure systems. As a result, there were more days with little and no cloud cover, which allowed for greater solar irradiance.

Using an objective weather type classification, a method of describing weather situations based on grid point data, the team showed that 2020 had about ten more spring days with dry weather associated with a high-pressure system compared to the mean for 1980-2019. The amount of precipitation also shows the unusual weather. Thus, spring 2020 is amongst the drier years on record (2004-2020), with the very dry period beginning on March 21, 2020.

Aerosol emissions caused by humans are relatively low in Europe compared to other world regions. 'If anthropogenic aerosol emissions continue to be rather small in the future, or if they further decrease, like scenarios from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suggest, weather will be the most important factor in setting new records for solar irradiance in spring,' said Stephanie Fiedler. 'Currently, however, many regions of the world are more affected by aerosols than western Europe. More significant regional impacts of aerosol reduction on solar irradiance from COVID-19 lockdowns have already been documented in such locations.'

Future research will examine the extent to which aerosol changes can affect weather patterns, for example. Climate scientists are currently working on a new international project to compare climate simulations with emission datasets adapted to the COVID-19 pandemic to answer such questions. In this context, Fiedler is compiling datasets for human-caused aerosols that will enable such model simulations.

Because cancers in children are rare, many details about their biology remain unknown. In the field of cancer genetics, there's a limited understanding of how inherited genetic changes may contribute to the formation and growth of tumors. Making connections between particular gene mutations and disease requires a lot of data, which until recently has been largely unavailable for pediatric cancers.

Now, tests like MSK-IMPACTTM can screen tumors for mutations in more than 500 genes as well as analyze patients' normal (germline) cells. In the largest study of its kind so far, researchers from Memorial Sloan Kettering's pediatric program, MSK Kids, are reporting germline genomic sequencing details for 751 pediatric patients treated for solid tumors.

The paper, published February 15, 2021, in Nature Cancer, explains how understanding the hereditary factors associated with children's cancers can help both patients and their family members better understand the risk of future cancers. Armed with this information, they can undergo screening and prevention measures as appropriate. It may also be used for family planning purposes. In a small but growing number of cases, this information may even help select the most appropriate treatment for a child's cancer.

"Many of the associations we are learning about with this kind of testing were not previously known and have broadened our understanding of how inherited genes may be related to a predisposition to pediatric cancers," says genetic counselor Elise Fiala, the paper's first author. "We're hoping to raise awareness about these connections and about how testing for these inherited genes might be clinically useful."

Updating Guidelines for Genetic Screening

For certain types of adult cancers -- such as breast cancers and colorectal cancers diagnosed in younger adults -- the importance of screening patients for mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes and Lynch syndrome is well established, especially for people who may have a family history of many cancers. But hereditary links to pediatric cancers have been largely unrecognized. Additionally, guidelines for which pediatric patients should be screened for inherited mutations are based on limited data.

"This study shows that the criteria we currently use to determine who should receive germline testing are flawed," says physician-scientist Michael Walsh, the paper's senior author, who leads research on inherited pediatric cancer genomics within MSK's Robert and Kate Niehaus Center for Inherited Cancer Genomics.

"In about half of the patients in whom we found an inherited predisposition, we would not have predicted detection of a cancer predisposition mutation and would not have screened them," he adds. These findings included mutations in the BRCA genes; the genes associated with Lynch syndrome; the gene TP53, which is linked to an inherited disorder called Li-Fraumeni syndrome; and others.

The Value of Genetic Testing

There are many reasons why it's important to know whether a child's cancer is caused by an inherited gene mutation, which are outlined in the paper.

For one thing, it can guide treatment. For example, tumors caused by the genes associated with Lynch syndrome may potentially respond to immunotherapy drugs called checkpoint inhibitors. These drugs usually don't work in pediatric cancers, so unless a patient is known to have Lynch syndrome, they likely wouldn't be considered.

Learning that a child has an inherited cancer gene can also help families. Parents, siblings, and other relatives may benefit from genetic testing to look for the same gene mutation. If the results are positive, they can be monitored more closely for cancer or consider preventive measures. For families that are planning to have more children, in vitro fertilization and preimplantation diagnosis -- in which embryos are screened for harmful mutations before being put in the uterus -- can be considered.

Testing for germline mutations in pediatric cancers can also help researchers learn more about the causes of some of these cancers, which could lead to new methods of diagnosis and treatment. In the Nature Cancer paper, the researchers provide evidence of a previously unrecognized link between a gene called CDKN2A and osteosarcoma, the most common form of bone cancer in children and young adults.

Expanding Reach to Survivors of Childhood Cancer

The researchers report that only 31% of families with children found to have inherited mutations opted to seek genetic testing in additional relatives. Ms. Fiala says this was not surprising because these families were in the middle of coping with a child being treated for cancer.

"But these findings have much broader implications than for just the 16,000 children diagnosed with cancer in the United States every year," Dr. Walsh says.

Ms. Fiala explains that the results from the study are important not only for children currently being treated for cancer and their families, but for cancer survivors. "Many people who were treated for cancer as children are now at the age where they're considering having kids," she says. "We would love to see people who have a cancer history and are now planning families consider testing so they can learn more about their risks and options."

Human health and ecosystems could be affected by microbes including cyanobacteria and algae that hitch rides in clouds and enter soil, lakes, oceans and other environments when it rains, according to a Rutgers co-authored study.

“Some of the organisms we detected in clouds and rain are known to have possible impacts on human health and could also affect microbial populations at rainfall locations,” said lead author Kevin Dillon, a doctoral student in the lab of co-author Donna E. Fennell, a professor who chairs the Department of Environmental Sciences in the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences at Rutgers University–New Brunswick. “More work is needed to confirm that and to investigate specific impacts.”Scientists, for the first time, were able to grow green algae collected from clouds. Their study, a collaboration between Rutgers and a Université Clermont Auvergne team, is published in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.

They collected cloud water at the summit of puy de Dôme, a mountain in central France, about 4,800 feet above sea level. They also collected rainwater below the mountain at about 2,230 feet above sea level. They detected blue-green (cyanobacteria), green, red and golden algae, as well as diatoms (another form of algae), and they grew green algae in the Chlorellaceae family in a lab.

Some of the microbes that hitched a ride in clouds may have come from the Atlantic Ocean. Others were likely from other parts of France that clouds passed over. Microbes in rain include those in a cloud and the air below it.

The airborne organisms could have important impacts on atmospheric processes and the ecosystems they enter after falling to Earth, the study says.

“Future work would involve identifying specific genes associated with the production of toxins by these organisms and trying to understand what could or would limit the growth of these microorganisms after they’re transported into a new ecosystem by rain,” Dillon said.

Since the 1980s, the physical and mental health of Swedish children and young people has been measured by way of surveys. One of these is the international "Health Behavior in School-aged Children Survey" (HBSC), which is taken by 11-, 13- and 15-year-olds every fourth year during a class in school.

Researchers Anette Wickström and Kristin Zeiler at Linköping University wanted to study the survey to see which norms can be conveyed in health surveys, something that has rarely been studied. The results have been published in the journal Children & Society.

"The study shows that survey questions on parents' occupation and financial situation create norms about how you should be and what you should own. Our interviews also show that some teenagers ask themselves if they should respond according to reality or in a way that protects themselves and the people they care about", says Anette Wickström, associate professor at the Department of Thematic Studies at Linköping University, who has previously studied norms and ideals in relation to health.

Survey raised thoughts they had not previously had

These surveys can be seen as a tool for finding out about the wellbeing of young people. But they can also be given a broader significance, as carriers of meaning and norms. This theoretical approach, from science and technology studies, is the one taken by the researchers.

By way of 51 interviews with 15-year-olds in three school classes, an understanding of how the teens view the surveys emerged.

According to the results of the study, some of them feel that the survey conveys a message about how people should live. The very existence of questions about having one's own room, and about the number of computers and bathrooms in the home, was perceived by some of them as a message that they should have these things. Similarly, they remarked that the survey questions about weight and body can give rise to negative thoughts that they previously had not had.

The survey also made them aware of differences, especially with regard to their families' financial situation. While some of them said the survey made them realise how fortunate they are, others said they felt afraid of appearing poor.

A growing field of research shows that a person's subjective idea of their socioeconomic status can affect their health more than their objective status does. In other words, it is more important for your health how you perceive your income and your status in society than how much you are actually paid.

"The young people say that the survey raises issues of status. If we know that the subjective understanding of your social status can mean more for your health than the actual situation, we can ask how this type of question impacts the teenagers", says Anette Wickström.

Motivating or guilt-inducing questions

The young people's experience of completing the survey differed. Some felt the survey was fun and informative, a "guide" to how you should live, which motivated them to set new targets.

Others said the survey was difficult to complete because it induced feelings of guilt, responsibility and inferiority. Some of them wondered about who is responsible for them feeling good. They felt the survey assumed that they themselves were ultimately responsible for - and could influence - their health. However their view was that largely, their health was reliant on external factors, things outside their control, such as deaths, abuse and conflict in the family.

Providing sensitive details in a classroom

The interviews also showed that it was difficult for the teenagers to complete the survey in privacy. Some reported that they tried to hide their questionnaire for fear of their classmates seeing it, while others said that questions and answers were discussed openly in the classroom.

Other interviewees spoke of the risk of being reminded of memories they didn't want to revisit while sitting amongst their classmates. Regarding the question of how old they were when they first had sexual intercourse, one girl commented: "If you've been abused and have never had sex voluntarily, how should you respond?"
Anette Wickström explains that the results of the study are a reminder that surveys and questionnaires require constant reflection.

"Rather than thinking that some surveys should be stopped, we feel that we should apply our new-found knowledge when creating new surveys. You have to think about how they are designed, distributed, how questions and pre-defined responses are worded, and if schools can offer psychological support after the survey. And of course you should also reflect about whether questions about such sensitive topics should be included."

A subtype of asthma in adults may cause higher susceptibility to influenza and could result in dangerous flu mutations.

University of Queensland-led animal studies have found that paucigranulocytic asthma (PGA) - a non-allergic form of the condition - allows the flu virus to flourish in greater numbers in sufferers.

UQ PhD candidate Ms Katina Hulme said this was due to the asthma's suppression of the immune system.

"We were first tipped off about this during the 2009 swine flu pandemic," Ms Hulme said.

"Asthma was identified as the most common underlying medical condition in individuals hospitalised with flu, and these individuals were at a greater risk of ICU admission.

"Our lab studies have found that non-allergic asthma, or PGA, can suppress immune response to flu and with the immune system compromised, the virus is left unchecked and can replicate more than it does in a healthy individual.

"And, since the flu is not so good at proof-reading its genetic code when replicating, it makes a lot of mistakes, and with more replication comes more opportunity for mutations to emerge.

To conduct the research, the researchers used an asthmatic mouse model with influenza virus.

From there, computer-driven analysis of the virus genome was used to identify mutations that emerged exclusively in the asthmatic group.

UQ's Dr Kirsty Short said while these tests were preliminary and conducted in animals, the results may reflect a broader phenomenon in humans.

"Our study produced clear findings that fit well with what we know about a suppressed immune response and the emergence of influenza virus variants," Dr Short said.

"Which is particularly relevant in the context of COVID-19, where it has been suggested that the so-called UK variant arose because of a prolonged infection in an immunocompromised patient.

"For this study, it would be interesting to get access to clinical asthmatic samples to potentially confirm what we've found experimentally.

"Our study provides the first evidence that asthma may influence the evolution of the influenza virus, and - transmission permitting - could lead to the emergence of more pathogenic strains into the community.

"It's therefore really important to remember that host-viral interactions are bidirectional and that host co-morbidities can influence the evolution of influenza virus."

The processes in living beings follow a finely orchestrated choreography down to the molecular level. Rhythmic processes are found everywhere in biology, for example, the 24-hour circadian cycle, a kind of "internal clock", plays an important role in regulating many processes in living cells, including metabolism and cell division mechanisms.

Scientists from Saarbrücken and Kaiserslautern have now taken a closer look at a similar cycle, the somewhat shorter ultradian cycle of baker's yeast. Under the leadership of Bruce Morgan, Professor of Biochemistry at Saarland University, the experts investigated what happens in the model organism baker's yeast when the metabolism of cells is changed in a targeted manner. It was previously known that the metabolic processes and the cell division cycles in healthy cells often run synchronously according to precisely such rhythms. So far it has not been answered whether rhythmic changes in metabolism are the cause or consequence of cell division.

With the aid of novel fluorescent sensors, the scientists were able to observe rhythmic changes in the level of hydrogen peroxide within yeast cells. For a long time, hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) was better known for stressing and damaging cells. "We also examined the protein peroxiredoxin and its reaction, as well as the effects on the cell division cycle of the cells," explains Bruce Morgan. This is because the protein peroxiredoxin is very sensitive to hydrogen peroxide and may help use changes in H2O2 levels to regulate cellular function. We therefore considered it particularly suitable for further understanding the complex mechanism of the cells' "internal clock".

The scientists were now able to address the causal relationships between cycles in cell metabolism and cell division: "We were able to determine that the link between metabolism and cell division is broken when we inactivate the peroxiredoxin in baker's yeast," explains Bruce Morgan. Cell division is then decoupled from the metabolism of the cells. In addition, they were able to precisely control when the cells enter and exit the cell division cycle by precisely controlling the metabolic cycles.

These fundamental findings could be important to better understand uncontrolled cell division in tumor cells. It is known that cell division in cancer cells is often decoupled from the circadian clock. It will be extremely interesting in the future to investigate whether a disrupted H2O2 regulation is involved.

An international study has shown, for the first time, that the capacity of the human brain to recover and rewire itself peaks around two weeks after a stroke and diminishes over time.

The finding, published today in the Neurorehabilitation and Neural Repair journal, is the result of a study in London and Adelaide that followed the recovery of 60 stroke patients up to one year after their stroke.

Lead author Dr Brenton Hordacre, from the University of South Australia, says the multi-site study showed conclusive evidence that the brain only has a small window of opportunity to more easily repair itself after stroke.

"Earlier animal studies suggested this was the case, but this is the first time we have conclusively demonstrated this phenomenon exists in humans," Dr Hordacre says.

The researchers scanned the brains of stroke survivors as they recovered over 12 months. They found that in the initial days following an ischemic stroke (caused by a blocked artery to the brain), the brain has a greater capacity to modify its neural connections and its plasticity is increased.

"It is during this early period after stroke that any physiotherapy is going to be most effective because the brain is more responsive to treatment.

"Earlier experiments with rats showed that within five days of an ischemic stroke they were able to repair damaged limbs and neural connections more easily than if therapy was delayed until 30 days post stroke."

The researchers used continuous transcranial magnetic stimulation (cTBS) to repetitively activate different hemispheres of the motor cortex to measure brain plasticity.

The Adelaide laboratory tested the stroke damaged motor cortex, which is the main area that controls movement. The London laboratory tested the non-stroke damaged hemisphere which is also important to help recovery.

"Our assessments showed that plasticity was strongest around two weeks after stroke in the non-damaged motor cortex. Contrary to what we expected, there was no change in the damaged hemisphere in response to cTBS."

Dr Hordacre says the findings confirm the importance of initiating therapy as soon as possible after a stroke.

Current evidence indicates that less than eight minutes of daily therapy is dedicated to upper limb recovery within the first four weeks of a stroke.

"Delivering more treatment within this brief window is needed to help people recover after stroke.

"The next step is to identify techniques which prolong or even re-open a period of increased brain plasticity, so we can maximise recovery," Dr Hordacre says.

Biophysicists at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munch have developed a new theory, which accounts for the observation that cells can perceive their own shapes, and use this information to direct the distribution of proteins inside the cell.

Many cellular processes are critically dependent on the precise distribution and patterning of proteins on the cell membrane. Diverse studies have shown that, in addition to protein-protein interactions and transport processes, cell shape can also have a considerable impact on intracellular pattern formation. Conversely, there are patterning processes in which any dependence on cell form would be deleterious. Using starfish oocytes as a model system, LMU physicists led by Professor Erwin Frey have now explained how robust protein patterns can emerge in the face of drastic changes in cell shape. As Frey and colleagues report a new study that appears in the journal Nature Physics, a concentration gradient formed within the cell itself encodes the shape information of the cell and gets decoded by self-organized protein patterns.

Starfish oocytes are relatively large and transparent, and are therefore well suited for biochemical investigations. Just before meiotic cell division, a wave of membrane contraction passes along the cell membrane towards the position where the cell divides asymmetrically. This contraction wave is triggered by the membrane-bound enzyme called Rho, which's activity propagates as a pulse over the membrane. The wave progresses from what is known as the vegetal pole of the oocyte to the animal pole, where the nucleus is located, and divides asymmetrically as the wave arrives. To study the influence of changes in cell shape on this process, the researchers placed single oocytes in differently shaped microchambers, thus forcing the cells to adopt the geometry imposed by the boundary of each container. "We found that, although the pulse of Rho activation propagates in a correspondingly altered manner in the deformed cells, it always reaches the position at which the nucleus lies," says Frey. "This fascinating observation proves that the Rho pulse recognizes the shape of the cell and adapts to it."

 Self-organized protein patterns can decode information about the cell shape

To understand the mechanism behind this remarkable adaptability, the team went on to develop a biophysical theory that accounts for this finding. The model is based on the earlier discovery that the cell-cycle regulator Cdk1 is asymmetrically distributed in the oocyte cytoplasm, where it forms a concentration gradient that extends from the nucleus into the cytoplasm and decays with time. This gradient enables the proteins on the membrane to adapt to the cell shape. "The key insight is that the protein that activates Rho measures the gradient close to the membrane and marks a threshold concentration of the gradient: It forms a front-like concentration profile on the membrane, such that the front is positioned exactly at the threshold concentration. At this front position, the Rho activator, in turn, locally triggers an activity pulse of Rho." says Wigbers, one of the first-authors of the article. As the gradient decays, the position of this threshold value moves at varying speed along the membrane, depending on the cell shape. Thus, via this hierarchy of protein concentration profiles, the shape information that is encoded in the gradient gets transformed into a mechanochemical response - the contraction wave that passes over the membrane.

"Our results underline the significance of the self-organization of hierarchical protein patterns for the understanding of biological functions," says Frey. In effect, the authors have integrated two major paradigms in the field of protein pattern formation - self-organization based on reaction-diffusion mechanisms and the exploitation of positional information. "We believe that such a mechanism, which utilizes a hierarchy of protein patterns to encode information that reflects cell shape, could represent a general physical principle for the recognition and regulation of cell shape," Frey concludes.

Individual variation in the shape and structure of the Achilles tendon may influence our susceptibility to injury later in life, says a study published today in eLife.

The findings suggest that studying individual Achilles tendon shape (or 'morphology') could help with identifying patients at risk of injury and designing new, potentially personalised approaches for treating and preventing Achilles tendinopathy and similar conditions.

The Achilles tendon is the tissue that links the calf muscles to the heel bone. It is fundamental to our movement and athletic ability. Its unique structure, which combines three smaller sub-tendons, increases the efficiency of our movement by allowing individual control from connected muscles. For this control to occur, the sub-tendons must work together and allow a certain degree of sliding between them. But the ability of the sub-tendons to slide decreases with age, possibly accounting for the increased frequency of injury sometimes seen in later life.

"Each sub-tendon should be seen as an individual working unit within the whole Achilles tendon to fully understand how force is distributed within the tendon," explains lead author Nai-Hao Yin, a PhD student at the UCL Institute of Orthopaedics and Musculoskeletal Science, London UK. "But current medical imaging methods don't allow us to accurately visualise the borders of the sub-tendons in living people. This means the relationship between sub-tendon morphology, mechanical behaviour and injury risk is still unclear."

To help address this gap, Yin and colleagues began by studying five human Achilles tendon specimens, from two males and three females. They performed mechanical tests on the sub-tendons of the specimens to compare their differing mechanical properties. Next, they recorded the morphology of the sub-tendons of an additional three specimens, from two males, aged 54 and 55 years old, and one female, aged 14, which were selected to represent a diverse range of individual differences in tendon morphology.

"Our experiments showed distinct mechanical properties in the sub-tendons in keeping with their mechanical demands," Yin says. "We identified considerable variation in the orientation of the sub-tendons from different individuals."

The team then generated computer models using the data gained from their experiments. They applied a simulation technique to explore how different sliding properties affect sub-tendon movement and distribution of force within the different models. They were especially interested in the soleus muscle-tendon junction, as this location is widely used to measure tendon mechanical properties.

Next, they explored whether the results of their modelling experiments would reflect age-related decline in sub-tendon sliding in people. They recruited two groups of study participants: a group of seven older participants, aged 52-67 years old, and a younger group of nine participants, aged 20-29 years old. They applied electrical stimulation to the participants' calf muscles and recorded the changes that occurred in the junction. The older group of participants showed less sliding compared to the younger group, reflecting the same trend as the modelling result when the team studied the soleus sub-tendon in isolation.

"Our work shows that the mechanical behaviour of the Achilles tendon is highly complex and affected by a combination of factors, including sub-tendon mechanical properties and morphology, and age-related changes in their capacity for sliding," concludes senior author Helen Birch, Professor of Skeletal Tissue Dynamics at the UCL Institute of Orthopaedics and Musculoskeletal Science. "It also suggests that certain tendon morphologies may be more susceptible to injury in later life. We hope our findings will pave the way for further research on how these factors can affect sub-tendons differently among individuals, and ultimately lead to new injury treatment and prevention strategies."

A comprehensive database of Estonian soils and a map application has been completed in cooperation with researchers of the University of Tartu and the Estonian University of Life Sciences. The database makes Estonian soil information easily accessible and can be used from local farm-scale to national-level big data statistical analysis and machine-learning models.

"Soil data is possibly the most undervalued and yet complicated type of environmental data there is. The diversity of organic, chemical, living and dead materials that make up a handful of dirt is astounding," said Alexander Kmoch, Research Fellow in Geoinformatics at the University of Tartu and the leading author of the study.

Estonia has had very detailed soil information available for decades. It is digitally available on the Geoportal of the Estonian Land Board in several formats under a permissive open data license. Its main purposes include land evaluation and assessing potential for agricultural use.

Unfortunately, it was not easy to make much use of the data so far. One of the reasons that limited the wider use of the soil map was the way the data was structured in the database. "For each soil unit, a series of complicated text codes and numbers describe very specialized soil type and soil texture, organic layer, rock content, and the potential for agricultural use. Only few experts can interpret that on a field-by-field basis, but it was close to impossible to derive large-scale actionable insights," said Kmoch.

Researchers of the University of Tartu and the Estonian University of Life Sciences have undertaken the mammoth project of deciphering that information and providing it in an easily readable table-based form, with all the bits and pieces extracted into numbers and categories that are much easier to analyze and use in a variety of use cases.

The new dataset is called EstSoil-EH, the Estonian soil dataset with ecological and hydrological variables all derived from the original soil map of Estonia. In addition, the new dataset is enriched with area and percentage information on six simple land-use types: arable, grassland, forest, wetland, urban/buildup and water. One can also find topographical variables like slope per each distinct soil unit.

Furthermore, machine learning was used to complement the new dataset with the soil organic carbon estimates. This way it opens Estonian soil information to many new specialized use cases from digital agriculture support to forest management, environmental assessments, biodiversity restoration, eco-tourism and much more.

"Countries like Lithuania and Latvia may have similar historical soil records from the Soviet era that could be turned into value-added datasets by using the same methodology," said Kmoch.

In a study led by National Institutes of Health (NIH) researchers, scientists found that five genes may play a critical role in determining whether a person will suffer from Lewy body dementia, a devastating disorder that riddles the brain with clumps of abnormal protein deposits called Lewy bodies. Lewy bodies are also a hallmark of Parkinson's disease. The results, published in Nature Genetics, not only supported the disease's ties to Parkinson's disease but also suggested that people who have Lewy body dementia may share similar genetic profiles to those who have Alzheimer's disease.

"Lewy body dementia is a devastating brain disorder for which we have no effective treatments. Patients often appear to suffer the worst of both Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases. Our results support the idea that this may be because Lewy body dementia is caused by a spectrum of problems that can be seen in both disorders," said Sonja Scholz, M.D., Ph.D., investigator at the NIH's National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) and the senior author of the study. "We hope that these results will act as a blueprint for understanding the disease and developing new treatments."

The study was led by Dr. Scholz's team and researchers in the lab of Bryan J. Traynor, M.D., Ph.D., senior investigator at the NIH's National Institute on Aging (NIA).

Lewy body dementia usually affects people over 65 years old. Early signs of the disease include hallucinations, mood swings, and problems with thinking, movements, and sleep. Patients who initially have cognitive and behavioral problems are usually diagnosed as having dementia with Lewy bodies, but are sometimes mistakenly diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. Alternatively, many patients, that are initially diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, may eventually have difficulties with thinking and mood caused by Lewy body dementia. In both cases, as the disease worsens, patients become severely disabled and may die within 8 years of diagnosis.

A growing body of evidence suggests genetics may play a role in the disorder and that some cases may be inherited. Scientists have found that some of these rare cases can be caused by mutations in the gene for alpha-synuclein (SNCA), the main protein found in Lewy bodies. Further studies have found that variants in the gene for apolipoprotein E (APOE), which is known to play a role in Alzheimer's disease, may also play one in Lewy body dementia.

"Compared to other neurodegenerative disorders, very little is known about the genetic forces behind Lewy body dementia," said Dr. Traynor. "To get a better understanding we wanted to study the genetic architecture of Lewy body dementia."

To do this, they compared the chromosomal DNA sequences of 2,981 Lewy body dementia patients with those of 4,931 healthy, age-matched control participants. Samples were collected from participants of European ancestry at 44 sites: 17 in Europe and 27 across North America. The DNA sequencing was led by Clifton Dalgard, Ph.D., and researchers at The American Genome Center, a series of state-of-the-art laboratories at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences and supported by the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine.

Initially, they found that the sequences of five genes from the Lewy body dementia patients were often different from those of the controls, suggesting that these genes may be important. It was the first time that two of the genes, called BIN1 and TMEM175, had been implicated in the disease. These genes may also have ties to Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases. The other three genes, SNCA, APOE, and GBA, had been implicated in previous studies, and thus, strengthened the importance of the genes in Lewy body dementia.

The researchers also saw differences in the same five genes when they compared the DNA sequences of another 970 Lewy body dementia patients with a new set of 8,928 control subjects, confirming their initial results.

Further analysis suggested that changes in the activity of these genes may lead to dementia and that the GBA gene may have a particularly strong influence on the disease. The gene encodes instructions for beta-glucosylceramidase, a protein that helps a cell's recycling system break down sugary fats. The researchers found that both common and rare variants in the GBA gene are tied to Lewy body dementia.

"These results provide a list of five genes that we strongly suspect play a role in Lewy body dementia," said Dr. Traynor.

Finally, to examine the apparent links between Lewy body dementia and other neurodegenerative diseases, the researchers further analyzed data from previous studies on Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease. They found that the genetic profiles of the patients in this study had higher chances of suffering from either Alzheimer's or Parkinson's disease than the age-matched control subjects. These predictions held even after they lowered the potential impact of known Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease-causing genes, like APOE and SNCA. Interestingly, the patient's genetic risk profiles for Alzheimer's disease, on the one hand, or Parkinson's disease, on the other, did not overlap.

"Although Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease are molecularly and clinically very different disorders, our results support the idea that the problems that cause those diseases may also happen in Lewy body dementia," said Dr. Scholz. "The challenge we face in treating these patients is determining which specific problems are causing the dementia. We hope studies like this one will help doctors find precise treatments for each patient's condition."

To help with this effort, the team published the genome sequence data from the study on the database of Genotypes and Phenotypes (dbGaP), a National Library of Medicine website that researchers can freely search for new insights into the causes of Lewy body dementia and other disorders.

Ithaca, N.Y. - At a glacier near the South Pole, earth scientists have found evidence of a quiet, slow-motion fault slip that triggers strong, fast-slip earthquakes many miles away, according to Cornell University research published in Science Advances.

During an earthquake, a fast slip happens when energy builds up underground and is released quickly along a fault. Blocks of earth rapidly slide against one another.

However, at an Antarctic glacier called Whillans Ice Plain, the earth scientists show that "slow slips" precede dozens of large magnitude 7 earthquakes. "We found that there is almost always a precursory 'slow slip' before an earthquake," said lead author Grace Barcheck, research associate in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at Cornell University.

Barcheck said that these slow-slip precursors - occurring as far as 20 miles away from the epicenter - are directly involved in starting the earthquake. "These slow slips are remarkably common," she said, "and they migrate toward where the fast earthquake slip starts."

Observations before several large tsunami-generating magnitude 8 and 9 earthquakes on subduction zone faults suggest a similar process may have occurred, according to Patrick Fulton, assistant professor and Croll Sesquicentennial Fellow in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences.

As these faults are mostly offshore and deep underwater, and because it is difficult to know when or where a large earthquake will occur, the start of large earthquakes is generally hard to observe.

To overcome these challenges, the scientists placed GPS sensors above an icy glacial fault at Whillans Ice Plain, where large magnitude 7 earthquakes occur nearly twice a day over a 60-mile-wide area of the glacier.

Within a period of two months in 2014, the group captured 75 earthquakes at the bottom of the Antarctic glacier. Data from GPS stations indicated that 73 - or 96% - of the 75 earthquakes showed a period of precursory slow motion.

The data from the GPS tracking stations and surface seismometers allowed the team to identify how the slow precursory slip triggers the fast earthquake slip.

"Our group was a little surprised to see so many precursors," Barcheck said.

"In some cases, we can actually see the migration of the earthquake precursor towards where the earthquake begins."

"Before we pored over the data, I thought that if we saw any precursors before the earthquakes, they would be rare and in the same place as the earthquake epicenter," she said. "Instead, we found many slow-slip precursors - starting miles from the epicenters and migrating across the fault."

Drilling a 270,000-year old core from a Tasmanian lake has provided the first Australian record of a major global event where the Earth's magnetic field 'switched '- and the opportunity to establish a precedent for developing new paleomagnetic dating tools for Australian archaeology and paleosciences.

"This is the first study of this kind in Australia since pioneering studies in the 1980s," said author Dr Agathe Lisé-Provonost, a McKenzie Fellow from the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Melbourne.

"Just two lakes in north-east Australia previously provided such "full-vector" record, where both the past directions and the past intensity of the Earth magnetic field are obtained from the same cores."

Published in the journal Quaternary Geochronology, Chronostratigraphy of a 270-ka sediment record from Lake Selina, Tasmania: Combining radiometric, geomagnetic and climatic dating, details how drilling into the 5.5 metre long Lake Selina core established that 41,000 years ago, people in Tasmania must have seen spectacular auroras when the Earth's magnetic field flipped, and for a few thousand years, north was south and south was north.

"During the geomagnetic 'excursion', the strength of the Earth's magnetic field almost vanished," said DrLisé-Provonost.

"This would lead to a big increase in cosmic and solar particles bombarding our planet because the magnetic field normally acts like a shield.

"We don't know when the next geomagnetic excursion will happen, but if one was to occur today, satellites would be rendered useless, smartphone navigation apps would fail, and there would be major disruptions of power distribution systems."

Research leading to that discovery got underway in 2014 when the author travelled to a small sub-alpine lake in western Tasmania with a team led by Associate Professor Michael-Shawn Fletcher, where a makeshift floating platform rigged to two inflatable rafts was used to drill down into the sediment.

With the core containing a climate, vegetation, and paleomagnetic record of the area, the team looked to first accurately date its layers finding evidence of the ecosystem changes that occurred as Tasmanian Aboriginals arrived 43,000 years ago and managed the land over thousands of years. Abrupt changes that occurred since the arrival of Europeans 200 years ago are also evidenced.

"Magnetic particles are eroded from rocks, making their way to a lake by wind or water, and settle down on the lake bottom," said Dr Lisé-Provonost.

"The magnetic particles act like tiny compass needles, aligning with the Earth's magnetic field. As these particles accumulate and become buried, they become locked in place, leaving a history of the Earth's magnetic field. The deeper we drill, the further back in time we go."

It's hoped the research will lead the way for more studies of the past geomagnetic field behavior from Australian lakes and other geological materials such as lava flows, cave deposits and fired archaeological artefacts, for developing new paleomagnetic dating tools and improving models of the Earth's magnetic field to, one day, maybe predict the next geomagnetic excursion.

The research team will now go even further back in time recovering the climate history of Tasmania, with analysing sediments from the 816,000 year-old meteorite impact at Darwin Crater.

The researchers of TPU together with their colleagues from Russian and foreign scientific centers have found a way to estimate the temperature of a chemical reaction activated by pseudo-particles - plasmons. Two organic molecules served as ultra-small sensors or thermometers. According to scientists, the experiments are of great fundamental importance: beyond the mere fact of evaluating the temperature with the use of molecules, it was possible to demonstrate that properties of plasmon serving as an activator of chemical reactions depend not only on thermal effects. The results of the study were published in Chemical Science journal (IF: 9, 346; Q1).

Plasmon is a pseudo-particle that represents a combination of vibrating electrons and an associated electromagnetic field. Plasmons originate from nanoscale solid-state bodies, in the vicinity of their surface. Their use as chemical catalysts makes it possible to carry out transformations at a room temperature under the action of sunlight.

"That is, if the reaction normally proceeds, for example, at 100°C, then using the plasmon energy allows it to be carried out at a room temperature. This is both more cost-effective and environmentally friendly. But why does plasmon trigger chemical reactions? How does it promote them? These apparently simple questions provoke heated discussions in the scientific community; there is no an unambiguous answer to them, and the catalytic nature of plasmon is not clear. We are trying to find answers.

The results published by our research team in the Chemical Science journal have become a big commitment," Pavel Postnikov, Associate Professor at the TPU Research School of Chemistry and Applied Biomedical Sciences, one of the contributors to the paper says.

According to the main theories, plasmons play the role of catalysts due to their thermal effects, or, to the contrary, their function is in no way related to temperature. In the first case, a metal nanoparticle acts as a small nanoboiler. It heats molecules locally and for a short period of time, but this heating cannot be traced via standard methods, it is simply invisible.

"Some researchers agree that a combination of different effects plays a key role. Our team is among them. In the course of our previous work, we have already questioned a pivotal role of heating. Besides, we needed a way to measure the reaction temperature in the vicinity of a single molecule to understand whether there was a temperature build-up or not. Researchers previously used physical methods, but we first proposed the use of specific molecules - alkoxyamines - as sensors or thermometers. The experiment was carried out using a well-studied reaction of their homolysis. This represents a bond breaking reaction; in this case, two particles - radicals - are obtained from the alkoxyamine molecule," the scientist says.

To conduct the experiment, the researchers took gold nanoparticles, to which they chemically "tied" molecules of alkoxyamines having different chemical structures. Then, they were irradiated with a laser to "trigger" the action of plasmons (they are generated under the action of light) and, accordingly, the reaction of breaking bonds within alkoxyamine molecules. It turned out that two molecules decomposed at different rates, and the local temperature was calculated from the reaction rate. For one molecule, the temperature was 96°C, while for the other - 118°C.

"What does this temperature difference tell us? Since the molecules of alkoxyamines are different in structure, they should react differently without heating, and when heated -- at the same rate. That is, if the plasmon worked only as a boiler, and the only point of its work was to heat the molecule, then the reaction temperature would be the same. Nevertheless, it is different, so it means that the plasmon does something else to speed up the reaction. What exactly --we'll have to find out.

It is a serious key question, the answer to which will make it possible to understand the mechanism of plasmon operation better and then to predict and control the process. Whereas, it will become a fundamental basis for developing new methods and obtaining materials," Pavel Postnikov explains.