Tech

Former Hurricane Kiko is now just a remnant low pressure area that has slid into the Central Pacific Ocean. The Global Precipitation Measurement mission or GPM satellite provided a look at the rainfall occurring within the low.

Kiko weakened to a remnant low pressure area by 11 p.m. EDT on Sept. 24. At the time, it was about 950 miles (1.530 km) east of Hilo, Hawaii, near 19.2 degrees north latitude and 140.5 degrees west longitude. Maximum sustained winds at the time were near 35 mph (55 kph) and weakening. That also marked the last advisory from NOAA's National Hurricane Center.

The GPM's core satellite passed over Kiko's remnants on Sept. 25 at 3:51 a.m. EDT (0751 UTC). GPM found scattered light rain from the remnant clouds falling at less than 0.2 inches (less than 5 millimeters) per hour. Forecasters at NOAA's National Hurricane Center or NHC incorporate the rainfall data into their forecasts.

On Sept. 25, 2019, the Tropical Weather Discussion from NHC at 6:05 a.m. EDT (10:05 UTC) noted that Post-Tropical Cyclone Kiko is west of 140 degrees west longitude and in the Central Pacific Ocean. Kiko continues to move west.

The air-pressure gradient created between Kiko (a low pressure area) and high pressure north of the area is supporting moderate to fresh trade winds. Kiko's remnants are producing a large area of ocean swells to 8 feet. Those ocean swells are expected to lessen as Kiko's remnants dissipate.

Hurricanes are the most powerful weather event on Earth. NASA's expertise in space and scientific exploration contributes to essential services provided to the American people by other federal agencies, such as hurricane weather forecasting.

Researchers from HSE University and RANEPA found that in high-income countries, age, rather than the cohort effect, has more impact on religiosity. They predict that this may have an impact on societal structure in the future. The study was published in Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion.

It has long been observed that older people tend to be more religious than younger people. However, it is still disputable whether this fact should be attributed to people generally becoming more religious with age per se (age effect), or to the process of secularization, wherein earlier cohorts (to which the now older people belong) used to be more religious than those that appeared later, i.e. younger cohorts (cohort effect). HSE University scholars decided to analyze this issue using data from six waves of the World Values Survey (2016) in high-income OECD countries. A total of 16 countries were studied, including Australia, the USA, Canada, Great Britain, Israel, New Zealand, Japan, Germany, as well as other European countries.

The researchers used logistic models and multiple linear regression to determine that the age effect has a higher impact on religiosity than the cohort effect. Older people are more inclined to believe in God, attend church, and believe it is important to instill religion in children.. The cohort effect impacts other factors analyzed by the scholars, such as church attendance and a belief in religion's importance in life, but the age effect still strongly prevails over the cohort effect.

These research results are very important for predicting the future structure of society. Many previous studies have shown that global ageing is spreading across the world, particularly in high-income countries. This recent research suggests that that population ageing can possibly slow down the transition from religious to secular values, a phenomenon earlier described by Ronald Inglehart and Christian Welzel. Nowadays, older people (aged 50+) constitute almost one-half of the adult (aged 20+) population of developed countries, and this proportion will increase to constitute a significant majority by 2040.

'That is why, it is mainly in the developed countries that global aging may have the most pronounced effect on slowing down the transition from religious to secular values or, possibly, even on some increase in religiosity,' says Andrey Korotaev, one of the study authors and Head of the Laboratory for Monitoring the Risks of Socio-Political Destabilization. 'For example, Japan is known to be one of the countries most affected by ageing, so probably it is not a mere coincidence that a number of important indicators reveal a slowdown of secularization trends and even a certain resurgence of religiosity in this country.'

The transition from religious to secular values may slow by 2040 in high-income OECD countries and, probably, there will be a resurgence of religiosity, the symptoms of which can be observed in Japan. On the other hand, widely divergent socio-cultural settings in different countries have an impact on religious behavior and attitude, and this must be taken into account in further research.

University of Waterloo researchers have developed a novel tool that will enable user-experience designers to create more effective, personalized games and marketing campaigns.

Unlike other tools that categorize gamers by types, the new "player traits model," along with a 25-item survey, can be used to more easily and accurately evaluate the kind of games different people will enjoy. The model is based on five traits: social, aesthetic, challenge, goal, and narrative.

The researchers believe the customized experience players are craving can be transferred into many areas of life and are currently working, for example, with autonomous cars and artificial intelligence in an effort to make a driverless car ride more engaging.

"It is important to understand the relationship between personality, playing preferences, and enjoyment of game elements because this knowledge has uses in the design of targeted and adaptive games, as well as gameful applications and advertising campaigns," said Gustavo Tondello, who led the study detailing the new model as part of his PhD research and is now an instructional support coordinator in Waterloo's David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science.

"None of the previous ideas of how to classify the different preferences of game players have got to the point where there is a survey that can just be given to a player. Now, based on some quick answers to a few questions, we will have a good idea of what games or types of user experiences within a game a particular player would like."

The player traits survey questions were collaboratively developed by a multidisciplinary team of four researchers from Professor Lennart Nacke's HCI Games Group located within Waterloo's Games Institute.

"We're breaking new ground by openly providing the entire scale for this, the first really valid and useful player trait model," said Nacke, an associate professor in Waterloo's Stratford School of Interaction Design and Business and Department of Communications Arts. "This is a free tool that's available for anyone to do personality assessment, personalize your marketing campaign or whatever else you're doing in your corporate structure and where you want to design an engaging user experience."

(Philadelphia, PA) - Like catching two fish with one worm, treating two problems with a single drug is efficient, but exceedingly difficult. In particular, for new diabetes medications, in which one drug aims to tackle two major complications of diabetes - the excess of both lipids and glucose in the blood - the therapeutic benefits, while great, frequently are accompanied by dangerous toxic effects to the heart.

Why and how these drugs, known as dual PPARα/γ agonists cause heart dysfunction in diabetes patients has been unclear. But now, in new research published in the journal JCI Insight, scientists at the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University (LKSOM) show for the first time that dual PPARα/γ diabetes drugs have a profound toxic effect on the generation and function of mitochondria, the tiny energy factories that power cells.

"We found that the combined activation of PPARα and PPARγ receptors by a single agonist drug, tesaglitazar, blocked the activity of proteins involved in mitochondrial biogenesis and energy production, including a protein known as SIRT1," explained Konstantinos Drosatos, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pharmacology and Assistant Professor in the Center for Translational Medicine and the Center for Metabolic Disease Research at LKSOM and senior investigator on the new study. "When we reactivated SIRT1 with resveratrol, an antioxidant widely known for its presence in grape skins, heart toxicity was reduced and the benefits of dual lowering of lipid and glucose levels were maintained in tesaglitazar-treated mice."

The effects of PPARα and PPARγ receptor activation are like the fish that researchers are trying to bait. The PPARα receptor binds molecules such as fibrates, which help reduce blood triglyceride levels and increase levels of high-density lipoproteins (HDLs) - popularly known as "heart-healthy" fats. Meanwhile, PPARγ receptors attach molecules that help lower blood glucose levels.

The popular diabetes drugs known as thiazolidinediones (TZDs), which include pioglitazone and rosiglitazone (the latter marketed as Avandia), bind to PPARγ receptors. Because these drugs given alone have been questioned for cardiac toxicity, the idea emerged for dual PPARα/γ activation by a single drug - the one piece of bait that in theory successfully lures the two fish - the combined lipid- and glucose-lowering effects of PPARα/γ coactivation.

To understand why these new drugs are accompanied by just as much cardiac toxicity, if not more, than TZDs, Dr. Drosatos and colleagues carried out a series of studies in diabetic mice treated with the dual PPARα/γ agonist tesaglitazar. Despite reduced triglyceride and glucose levels in the blood, the mice developed cardiac dysfunction. Molecular analyses of heart tissue from affected animals revealed a significant reduction in the expression and activation of a protein known as cardiac PPARγ coactivator 1-α (PGC1α), which plays a critical role in mitochondrial biogenesis. This reduction was accompanied by decreases in SIRT1 expression and in mitochondrial abundance.

The researchers then repeated their experiment, this time treating diabetic mice with tesaglitazar in combination with resveratrol, which serves as an activator of SIRT1. Mice treated with the combination of the two drugs had reduced heart toxicity, relative to tesaglitazar-only therapy, and their heart cells exhibited normal mitochondrial function.

"Now we have much a clearer idea of how heart toxicity arises from treatment with dual PPARα/γ agonists," Dr. Drosatos said. "This allows us to more effectively guide the development of future PPAR-targeting drugs."

One of the team's next aims is to further elucidate the signaling pathway that moderates the effects of PPAR drugs in order to identify a single target - one worm to catch one really big fish. "By targeting fewer proteins, there should be fewer toxic effects to worry about," Dr. Drosatos added.

India is on a path with dual -- and potentially conflicting -- goals related to the use of citizen data.

To improve the efficiency their municipal services, many Indian cities have started enabling government-service requests, which involves collecting and sharing citizen data with government officials and, potentially, the public. But there's also a national push to protect citizen privacy, potentially restricting data usage. Cities are now beginning to question how much citizen data, if any, they can use to track government operations.

In a new study, MIT researchers find that there is, in fact, a way for Indian cities to preserve citizen privacy while using their data to improve efficiency.

The researchers obtained and analyzed data from more than 380,000 government service requests by citizens across 112 cities in one Indian state for an entire year. They used the dataset to measure each city government's efficiency based on how quickly they completed each service request. Based on field research in three of these cities, they also identified the citizen data that's necessary, useful (but not critical), or unnecessary for improving efficiency when delivering the requested service.

In doing so, they identified "model" cities that performed very well in both categories, meaning they maximized privacy and efficiency. Cities worldwide could use similar methodologies to evaluate their own government services, the researchers say. The study was presented at this past weekend's Technology Policy Research Conference.

"How do municipal governments collect citizen data to try to be transparent and efficient, and, at the same time, protect privacy? How do you find a balance?" says co-author Karen Sollins, a researcher in the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL), a principal investigator for the Internet Policy Research Initiative (IPRI), and a member of the Privacy, Innovation and e-Governance using Quantitative Systems (PIEQS) group. "We show there are opportunities to improve privacy and efficiency simultaneously, instead of saying you get one or the other, but not both."

Joining Sollins on the paper are: first author Nikita Kodali, a graduate student in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science; and Chintan Vaishnav, a senior lecturer in the MIT Sloan School of Management, a principal investigator for IPRI, and a member PIEQS.

Intersections of privacy and efficiency

In recent years, India's eGovernment Foundation has aimed to significantly improve the transparency, accountability, and efficiency of operations in its many municipal governments. The foundation aims to move all of these governments from paper-based systems to fully digitized systems with citizen interfaces to request and interact with government service departments.

In 2017, however, India's Supreme Court ruled that its citizens have a constitutional right to data privacy and have a say in whether or not their personal data could be used by governments and the private sector. That could potentially limit the information that towns and cities could use to track the performance of their services.

Around that time, the researchers had started studying privacy and efficiency issues surrounding the eGovernment Foundation's digitization efforts. That led to a report that determined which types of citizen data could be used to track government service operations.

Building on that work, the researchers were provided 383,959 anonymized citizen-government transactions from digitized modules from 112 local governments in an Indian state for all of 2018. The modules focused on three areas: new water tap tax assessment; new property tax assessment; and public grievances about sanitation, stray animals, infrastructure, schools, and other issues.

Citizens send requests to those modules via mobile or web apps by entering various types of personal and property information, and then monitor the progress of the requests. The request and related data pass through various officials that each complete an individual subtask, known as a service level agreement, within a designated time limit. Then, the request passes on to another official, and so on. But much of that citizen information is also visible to the public.

The software captured each step of each request, moving from initiation to completion, with time stamps, for each municipal government. The researchers then could rank each task within a town or city, or in aggregation across each town or city on two metrics: a government efficiency index and an information privacy index.

The government efficiency index primarily measures a service's timeliness, compared to the predetermined service level agreement. If a service is completed before its timeframe, it's more efficient; if it's completed after, it's less efficient. The information privacy index measures how responsible is a government in collecting, using, and disclosing citizen data that may be privacy sensitive, such as personally identifiable information. The more the city collects and shares inessential data, the lower its privacy rating.

Phone numbers and home addresses, for instance, aren't needed for many of the services or grievances, yet are collected -- and publicly disclosed -- by many of the modules. In fact, the researchers found that some modules historically collected detailed personal and property information across dozens of data fields, yet the governments only needed about half of those fields to get the job done.

Model behavior

By analyzing the two indices, they found eight "model" municipal governments that performed in the top 25 percent for all services in both the efficiency and privacy indices. In short, they used only the essential data -- and passed that essential data through fewer officials -- to complete a service in a timely manner.

The researchers now plan to study how the model cities are able to get services done so quickly. They also hope to study why some cities performed so poorly, in the bottom 25 percent, for any given service. "First, we're showing India that this is what your best cities look like and what other cities should become," Vaishnav says. "Then we want to look at why a city becomes a model city."

Similar studies can be conducted in places where similar citizen and government data are available and which have equivalents to India's service level agreements -- which serve as a baseline for measuring efficiency. That information isn't common worldwide yet, but could be in the near future, especially in cities like Boston and Cambridge, Vaishnav says. "We gather a large amount of data and there's an urge to do something with the data to improve governments and engage citizens better," he says. "That may soon be a requirement in democracies around the globe."

Next, the researchers want to create an innovation-based matrix, which will determine which citizen data can and cannot be made public to private parties to help develop new technologies. They're also working on a model that provides information on a city's government efficiency and information privacy scores in real time, as citizen requests are being processed.

Dropping cloud top temperatures from NASA-NOAA's Suomi NPP satellite indicated Hurricane Lorenzo was getting stronger in the North Atlantic Ocean.

The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument aboard Suomi NPP provided an infrared image of the storm. Infrared imagery reveals cloud top temperatures, and the higher the cloud top, the colder it is, and the stronger the storm. On Sept. 25 at 0312 UTC (Sept. 24 at 11:12 p.m. EDT) a large area of powerful thunderstorms circled the eye where cloud top temperatures were as cold as minus 121 Fahrenheit (minus 85 degrees Celsius). NOAA's National Hurricane Center (NHC) forecasters cited that data in their Discussion at that time.

NASA research has shown that storms with cloud tops that cold have been found to generate heavy rainfall.

Later in the day, at 11 a.m. EDT (1500 UTC), the center of Hurricane Lorenzo was located near latitude 14.1 degrees north and longitude 35.1 degrees west. That is about 715 miles (1,155 km) west of the southernmost Cabo Verde islands. Lorenzo is moving toward the west-northwest near 17 mph (28 kph), and this motion is expected to continue through Thursday.

A turn toward the northwest is expected late Thursday. Maximum sustained winds have increased to near 85 mph (140 kph) with higher gusts. Additional strengthening is forecast during the next couple of days, and Lorenzo is forecast to become a major hurricane by Thursday [Sept. 26]. The estimated minimum central pressure is 983 millibars.

Hurricanes are the most powerful weather event on Earth. NASA's expertise in space and scientific exploration contributes to essential services provided to the American people by other federal agencies, such as hurricane weather forecasting.

For updated forecasts. visit: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - In a new study, researchers found that unless steps are taken to mitigate climate change, up to 60 percent of current wheat-growing areas worldwide could see simultaneous, severe and prolonged droughts by the end of the century. Wheat is the world's largest rain-fed crop in terms of harvested area and supplies about 20 percent of all calories consumed by humans.

The risk of widespread drought in wheat production areas is four times the level scientists see today, said Song Feng, associate professor of geosciences and the second author on the study published in the journal Science Advances. Such droughts would be a shock to the food production system.

Given present-day weather patterns, severe drought could affect up to 15 percent of current wheat-growing areas, the study states. Researchers found that even if global warming is held to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the target of the Paris Agreement, up to 30 percent of global wheat production areas could see simultaneous drought.

"This clearly suggests that that global warming will affect food production," said Feng.

For the study, Feng and colleagues analyzed 27 climate models, each of which had three different scenarios. "It was terabytes of information, and it took a couple months and multiple computers to run," he said. Feng and Miroslav Trnka, a professor at the Global Change Research Institute in the Czech Republic and first author of the study, came up with the idea for the study over pizza at a conference in Nebraska. They sketched out the initial ideas for the study on the back of a napkin.

The study found that historically, the total area affected by severe drought worldwide and food prices are closely related. More widespread drought has meant higher food prices in the past.

"If only one country or region sees a drought there is less impact," Feng said. "But if multiple regions are affected simultaneously, it can affect global production and food prices, and lead to food insecurity."

Tropical Storm Karen has crossed over Puerto Rico and into the western Atlantic Ocean. Early on Sept. 25 when Global Precipitation Measurement mission or GPM core satellite passed overhead, the satellite found heavy rain occurring over the territory.

The GPM's core satellite passed over Tropical Storm Karen on Sept. 25 at 0316 UTC (Sept. 24 at 11:16 p.m. EDT). GPM found heavy rain falling at a rate greater than 1.6 inches (40 millimeters) southwest of Karen's center over the Atlantic Ocean and just north of central Puerto Rico. Heavy rain was also falling at more than 1 inch (25 mm) per hour over much of Puerto Rico and extended far to the north of Karen's center into the Atlantic.

Forecasters at NOAA's National Hurricane Center or NHC incorporate the rainfall data into their forecasts. At 11 a.m. EDT (1500 UTC), NHC noted "Karen is expected to produce additional rainfall accumulations of 1 to 2 inches across Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, with isolated storm totals of 8 inches."

The center of Tropical Storm Karen was located near latitude 21.7 degrees north and longitude 64.9 degrees west. Karen's center had moved further away from Puerto Rico since the GPM image was collected and was located about 240 miles (385 km) north-northwest of San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Karen was moving toward the north near 15 mph (24 kph). Maximum sustained winds are near 45 mph (75 kph) with higher gusts. Some strengthening is forecast during the next couple of days. Tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 70 miles (110 km) from the center. The estimated minimum central pressure is 1003 millibars.

NHC said, "A north-northeastward to northeastward motion with a decrease in forward speed is expected through early Friday.  Karen is then expected to slow down and make a clockwise loop over the southwestern Atlantic into the weekend."

Hurricanes are the most powerful weather event on Earth. NASA's expertise in space and scientific exploration contributes to essential services provided to the American people by other federal agencies, such as hurricane weather forecasting.

GPM is a joint mission between NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, JAXA.

For updated forecasts on Karen from NHC, Visit: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov

For local forecasts from the National Weather Service in Puerto Rico, Visit: https://www.weather.gov/sju/

Many people are trying to reduce their plastic use, but some tea manufacturers are moving in the opposite direction: replacing traditional paper teabags with plastic ones. Now, researchers reporting in ACS' Environmental Science & Technology have discovered that a soothing cup of the brewed beverage may come with a dose of micro- and nano-sized plastics shed from the bags. Possible health effects of ingesting these particles are currently unknown, the researchers say.

Over time, plastic breaks down into tiny microplastics and even smaller nanoplastics, the latter being less than 100 nanometers (nm) in size. (For comparison, a human hair has a diameter of about 75,000 nm.) Scientists have detected the microscopic particles in the environment, aquatic organisms and the food supply, but they don't know yet whether they are harmful to humans. Nathalie Tufenkji and colleagues wondered whether recently introduced plastic teabags could be releasing micro- and nanoplastics into the beverage during brewing. They also wanted to explore effects of the released particles on small aquatic organisms called Daphnia magna, or water fleas, which are model organisms often used in environmental studies.

To conduct their analysis, the researchers purchased four different commercial teas packaged in plastic teabags. The researchers cut open the bags, removed the tea leaves and washed the empty bags. Then, they heated the teabags in containers of water to simulate brewing conditions. Using electron microscopy, the team found that a single plastic teabag at brewing temperature released about 11.6 billion microplastic and 3.1 billion nanoplastic particles into the water. These levels were thousands of times higher than those reported previously in other foods. In another experiment, the researchers treated water fleas with various doses of the micro- and nanoplastics from teabags. Although the animals survived, they did show some anatomical and behavioral abnormalities. More research is needed to determine if the plastics could have more subtle or chronic effects on humans, the researchers say.

If scientists could give living cells magnetic properties, they could perhaps manipulate cellular activities with external magnetic fields. But previous attempts to magnetize cells by producing iron-containing proteins inside them have resulted in only weak magnetic forces. Now, researchers reporting in ACS' Nano Letters have engineered genetically encoded protein crystals that can generate magnetic forces many times stronger than those already reported.

The new area of magnetogenetics seeks to use genetically encoded proteins that are sensitive to magnetic fields to study and manipulate cells. Many previous approaches have featured a natural iron-storage protein called ferritin, which can self-assemble into a "cage" that holds as many as 4,500 iron atoms. But even with this large iron-storage capacity, ferritin cages in cells generate magnetic forces that are millions of times too small for practical applications. To drastically increase the amount of iron that a protein assembly can store, Bianxiao Cui and colleagues wanted to combine the iron-binding ability of ferritin with the self-assembly properties of another protein, called Inkabox-PAK4cat, that can form huge, spindle-shaped crystals inside cells. The researchers wondered if they could line the hollow interiors of the crystals with ferritin proteins to store larger amounts of iron that would generate substantial magnetic forces.

To make the new crystals, the researchers fused genes encoding ferritin and Inkabox-PAK4cat and expressed the new protein in human cells in a petri dish. The resulting crystals, which grew to about 45 microns in length (or about half the diameter of a human hair) after 3 days, did not affect cell survival. The researchers then broke open the cells, isolated the crystals and added iron, which enabled them to pull the crystals around with external magnets. Each crystal contained about five billion iron atoms and generated magnetic forces that were nine orders of magnitude stronger than single ferritin cages. By introducing crystals that were pre-loaded with iron to living cells, the researchers could move the cells around with a magnet. However, they were unable to magnetize the cells by adding iron to crystals already growing in cells, possibly because the iron levels in cells were too low. This is an area that requires further investigation, the researchers say.

Bloodstream infections caused by the fungus Candida are among the most common and deadly infections in hospitals, with 25,000 such cases seen annually in the U.S. - mostly in people originally hospitalized for other reasons. About 40% to 45% of people with Candida in their blood die of the infection.

New research from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis shows that the death rate can be reduced by 20% if infectious disease specialists oversee care of such patients. Such specialists are more likely to follow evidence-based best practices for treating infections, which is likely why their patients do better, the researchers said. The findings, published Sept. 24 in Lancet Infectious Diseases, suggest that physicians should not hesitate to consult with infectious disease doctors if they suspect a fungal bloodstream infection.

"Candida infections are a major problem in hospitals large and small across the country," said senior author Andrej Spec, MD, an assistant professor of medicine and associate director of the university's Infectious Diseases Clinical Research Unit and director of the university's Invasive Fungal Infections Clinic. "Even uncomplicated versions of these infections are actually quite dangerous and require a detailed and well-thought out approach to make sure that people do well. Infectious disease doctors are the ones who have the expertise to best treat these infections."

Even in major medical centers, it has not been the standard of care to call in an infectious disease physician to help treat fungal bloodstream infections, said study co-author William G. Powderly, MD, the Dr. J. William Campbell Professor of Medicine at Washington University. "But our study indicates that bringing in a specialist to consult on such infections should be the standard of care. We're taking steps to adopt this protocol for our patients."

Large hospitals usually have an infectious disease physician on staff, but such experts may be rare in smaller community hospitals.

"Washington University provides a physicians' access line, where any community physician who has any concerns about a patient can call an infectious disease doctor 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, and ask questions," Spec said. "This is a service that we provide for free to the community."

To find out whether infectious disease specialists improve outcomes, first author Carlos Mejia-Chew, MD, an instructor in infectious diseases, worked with Spec and colleagues to analyze data from 1,691 patients with Candida bloodstream infections treated at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis from 2002 to 2015. The team looked at what steps the Washington University doctors took to treat each infection, including whether they consulted with infectious disease specialists, and how many patients were still living 90 days after diagnosis.

Nearly half (45.9%) of the physicians with primary responsibility for the patients consulted with infectious disease specialists. Of the patients who were evaluated by an infectious disease expert, 28.6% died within 90 days. But of those whose doctors did not call the specialists, 50.5% died. Even after correcting for risk factors such as age and underlying disease, the benefit of a specialist consultation translated into a 20% lower risk of death.

When infectious disease experts were involved, patients were more likely to receive treatments that have been proven to save lives. More of the patients were prescribed antifungal medications, and they stayed on the drugs longer. Infectious disease doctors were more likely to check for serious complications such as infections of the heart. Perhaps most importantly, infectious disease physicians were more likely to remove central line catheters, which are used to administer IV medications.

"A lot of times doctors hesitate to remove central lines because they're necessary for the care of the patient and once you take it out it's hard to put a new one in," Spec said. "But these catheters are also often the source of the infection. When you're looking at a 40% chance of death, it's really important to stack the deck in the patient's favor by getting rid of the source of infection."

The study is one more piece of evidence that infectious disease physicians play a critical role in managing the care of hospitalized patients. Other studies have shown that consulting with infectious disease physicians in cases of Staphylococcus aureus, Cryptococcus and multidrug resistant infections leads to similarly impressive improved outcomes.

Majorana bound states have attracted scientists' interests and topological superconductors (TSCs) are predicted to host exotic Majorana states that obey non-Abelian statistics and can be used to implement a topological quantum computer. Recently, experimental scientists provide strong evidences for the existence of Majorana zero-energy mode in vortex cores in single material platforms of Fe(Te,Se) bulk single crystals and similar compounds of iron-based superconductors. The superconducting (SC) gap of topological surface state (ΔTSS) plays a vital role in protecting MZM that a larger ΔTSS leads to a larger energetic separation between MZM and other trivial excitations. β-Bi2Pd, as a candidate of topological superconductor, has some distinct physical characters. A previous scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy experiment observed large zero-bias conductance peaks in the line-cut measurement across its SC vortices and found two SC gaps (Δ1~1.0 meV and Δ2 ~3.3 meV) in the β-Bi2Pd film grown by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE), while only the smaller one (Δ1) compares to the SC gap of β-Bi2Pd bulk single crystal (Δb ~ 0.8 meV, Tc = 5.4 K). In order to understand the puzzle of the anomalously larger SC gap, it is necessary to study the topological superconductivity in momentum space.

In this work, by using in-situ angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) combined MBE, Hong Ding's group from the Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Science grown the 20-UC β-Bi2Pd thin films with tetragonal structure by MBE and studied the superconductivity by in-situ ARPES. The clear topological surface state was observed near fermi energy, which owns anomalously larger superconducting gap (~3.8 meV) measured by temperature dependence experiments. A key question then is the difference of thin film and single crystal. So we measured the band structure of single crystal grown by Youguo Shi's group at the "Dreamline" beamline of the Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility (SSRF) as well. By measuring β-Bi2Pd bulk single crystal as a comparison, we clearly observed the upward-shift of chemical potential in the film. A concomitant increasing of surface weight on the topological surface state was revealed by first principle calculation calculated by Hongming Weng's group, suggesting that the Dirac-fermion-mediated parity mixing may cause this anomalous superconducting enhancement. Their results establish β-Bi2Pd film as a unique case of connate TSCs with a highly enhanced topological superconducting gap.

Their results establish β-Bi2Pd as a candidate of topological superconductor with a highly enhanced topological superconducting gap, which may provide a new platform to stabilize Majorana zero modes at a higher temperature.

This is the first study in the Mediterranean to combine boat and marina sampling data with crew surveys to better understand the role these boats play in spreading alien species. The researchers from the University of Pavia, Italy found that boats traveling to new marinas were likely to be transporting alien species in the biofouling: living growth on submerged areas of the vessel.

The Mediterranean is a marine biodiversity hotspot, having the highest number of species for its size on the planet as well as the highest number of alien species. Invertebrate spawning occurs in the summer months, coinciding with the annual peak in recreational boating, making boats ideal carriers.

"Boats which have visited Eastern Mediterranean marinas had an especially high risk of spreading alien species due to the closer proximity to the Suez Canal, where most alien species enter the Mediterranean" said Aylin Ulman, lead author of the study.

The biggest predictors of high species richness on boats were visible biofouling in niche areas such as ladders and propellers combined with longer elapsed time since a professional clean. Many boats only had small clumps of visible biofouling, but these could be hosting as many eleven alien species.

Biofouling is not currently regulated in the Mediterranean, which Aylin Ulman said needs to change, "Biofouling is a major vector for the spread of marine alien species in the Mediterranean and needs regulation. To inhibit further spreading, marine pontoons should be cleaned regularly, and incoming vessels to marinas should be screened to determine if they require professional cleaning."

Even after boats have been professionally cleaned, the researchers found that colonisation of alien species occurs rapidly. This is likely due to niche areas getting missed during cleans. The authors advise that these areas should be given special attention.

Global management of biofouling is currently under consideration by the International Maritime Organization (IMO). The project supervisor, Agnese Marchini is presenting the findings of this study to the 1st GEF-UNDP-IMO GloFouling R&D Forum and Exhibition on Biofouling Management in October in Melbourne, Australia, to inform stakeholders around this.

In the study the researchers sampled 601 boats and surveyed the crews to gather information on travel histories and time since the last clean. This took place at 25 marinas across six countries in Western, Central and Eastern Mediterranean.

Samples from the boats were collected by scuba diving, snorkelling or when the boat was on land. They collected and identified macroinvertebrates including species of annelids, molluscs, tunicates, crustaceans and bryozoans.

Aylin Ulman warned that "the actual number of alien species could be much more than were found in this study since macroalgae were not identified here due to time limitations." She also added that due to funding limitations "data was not collected from the Southern Mediterranean countries."

On further research into alien species and recreational boating in the Mediterranean Aylin Ulman said "Longtime colleague Jasmine Ferrario at the University of Pavia is using this extensive dataset on alien species to build a model to identify high-risk marinas using environmental factors and marina characteristics. Some new marinas are now being sampled to validate the model."

Osaka, Japan - Hydrogen occurs in nature as H2 molecules; however when deuterium isotopes—so called "heavy hydrogen"—are introduced, the result can be deuterium hydride (HD) or deuterium gas (D2). These compounds are useful starting materials in fine chemical production; however, the natural abundance of these gases is low and the techniques used for producing D2 are expensive and energy intensive. Researchers from Osaka University have now developed a catalyst that promotes selective production of D2 and HD from the inexpensive starting material formic acid in the presence of D2O. Their findings are published in Nature Communications.

Formic acid (FA) has low toxicity, high hydrogen content, and is also low-cost and non flammable, making it an attractive hydrogen storage material. Significant effort has therefore been devoted to optimizing the use of FA as a source of hydrogen. However, previously reported reactions to produce deuterium gases from FA have required the expensive deuterium form of FA as a starting material and high toxicity materials. In addition, the use of homogenous processes, where the catalyst and the reactants are the same phase, has made the recovery of the catalysts challenging and expensive on a large scale.

The researchers report a heterogeneously catalyzed process, in which the catalyst is a different phase to the reactants, using a palladium-based alloy nanocatalyst (PdAg). The catalyst is supported on a silica substrate modified with amine groups that promote the reaction. The amine groups were found to be central to the viability of the reaction and a correlation between the basicity of the amine groups used and the selectivity of the reaction was demonstrated.

"Heterogeneously catalyzed processes are advantageous as they reduce the need for challenging separations," study lead author Kohsuke Mori explains. "Further advantages of our process are the cost-effective formic acid starting material and the control over the product gas we have demonstrated by tuning the amine groups on the catalyst surface. We also showed that the H/D exchange reaction that leads to the formation of the hydrogen isotope gases involves a quantum tunneling effect."

Molecules that contain deuterium in place of hydrogen are extremely useful research tools in chemistry and life sciences owing to their distinct properties of deuterium nuclei compared with hydrogen equivalents.

"The demand for deuterated products continues to increase as their applications are developed and become more widespread; therefore, it is important to make the production of precursors more accessible," study corresponding author Hiromi Yamashita explains. "Japan in particular relies heavily on imported materials, so we hope that our catalyst will lead to viable low-cost systems that will be able to satisfy the increasing global demand."

Weeds are thieves. They steal nutrients, sunlight and water from our food crops. In the case of sugarcane, yield refers to the amount of biomass and the sucrose concentration of the cane, which ultimately determines the amount of sugar produced. Two weedy culprits, namely itchgrass and divine nightshade, reduce cane biomass and sucrose yield.

These two weeds are a growing problem in Louisiana, where nearly half of the United States' sugarcane is grown. Itchgrass competition can reduce the sugar yield in cane by 7-17%. And, the longer it competes with sugarcane, the more the sugar yield is reduced. Although divine nightshade is a relative newcomer to Louisiana, it can reduce sugar production by up to 43%. Therefore, researchers are looking at the effect of heat to control itchgrass and divine nightshade seed before it emerges in sugarcane fields.

Burning sugarcane fields is common after harvest to reduce crop residue on the fields. This helps promote the growth of the next year's crop, as the residue has been found to reduce cane biomass. Research on flame weeding and other forms of heat to control weeds is of interest in the U.S., largely because of herbicide-resistant weeds. So, Douglas Spaunhorst and his research team looked to find the right temperature to control weed seed during the normal sugarcane residue burns.

"Integrated weed management strategies have become more common in U.S. agriculture," says Spaunhorst, who is based at the USDA-ARS Sugarcane Research Unit in Houma, Louisiana. "Mechanical types of weeding, like cultivation, burning, and seed crushers, show a lot of promise."

"Evaluation of non-chemical strategies for itchgrass and divine nightshade management is limited," says Spaunhorst. Chemical-alternative weed control can help slow herbicide-resistance evolution. "In fields historically under sugarcane cultivation, no chemical-resistant divine nightshade or itchgrass has been reported," says Spaunhorst. "However, a few examples have been found where resistant itchgrass became established in soybean fields."

One of the tricks of weed control by burning is creating the right conditions. Burning can kill the actual weed plant, and it can also kill weed seeds retained on the soil surface. "Once weed seeds are buried below the soil surface, killing seed using heat is difficult," says Spaunhorst. "The soil acts as an insulator to protect seeds, similar to a heat shield on a space shuttle that protects astronauts as they reenter into Earth's atmosphere. But, the temperature, length of time of exposure, and other variables need to be determined for each weed species."

During 2017 and 2018, researchers from Spaunhorst's team researched the effects of heat on weed seeds in the lab. After collecting seeds, they applied temperatures of 100, 150 and 200°C to various groups. Times of heat exposure varied as well.

Once the seeds had been heat-treated, they were planted to see if they would grow in a greenhouse. This is where the seeds from the two weedy species differed in how they reacted to heat. This makes sense, because each is from a different family of plants.

A more important variable for heat tolerance is that the seeds of the plant have different structures. "Itchgrass seed is protected by an outer coating, similar to a husk," says Spaunhorst. "However, divine nightshade seeds are located inside a fluid-filled berry. The fluid inside the berry seems to insulate the seed from high temperatures for short periods."

Now that the team has collected lab and greenhouse results, the next step will be to apply these conditions in the field. It's easy to control temperatures in an oven, but care will need to be taken to get the temperatures just right in the field. Wet crop residue in the field may not completely burn and produce temperatures too low to kill weed seeds. The burns will be started just like prairie burns - a little fuel, some wind, and a match.

"We know that high temperatures can kill itchgrass and divine nightshade seed," says Spaunhorst. "Now we will experiment with temperature probes in the soil - both at the surface and just below. We expect that residue density and moisture will be significant factors in the next results. After we do the field burns, we will collect the seed and attempt to grow plants in the greenhouse again."

Spaunhorst and his team have taken a process already in place - burning the residue of sugarcane - to see if it can be optimized as a dual-purpose procedure. If so, they can help sugarcane farmers keep their yields high, with fewer nutrient-stealing weeds getting in the way.