Tech

LISLE, Ill. (August 25) - The world is experiencing a sixth global mass extinction event, and a new paper advocates that botanical gardens are uniquely positioned to preserve the world's plant diversity.

In a paper published in Plants, People, Planet, The Morton Arboretum scientists Murphy Westwood, Ph.D., and Nicole Cavender, Ph.D., in collaboration with Abby Meyer, and Paul Smith, Ph.D., from Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI), detail how botanical gardens have the skills and knowledge, facilities, plant collections, and access to the public required to advance plant conservation, but lack the funding and public recognition necessary to achieve significant impact on global conservation.

"Although gardens are the ideal organizations to take on the significant challenges that come with preserving the world's plant diversity, their conservation efforts remain chronically underfunded," explained Westwood, Director of Global Tree Conservation at The Morton Arboretum. "There is a need for not only more funding for garden-led plant conservation initiatives, but also more reliable, long-term, steady funding sources that reflect the time scales necessary to secure threatened plant species, especially long-lived plants like trees," she added.

According to the authors, more than 20% of plant species are threatened with extinction, and Earth is losing species before they can even be described. In response to this crisis, the paper indicates that botanical gardens are increasingly placing the conservation of plant diversity at the center of their missions, programming, and collections.

Botanical gardens, including arboreta, today hold at least one-third of known plant species in their collections, including more than 40% of threatened species. Approximately 60,000 plant scientists and specialized horticulturists provide expertise and manage world-class facilities at gardens around the world. The paper indicates that botanical gardens have the most sophisticated conservation infrastructure in the world, running vital recovery programs for threatened species while also educating a growing public audience of over half a billion visitors each year.

"Botanical gardens and arboreta are hubs of expertise, and the critical link between people and plants," said Westwood. "But gardens will not be able to achieve the results needed to avert the global plant extinction crisis without a revolution in the way resources, funding, and public attention are focused."

The garden community has already proven that it can lead conservation initiatives, say the authors, but they stress that these efforts will be insufficient without added capacity to scale and amplify this impact worldwide. They urge gardens to be stronger advocates for themselves in local politics to secure a seat at the environmental decision-making table, but the authors also call for much greater support from the public, funders, and corporations to center botanical gardens in global plant conservation efforts.

"Now, more than ever, there is an urgent need for our trusted botanical institutions and the critical role they play in a scientifically informed, coordinated, global effort to save plants from extinction--because all life depends on plants," Westwood stressed.

Tropical Storm Laura strengthened to a hurricane in the morning hours of Aug. 25, and NASA provided infrared imagery that showed the structure, temperature and rainmaking capabilities of the storm. When NASA's Terra satellite and NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite passed overhead, both provided different images of Laura as it was about to exit the Caribbean Sea and move into the Gulf of Mexico.

Watches and Warnings on Aug. 25

On Aug. 25, NOAA's National Hurricane Center (NHC) posted several watches and warnings.

A Storm Surge Warning is in effect from San Luis Pass Texas to the mouth of the Mississippi River, including areas inside the Port Arthur Hurricane Flood Protection system. A Hurricane Warning is in effect from San Luis Pass, Texas to Intracoastal City, Louisiana.

A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect from Sargent, Texas to San Luis Pass and from east of Intracoastal City to the mouth of the Mississippi River. A Storm Surge Watch is in effect from Freeport, Texas to San Luis Pass.

NASA's Night-Time View of Laura's Intensification

The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument aboard Suomi NPP provided a nighttime image of Laura during the early morning hours of Aug. 25. Not yet named a hurricane, the development of an eye was apparent. By 11 a.m. EDT, Laura had a central dense overcast and some outer banding in the southern quadrant.

Satellite imagery shows the storm is over 350 miles in diameter. Hurricane-force winds extend outward up to 45 miles (75 km) from the center and tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 175 miles (280 km).

NASA's Infrared Data Reveals Heavy Rainmakers

Tropical cyclones are made up of hundreds of thunderstorms, and infrared data can show where the strongest storms are located. That is because infrared data provides temperature information, and the strongest thunderstorms that reach highest into the atmosphere have the coldest cloud top temperatures.

On July 27 at 4:35 a.m. EDT (0835 UTC), the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer or MODIS instrument that flies aboard NASA's Aqua satellite used infrared light to analyze the strength of storms within Laura. MODIS found the most powerful thunderstorms were around Laura's center over the Caribbean Sea, just south of western Cuba, where cloud top temperatures were as cold as minus 80 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 62.2 Celsius). NASA research has found that cloud top temperatures that cold indicate strong storms with the potential to generate heavy rainfall.

Strong storms with cloud top temperatures as cold as minus 70 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 56.6. degrees Celsius) circled the most powerful storms, and were also dropping large amounts of rain.

Laura's Status on Aug. 25, 2020

At 11 a.m. EDT (1500 UTC), the center of Hurricane Laura was located near latitude 23.7 degrees north and longitude 87.0 degrees west. That is about 585 miles (940 km) southeast of Lake Charles, Louisiana and about 620 miles (1,000 km) southeast of Galveston, Texas.

Laura was moving toward the west-northwest near 16 mph (26 kph), and this general motion should continue today, according to NHC. A turn toward the northwest is forecast by Wednesday, and a northwestward to north-northwestward motion should continue through Wednesday night. Reports from NOAA and Air Force Reserve Hurricane Hunter aircraft indicate that maximum sustained winds are near 75 mph (120 kph) with higher gusts. The estimated minimum central pressure based on the Hurricane Hunter aircraft data is 990 millibars.

Laura's Forecast from NHC

Significant strengthening is forecast during the next 36 hours, and Laura is expected to be a major hurricane at landfall. NHC noted the forecast calls for the hurricane to make landfall in the area of southwestern Louisiana or the upper Texas coast late Wednesday night or Thursday morning.

A new study demonstrates for the first time that subseasonal rainfall and temperature forecasts can be used to predict outbreaks of dengue fever by estimating mosquito abundance.

Climate models are often applied to future predictions, but one of the most reliable ways to improve and test the capabilities of these models is to look to the past. In a new study published in GeoHealth, researchers revisited a large dengue outbreak on the island of Réunion and determined it would have been possible to predict the event using available climate data. In particular, they integrated forecasts of rainfall and temperature generated up to four weeks ahead of the start of the outbreak into a mosquito population model. Their success has implications for the use of climate data in future public health efforts.

Réunion, a French overseas island between Madagascar and Mauritius in the Indian Ocean, faced an unprecedented outbreak of dengue in 2018. Dengue fever is a viral tropical disease spread by mosquitoes; in Réunion, the disease is carried by the local species Aedes albopictus. Mosquito populations are influenced by a complicated web of environmental factors that are difficult to monitor on a local scale. However, the study by researchers at Columbia University's International Research Institute for Climate and Society, Umeä University, New York University and the European Center for Disease Control and Prevention shows that there is great potential for using climate information to predict how suitable an environment will be for vector-borne diseases.

Mosquito species such as A. albopictus thrive only within a unique temperature range. Rainfall events also have distinctive effects on their survival. These factors and others can be identified among climate data, and the researchers recognized that an ideal confluence of these environmental factors could bring on an increase in the abundance of mosquitoes, which could lead to an outbreak.

"Tropical-cyclone-related rainfall events and higher-than-average temperatures played a role in the 2018 dengue outbreak," said Laurel DiSera, a senior research staff associate at the International Research Institute for Climate and Society and the study's lead author. "Since we can forecast such conditions up to four weeks in advance, we thought it would be possible that the outbreak itself could be predicted weeks ahead."

To test the idea, DiSera and her colleagues incorporated subseasonal climate forecasts from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) model, available via the Subseasonal-to-seasonal Prediction Project Database, into a vector model that generated predictions of mosquito populations; they found that the methodology was reasonably predictive of the outbreak event in 2018.

"Our results strongly suggest that we can use subseasonal data to better understand suitability for mosquito populations and the potential for resulting outbreak events," DiSera said.

"The routine way to prevent and manage dengue outbreaks is through mosquito control," said coauthor Joacim Rocklöv for Sweden's Umeå University. "Having more time to act makes a difference, not in the least operationally."

DiSera added that in a time when many public-health systems are already under strain, new methodologies like the one proposed may help public health agencies save resources and time and allow them to be more flexible in dealing with urgent and unexpected threats such as COVID-19.

Cambridge, Mass. - About one in five U.S. adults, an estimated 47 million people, lives with a mental illness. Fewer than half of them receive treatment, counseling or medication. In recent years, smartphone apps have emerged as potentially cost-effective means of expanding access to mental healthcare. But with some 10,000 mental health apps -- which are not subject to FDA oversight -- available in mobile app stores today, the task of determining which apps are safe and effective can seem overwhelming to patients and providers alike.

Now, researcher-clinicians from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) and Lahey Hospital and Medical Center, both part of Beth Israel Lahey Health, have collaborated to develop an online assessment tool , currently available in its beta version, to help patients and providers make more informed decisions about choosing and using a mental health app. The 105-question interactive tool does not endorse or recommend specific apps, but rather helps potential users weigh apps' safety, ease of use, and commitment to user privacy, the scientists re-ported in npj Digital Medicine.

"The absence of regulatory oversight leaves the app stores' user reviews and rankings as the major sources of information for consumers interested in mental health apps," said corresponding author John Torous, MD, Direc-tor of Digital Psychiatry at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. "To fill that void, we developed a database of mental health apps that is grounded in principles of medical ethics. Rather than focusing on what is the 'best' app we aim to help people find one that is the 'best match" through guiding them through informed decision making."

The largest database of its kind, the assessment tool currently features more than 200 apps and allows users to easily filter and find apps by the criteria that matter most to them. The six-step, 105-question interactive tool -- developed in collaboration with the American Psychiatry Association (APA) -- incorporates concepts from nearly 1,000 questions from 45 existing but non-standardized app evaluation frameworks. By boiling these concepts down to just 105 questions with yes/no or numeric answers, the assessment provides objective guidance that allow users to sort and filter mental health apps according to individual preferences and priorities.

"We remain focused on growing the database to encompass more apps and more diseases and to enhance the user experience for patients and providers," said Patrick Aquino, MD, Chair, Division of Psychiatry & Behavioral Medicine, Lahey Hospital & Medical Center. "This collaborative effort shows what is possible through our new health system."

In the search for a reliable, quick-charging, cold-weather battery for automobiles, a self-assembling, thin layer of electrochemically active molecules may be the solution, according to a team or researchers.

"The lithium metal battery is the next generation of battery after the lithium ion battery," said Donghai Wang, professor of mechanical engineering and a key researcher in the Battery and Energy Storage Technology Center, Penn State. "It uses a lithium anode and has higher energy density, but has problems with dendritic growth, low efficiency and low cycle life."

The solution to these problems, according to the researchers, is a self-assembling monolayer that is electrochemically active so that it can decompose into its proper components and protect the surface of the lithium anode.

The battery is composed of the lithium anode, a lithium metal oxide cathode and an electrolyte which also has lithium-ion conducting materials and the protective, thin film layer. Without this layer, the battery would tend to grow lithium crystal spikes if charged rapidly or under cold conditions. These lithium spikes eventually short out the battery, greatly decreasing the usefulness and cycle life.

"The key is to tune the molecular chemistry to self-assemble on the surface," said Wang. "The monolayer will provide a good solid electrolyte interface when charging, and protect the lithium anode."

The researchers deposit the monolayer on a thin copper layer. When the battery charges, lithium hits the monolayer and decomposes to form a stable interfacial layer. Some lithium is deposited on the copper along with the remaining layer, and the decomposed portion of the original layer reforms on top of the lithium, protecting the lithium and preventing dendrites of lithium from forming.

According to the researchers, this technology can increase the amount of storage capacity of the battery and can increase the number of times the battery can be charged. However, at this point, the battery can only be charged a few hundred times. The researchers reported their work in a recent issue of Nature Energy.

"The key is that this technology shows an ability to form a layer when needed on time and decompose and spontaneously reform so it will stay on the copper and also cover the surface of the lithium," said Wang. "Eventually it could be used for drones, cars, or some very small batteries used for underwater applications at low temperatures.

A research team led by Florida State University found that sea turtles in the U.S. will have less suitable nesting habitat in the future because of climate change and coastal development.

Researchers found areas that will remain or become suitable for sea turtle nesting in the future because of climatic changes and sea-level rise will be exposed to increased coastal development, hindering the ability of turtles to adapt to these disturbances. Their work was published in the journal Regional Environmental Change.

"A reduction in available nesting habitat coupled with the pressures associated with coastal development could likely have detrimental impacts on the reproductive output of sea turtle nesting areas in the U.S. and population stability," said Mariana Fuentes, an assistant professor of oceanography in the FSU Department of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science and the study's lead author.

The researchers modeled suitability of coastal habitats in the eastern U.S. by 2050 for loggerhead, green and leatherback sea turtle nesting, considering predicted sea-level rise and future climates.

The results differ for specific places and species, but the overall picture is one of decreases in suitable nesting grounds and increasing pressure from coastal development.

Loggerhead turtles will see a decrease of about 10 percent in suitable nesting areas, with deteriorating conditions in Florida, South Carolina and North Carolina. Green turtles will see some improved nesting habitat in southwest Florida, but less suitable habitat elsewhere in the state and the Carolinas. Overall, green turtles will see a decrease of about 7 percent in suitable nesting habitat along the U.S. East Coast. Leatherback turtles won't see major changes in the broad availability of suitable areas.

A changing climate, rising sea levels and coastal development each play a role in determining the availability of suitable nesting habitats in the future.

Sea turtles need certain climate conditions for egg incubation, and a changing climate will mean different conditions for precipitation and temperature. Sea-level rise is another factor. It is projected to submerge about 80 percent of current habitat that is predicted to have a suitable climate for future egg incubation.

But sea-level rise is also projected to create new beaches. In fact, a 0.5-meter sea-level rise (a conservative estimate) is predicted to result in a net habitat gain for the sea turtle species the researchers studied. However, coastal development will be an issue in most of those areas, which will impact how well they function as nesting sites.

Researchers found a few regions in North Carolina and South Carolina that are projected to have high or very high climate suitability for sea turtle egg incubation, little risk from sea-level rise and no substantial housing growth, which will make them optimal nesting habitats. Identifying these areas could inform management and conservation policies.

In other places where development is expected to add pressure to sea turtles, management strategies, such as turtle-friendly lighting, removing beach debris and not disturbing nesting areas, will help minimize additional impacts of human activity on these animals.

"Sea turtles have existed for millions of years, and they have persisted through dramatic changes in climate in the past," Fuentes said. "They have the ability to adapt to changing conditions, but coastal development and the unprecedented speed of current climate change are things they have never had to deal with, which may hinder their ability to adapt to the future."

BINGHAMTON, NY -- New research from Binghamton University, State University of New York could lead to more environmentally friendly paints and coatings.

In Roman mythology, the god Janus had two faces so that he could see clearly into both the past and future.

Janus particles have a similar dual nature, because they are engineered to have two surfaces each with distinct physical properties. One combination for a Janus particle is to have one side hydrophilic (attracted to water) and the other hydrophobic (water repellant).

Until recently, Janus particles could not be produced in large quantities, and their commercial applications were unclear. A Binghamton coauthored study, led by researchers at Iowa State University, shows that the nanoparticles could be the key to more environmentally friendly paints and coatings.

Xin Yong -- an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Binghamton University's Thomas J. Watson College of Engineering and Applied Science -- teamed up with Iowa State's Shan Jiang (an assistant professor in the university's Department of Materials Science and Engineering) and Chunhui Xiang (an assistant professor in its Department of Apparel, Events and Hospitality Management) for a study published as the cover story in the August edition of the journal Materials Horizons.

"Previous studies are heavily focused on structures formed by these particles at a very small scale, because they have unique surface properties," Yong said. "In this study, we are trying to use these particles to improve the performance of paints and coating, which no one has ever thought about."

Think for a minute about painting a wall in your house or apartment. To do it properly, there are a few general methods. You can do a primer layer and then a paint layer, which can take twice the time. You can mix paints with solvents, but solvents are a health risk and fumes can be an issue in poorly ventilated spaces. Or you can use water-based paints such as latex or acrylic latex, but many of those still contain solvents and may not be as durable.

Manufacturers of electronics, furniture and numerous other products face the same options for the products they make, and they must choose what makes sense for each individual item being made.

For the paper "Self-stratification of amphiphilic particles at coating surfaces," the research team mixed hydrophilic/hydrophobic Janus particles with commercial paints, then painted surfaces to see how the particles would react.

The result: The hydrophilic side oriented to the surface and helped the coatings adhere better, while the hydrophobic side faced toward the surface and made it water-repellant. The researchers also found that the particles diffused and arranged themselves into self-stratifying layers more quickly and in ways that did not completely follow their hypotheses.

"Currently no theory can be used to explain the self-stratification behaviors of Janus particles," Jiang said. "However, more studies are warranted to probe the detailed mechanism [of the particles]. I hope by fully understanding the principles in Janus particle self-stratification, we will be able to design next-generation 'smart' coating materials that are more environmentally friendly with better properties."

The team believes that Janus particles can prove to be beneficial in many other applications, including cosmetics, 3D printing and drug formulations.

BEER-SHEVA, Israel...August 25, 2020 -- Researchers at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev have developed a new artificial intelligence technique that will protect medical devices from malicious operating instructions in a cyberattack as well as other human and system errors.

BGU researcher Tom Mahler will present his research, "A Dual-Layer Architecture for the Protection of Medical Devices from Anomalous Instructions" on August 26 at the 2020 International Conference on Artificial Intelligence in Medicine (AIME 2020). Mahler is a Ph.D. candidate under the supervision of BGU Profs. Yuval Elovici and Prof. Yuval Shahar in the BGU Department of Software and Information Systems Engineering (SISE).

Complex medical devices such as CT (computed tomography), MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) and ultrasound machines are controlled by instructions sent from a host PC. Abnormal or anomalous instructions introduce many potentially harmful threats to patients, such as radiation overexposure, manipulation of device components or functional manipulation of medical images. Threats can occur due to cyberattacks, human errors such as a technician's configuration mistake or host PC software bugs.

As part of his Ph.D. research, Mahler has developed a technique using artificial intelligence that analyzes the instructions sent from the PC to the physical components using a new architecture for the detection of anomalous instructions.

"We developed a dual-layer architecture for the protection of medical devices from anomalous
instructions," Mahler says. "The architecture focuses on detecting two types of anomalous instructions: (1) context-free (CF) anomalous instructions which are unlikely values or instructions such as giving 100x more radiation than typical, and (2) context-sensitive (CS) anomalous instructions, which are normal values or combinations of values, of instruction parameters, but are considered anomalous relative to a particular context, such as mismatching the intended scan type, or mismatching the patient's age, weight, or potential diagnosis.

"For example, a normal instruction intended for an adult might be dangerous [anomalous] if applied to an infant. Such instructions may be misclassified when using only the first, CF, layer; however, by adding the second, CS, layer, they can now be detected."

The research team evaluated the new architecture in the computed tomography (CT) domain, using 8,277 recorded CT instructions and evaluated the CF layer using 14 different unsupervised anomaly detection algorithms. Then they evaluated the CS layer for four different types of clinical objective contexts, using five supervised classification algorithms for each context.

Adding the second CS layer to the architecture improved the overall anomaly detection performance from an F1 score of 71.6%, using only the CF layer, to between 82% and 99%, depending on the clinical objective or the body part. Furthermore, the CS layer enables the detection of CS anomalies, using the semantics of the device's procedure, an anomaly type that cannot be detected using only the CF layer.

LEXINGTON, Ky. - Research looking at a possible new therapeutic approach for Alzheimer's disease was recently published in the Journal of Neuroinflammation. The paper out of the University of Kentucky's Sanders-Brown Center on Aging (SBCoA) is titled "Therapeutic Trem2 activation ameliorates amyloid-beta deposition and improves cognition in the 5XFAD model of amyloid deposition". The work looked at targeting inflammation by using an antibody. Alzheimer's disease and related dementias have no disease-modifying treatments at this time and represent a looming public health crisis given the continually growing aging population.

The paper explains that current therapeutic approaches to the treatment of Alzheimer's disease focus on the major pathological hallmarks of the disease which are amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles. They are the requirements for a diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease. However, the authors say there has been an explosion of genetic data suggesting the risk for sporadic Alzheimer's disease is driven by several other factors including neuroinflammation, membrane turnover and storage, and lipid metabolism.

In this study the researchers focused on triggering receptor expressed on myeloid cell-2 (TREM2). "TREM2 was identified several years ago as a gene that, when there's a mutation, significantly increases risk of Alzheimer's disease. The field thinks that this mutation reduces the function of the receptor, so we hypothesized that targeting TREM2 to increase its function might be a valid treatment for Alzheimer's," explained Donna Wilcock, SBCoA associate director.

Through the groups work they found that the therapeutic targeting of TREM2 using a TREM2-activating antibody leads to the activation of microglia, recruitment of microglia to amyloid plaques, reduced amyloid deposition, and ultimately improved cognition. "The big takeaway is that this is the first approach that targets TREM2 to promote microglia to clear the amyloid deposits in the brain that are thought to be the cause of Alzheimer's," said Wilcock.

The biopharmaceutical company Alector developed the antibody for this study which was conducted on mice. Due to the study's success SBCoA is set to be a site for an upcoming clinical trial using this new approach.

A new study has found that adults who had parents who struggled with substance dependence, intimate partner violence and mental illness are more than 10 times more likely to have been victims of childhood sexual abuse than those whose parents did not have these problems, once age and race are taken into account.

The study, by researchers at the University of Toronto's Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work and Institute of Life Course & Aging, was published online this week in the journal Social Work.

With each risk factor present, the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse increased dramatically. About one percent of men and two percent of women who were not exposed to parental substance dependence, intimate partner violence, or mental illness reported that they had been sexually abused during their childhood. For those exposed to one of these childhood adversities, the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse nearly tripled to 2.7 percent for men and 6.4 percent for women. Exposure to two of the risk factors was linked to an additional increase in the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse (5.5 percent for men and 15.5 percent for women). For those who came from chaotic homes where all three main risk factors were present, the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse was 11.6 percent for men and 26.4 percent for women.

"The finding of more than a ten-fold difference in the prevalence of sexual abuse from those exposed to three childhood adversities to those with none was quite shocking," says co-author Senyo Agbeyaka, a recent University of Toronto MSW graduate who is a social worker at University Health Network. "It is rare to see such a big effect and for the effect to be so consistent for both men and women."

The researchers decided to conduct the study a second time in a different population-based independent sample in order to see if they could replicate the findings.

"The findings from both surveys were remarkably similar, suggesting that the associations are particularly robust and worthy of further investigation," Agbeyaka says.

The study was based on two representative community samples: one study conducted in 2010 with 22,868 adults and the second, in 2012, with a different sample of 29,801 adults. The data were drawn from the Brief Risk Factor Surveillance Survey (BRFSS) and separate analyses were conducted for each sex. Two major limitations of the study are use of retrospective self-report of these early adversities and a lack of information on the exact timing when they occurred. The findings only indicate correlation and cannot be interpreted as causative.

"Our findings have important implications for improved screening for childhood maltreatment by social workers and other health and education professionals working with children," says lead author Professor Esme Fuller-Thomson, Director of the Institute of Life Course and Aging at the University of Toronto's Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work. "We must not underestimate the negative impact of parental intimate partner violence, mental illness and substance dependence on the children in the household. Children are very vulnerable to sexual abuse in households where parents are struggling with several of these adversities."

Creating computers that can teach themselves how chemical structure dictates the fundamental properties of molecules and then using that knowledge to predict the properties of novel molecules could help to design cleaner energy and industrial systems.

KAUST researchers have developed a machine learning model that can analyze the structure of hydrocarbon molecules and accurately predict a property called enthalpy of formation. When it comes to estimating this property, the model already makes better predictions than conventional approaches, and its accuracy will only improve as more data is collected for the model to learn from.

"Data on molecular properties, such as enthalpy of formation, are essential for engineers modeling the kinetic mechanisms, or energy flows, of chemical reactions," says Kiran Yalamanchi, a Ph.D. student in the research group of Mani Sarathy, who led the research. "Kinetic mechanisms for hydrocarbon fuels are important for the development and optimization of engine designs and chemical reactors," Yalamanchi says.

Generating the large sets of thermodynamics data required for kinetic mechanism modeling typically uses an approach called group additivity, which has limited accuracy. "Group additivity was developed in the mid-20th century, and the field of data science has advanced a lot in the last few decades," Yalamanchi says.

So Yalamanchi and Sarathy approached KAUST computer scientist, Xin Gao, to apply machine learning to the problem. "Our initial study gave very promising results," Yalamanchi says. "This potential helped us to push toward converging machine learning with generating thermodynamic data."

Machine learning offers a way to take enthalpy of formation data--measured experimentally, or calculated for a small number of molecules using highly accurate but slow quantum chemistry computations--and then extrapolate to a much broader range of molecules.

The machine learning program analyzed a "training" dataset of molecule structures and their enthalpies of formation. It then used the patterns it detected to predict the enthalpy of formation of molecules it had not seen before.

Machine learning proved to be much more accurate than the traditional group additivity approach.1 "We got better estimates of enthalpy of formation of chemical species using machine learning methods compared to traditional methods," Yalamanchi says.

For example, although traditional group additivity can make relatively good predictions for simple molecules with linear structures, its accuracy decreases with more complex molecules, such as those that incorporate carbon rings in their structure.2 "The improvement we saw in estimates of enthalpy of formation, compared with traditional group additivity, was even more significant in the case of cyclic species," Yalamanchi adds.

"The results suggest that machine learning will become an increasingly important tool in the field," Sarathy says. "The ability to accurately predict important thermodynamic properties from molecular descriptors is an important step toward developing fully automated algorithms for predicting more complex chemical phenomenon," he adds.

The team is now running high accuracy quantum chemistry calculations to expand the machine learning models' training dataset. "In this way, we are developing a hybrid first-principles artificial intelligence framework for more accurate predictions of many physical-chemical properties," says Sarathy.

Information can successfully be transmitted through noisy channels using quantum mechanics, according to new research from The University of Queensland and Griffith University.

We all know it's impossible to take a picture through thick smoke or fog--physicists would say, 'it's impossible to send information through a completely noisy channel'.

But UQ physicist Dr Jacqui Romero from the ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems (EQUS) said that you can get your picture if you use quantum mechanics, using a principle called 'superposition of order'.

"This is another example of quantum physics assisting classical communication," Dr Romero said.

"Classically, no information can be transmitted through a single completely noisy channel, let alone two completely noisy channels.

"But with quantum mechanics, adding a second channel actually provides a way to successfully get the information through.

"We show that by combining the noisy channels such that you don't know which noisy channel was applied first, it becomes possible to transmit some information."

UQ PhD student Kaumudibikash Goswami, also at EQUS, said that if you're sending information through two noisy media A and B then you would normally think about doing it in an order: either send the information through A, then B, or vice versa.

"The quantum superposition of order means that we lose this idea of an order of events, or of one event causing another," Mr Goswami said.

"This is what allows us to successfully transmit information through the noisy channels.

"More surprisingly, if one medium is noise-free, then superposition of order can completely nullify the effect of the other noisy medium, leading to perfect transmission of information.

"This can be useful in satellite communication as well as secret sharing."

Many elasmobranch species, which include sharks, skates, and rays, use estuaries as nurseries, for birthing, and as foraging grounds. Florida's Indian River Lagoon is one of 28 estuaries designated as an "estuary of national significance" by the Environmental Protection Agency's National Estuary Program. In recent decades, this estuary has experienced many environmental impacts, such as habitat degradation and harmful algal blooms resulting in degraded water quality and fish kills. Currently, there is a substantial data gap surrounding the status of elasmobranchs in this estuary system.

Researchers from Florida Atlantic University's Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute conducted a fishery-independent survey to characterize the elasmobranch community and understand distribution patterns and habitat use in the Indian River Lagoon from Sebastian to St. Lucie Inlet. This study provides the first long-term, in-depth analysis of the elasmobranch community in the southern Indian River Lagoon and develops capacity to understand how these species may respond to further environmental changes.

Results of the study, published in Estuaries and Coasts, the journal of the Coastal and Estuarine Research Foundation, showed that many elasmobranchs use the southern Indian River Lagoon throughout their life histories and the area may serve as an important nursery habitat for multiple species.

From 2016 to 2018, researchers caught 630 individuals of 16 species, including two critically endangered smalltooth sawfish (Pristis pectinata). They characterized the species composition and distribution of elasmobranchs, examined spatial and temporal variability in the elasmobranch community, and assessed how temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, depth, water clarity, distance to an inlet, and distance to a freshwater source affect elasmobranch community composition. The two most commonly caught species were bull sharks and Atlantic stingrays, the only two species to each comprise greater than 20 percent of the catch. The remaining 14 species comprised 53 percent of the catch.

Researchers also observed size and compositional differences by region and season; for example, bull sharks were most abundant in Vero Beach and the St. Lucie River, and both bull sharks and Atlantic stingrays were more abundant in the fall than in the spring and summer. Clearer, relatively deeper, and higher salinity waters farther from freshwater sources and closer to inlets resulted in a more diverse community; while bull sharks and Atlantic stingrays dominated shallower, less clear waters closer to freshwater sources and further from inlets.

"As global human populations increase and environmental pressures on estuaries become more widespread, it is essential to continue to monitor changes in elasmobranch communities in order to effectively manage and conserve these populations," said Grace Roskar, M.S., lead author, current Knauss Fellow with NOAA Fisheries and former graduate student working with Matt Ajemian, Ph.D., co-author and an assistant research professor at FAU's Harbor Branch. "Establishing updated records of the diversity and distribution of elasmobranchs in the Indian River Lagoon is a critical first step to understand how varying environmental and pollution impacts may affect these species, which are integral to the fish community of the lagoon and surrounding habitats."

The interconnected nature of abiotic parameters such as distance to freshwater sources or inlets and salinity that influenced elasmobranch distributions suggest important implications for future hydrological changes in the Indian River Lagoon.

"If freshwater discharges into the Indian River Lagoon increase in duration and/or volume, the elasmobranch community could shift even further to bull shark and Atlantic stingray dominance. Less tolerant species may be driven closer to the inlets or even out of the estuary to nearshore ocean habitats," said Ajemian. "These community shifts could result in both decreased elasmobranch diversity and biodiversity of the estuary as a whole, possibly altering the dynamics of prey populations as well. Moreover, displaced species may face increased risks of predation or competition as well as declines in habitat quality or prey availability."

The researchers emphasize the importance of continuing the survey for additional years to yield greater sample sizes and allow for the formulation of standardized relative abundance indices that will be useful in the stock assessment process, which is essential to fisheries management.

Tsukuba, Japan - Researchers at the University of Tsukuba used high-speed cameras and pressure sensors to quantify the force created by water polo players during kicking motions. They found that the high efficacy of the "eggbeater" technique exceeds the predictions of conventional biomechanical theories, which may be due to turbulent water flow. This research may help improve our understanding of both the biophysics of sports, as well as lead to new ways to travel through the water more easily.

While polo played with horses may seem genteel and relaxing, the same cannot be said of water polo. It is a grueling competition in which players must constantly expend energy just to stay in a position to catch or throw the ball. A common swimming technique that allows players to tread water while upright is called an "eggbeater" kick, in which the legs make large circles, just like the kitchen gadget. In fact, they spend about half their time in the water performing this motion, which allows players to elevate themselves from the surface without becoming exhausted.

To understand why this method is so efficient, researchers at the University of Tsukuba studied six male water polo players.

"Sports are often a good place to look for highly optimized techniques," Senior author Professor Hideki Takagi says. "We captured the kicking motions using three high-speed cameras, and we attached four pairs of pressure sensors to the dorsal and plantar surfaces of each participant's right foot."

The video recording allowed the scientists to know the position, velocity, and acceleration at each moment of time, and the force could be calculated using the pressure sensors.

Surprisingly, the researchers found that the force created by the eggbeater kick was greater than would be expected if one just applied Newton's laws and hydrodynamics. "Our study hints that water polo players are actually taking advantage of complex physics, including unstable vortices, to achieve this increased efficiency," explains Professor Takagi. "In addition to improving sports performance, the results of this research may lead to optimized underwater propulsion."

While paleontologists have a wealth of vertebrate fossils at their disposal, their knowledge of the ecology of ancient extinct species, particularly regarding their relationship with invertebrate species, is relatively poor. As bones and hard shells “fossilize” much better than soft tissues and cartilage, scientists are limited in their ability to infer the presence of parasitic or symbiotic organisms living in or on these ancient vertebrates. As a result, relatively little is known about the evolutionary relationships between these ancient “clades” and their modern descendants.

All hope is not lost, though, as researchers can infer the presence of these small organisms from the footprints they left behind. These records are called trace fossils, or ichnofossils. One clear example of such ichnofossils is the boreholes that many mollusks make in the turtle shell remains and whale and fish bones on the ocean floor. However, to this date, there have been no indications that such species also lived in the shell while the turtle was alive and well.

In their recent study published in the journal Palaios, Assistant Professor Kei Sato from Waseda University and Associate Professor Robert G Jenkins from Kanazawa University focused on the trace evidence left on the carapace (shell) of an extinct basal leatherback marine turtle (Mesodermochelys sp.). The fossil was recovered from an Upper Cretaceous formation in Nio River, Japan, and the evidence in question were 43 tiny, flask-shaped boreholes all over the turtle shell fossil.

Eager to learn more about the organisms responsible for this, the scientists formulated a hypothesis, based on previous borehole evidence found on ancient marine turtle shells. After observing the fossil up close and measuring the morphological characteristics of the boreholes (see Figure), they produced a 3-dimensional reconstruction of the carapace and the cross-section of one of the boreholes, which allowed them to observe the intricate details left by the species.

Sato, who is the lead author of this study, elaborates on the surprising evidence they found, “We saw that there were signs of healing around the mouth of boreholes, suggesting that the turtle was alive when the organisms settled on the carapace.” Based on the morphology and positioning of the boreholes, they determined that the likely culprits for these boreholes were “bivalves” from the superfamily Pholadoidea, creatures similar to the modern clams. These “sessile” (or immobile) organisms normally require a stable substrate to bore into, and the turtle carapace was a suitable host. The fact that the host animal was swimming around freely probably helped, as this allowed exposure to new environments.

Sato and Jenkins identified the boreholes called Karethraichnus; however, they were unable to match the characteristics of the boreholes they found with those made by any currently described species. This only meant one thing: that they had stumbled onto a completely new species! They have accordingly named this new species as Karethraichnus zaratan.

Sato is excited about the implications of their findings, stating, “This is the first study to report this unique behavior of boring bivalves as a symbiont of living marine vertebrate, which is a significant finding for the paleoecology and evolution of ancient boring bivalve clades.” Previously, no such species had been shown to live on the carapace of living vertebrates. Instead, they were often reported to occur on the remains of marine turtles and other vertebrates, laying on the ocean floor alongside various decomposing organisms. By attaching themselves on a live, free-swimming substrate, such as the carapace of a marine turtle, these pholadoid bivalves may have paved the way for a novel, yet-unknown evolutionary path of accessing previously unexplored niches and diversifying into new species. As the tracemaker bivalves of Karethraichnus zaratan are considered to belong to one of the basal groups for Pholadoidea, this knowledge is crucial for understanding the evolutionary history of extant organisms in this group.

Reference

Authors: Kei Sato and Robert Jenkins
Title of original paper: Mobile home for pholadoid boring bivalves: first example from a late Cretaceous sea turtle in Hokkaido, Japan
Journal: Palaios
DOI: 10.2110/palo.2019.077
Affiliations: (1) Waseda University, Nishiwaseda, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo, 169-8050, Japan. (2) Kanazawa University, Kakuma, Kanazawa, Ishikawa, 920–1192, Japan.

Journal

Palaios

DOI

10.2110/palo.2019.077