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March 29, 2013

Brain scans might predict future criminal behavior

A new study conducted by The Mind Research Network in Albuquerque, N.M., shows that neuroimaging data can predict the likelihood of whether a criminal will reoffend following release from prison.

The paper, which is to be published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, studied impulsive and antisocial behavior and centered on the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), a portion of the brain that deals with regulating behavior and impulsivity.

The study demonstrated that inmates with relatively low anterior cingulate activity were twice as likely to reoffend than inmates with high-brain activity in this region.

"These findings have incredibly significant ramifications for the future of how our society deals with criminal justice and offenders," said Dr. Kent A. Kiehl, who was senior author on the study and is director of mobile imaging at MRN and an associate professor of psychology at the University of New Mexico. "Not only does this study give us a tool to predict which criminals may reoffend and which ones will not reoffend, it also provides a path forward for steering offenders into more effective targeted therapies to reduce the risk of future criminal activity."

Biological transistor enables computing within living cells

When Charles Babbage prototyped the first computing machine in the 19th century, he imagined using mechanical gears and latches to control information. ENIAC, the first modern computer developed in the 1940s, used vacuum tubes and electricity. Today, computers use transistors made from highly engineered semiconducting materials to carry out their logical operations.

And now a team of Stanford University bioengineers has taken computing beyond mechanics and electronics into the living realm of biology. In a paper to be published March 28 in Science, the team details a biological transistor made from genetic material -- DNA and RNA -- in place of gears or electrons. The team calls its biological transistor the "transcriptor."

"Transcriptors are the key component behind amplifying genetic logic -- akin to the transistor and electronics," said Jerome Bonnet, PhD, a postdoctoral scholar in bioengineering and the paper's lead author.

The creation of the transcriptor allows engineers to compute inside living cells to record, for instance, when cells have been exposed to certain external stimuli or environmental factors, or even to turn on and off cell reproduction as needed.

Robot ants mimic insect behaviour

Scientists in the US have built and tested robotic ants, which they say behave just like a real ant colony.

The robots do not resemble their insect counterparts; they are tiny cubes equipped with two watch motors to power the wheels that enable them to move. But their collective behaviour is remarkably ant-like.

Sound cloaks enter the third dimension

A simple plastic shell has cloaked a three-dimensional object from sound waves for the first time. With some improvements, a similar cloak could eventually be used to reduce noise pollution and to allow ships and submarines to evade enemy detection. The experiments appear March 20 in Physical Review Letters.

“This paper implements a simplified version of invisibility using well-designed but relatively simple materials,” says Steven Cummer, an electrical engineer at Duke University, who was not involved in the study. Cummer proposed the concept of a sound cloak in 2007.

Scientists’ recent efforts to render objects invisible to the eye are based on the fact that our perception of the world depends on the scattering of waves. We can see objects because waves of light strike them and scatter. Similarly, the Navy can detect faraway submarines because they scatter sound waves (sonar) that hit them.

March 28, 2013

Pesticide combination affects bees' ability to learn

Two new studies have highlighted a negative impact on bees' ability to learn following exposure to a combination of pesticides commonly used in agriculture. The researchers found that the pesticides, used in the research at levels shown to occur in the wild, could interfere with the learning circuits in the bee's brain. They also found that bees exposed to combined pesticides were slower to learn or completely forgot important associations between floral scent and food rewards.

In the study published today (27 March 2013) in Nature Communications, the University of Dundee's Dr Christopher Connolly and his team investigated the impact on bees' brains of two common pesticides: pesticides used on crops called neonicotinoid pesticides, and another type of pesticide, coumaphos, that is used in honeybee hives to kill the Varroa mite, a parasitic mite that attacks the honey bee.

The intact bees' brains were exposed to pesticides in the lab at levels predicted to occur following exposure in the wild and brain activity was recorded. They found that both types of pesticide target the same area of the bee brain involved in learning, causing a loss of function. If both pesticides were used in combination, the effect was greater.

The study is the first to show that these pesticides have a direct impact on pollinator brain physiology. It was prompted by the work of collaborators Dr Geraldine Wright and Dr Sally Williamson at Newcastle University who found that combinations of these same pesticides affected learning and memory in bees. Their studies established that when bees had been exposed to combinations of these pesticides for 4 days, as many as 30% of honeybees failed to learn or performed poorly in memory tests. Again, the experiments mimicked levels that could be seen in the wild, this time by feeding a sugar solution mixed with appropriate levels of pesticides.

New way to lose weight? Changing microbes in guts of mice resulted in rapid weight loss

New research, conducted in collaboration with researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital, has found that the gut microbes of mice undergo drastic changes following gastric bypass surgery. Transfer of these microbes into sterile mice resulted in rapid weight loss. The study is described in a March 27 paper in Science Translational Medicine.

"Simply by colonizing mice with the altered microbial community, the mice were able to maintain a lower body fat, and lose weight -- about 20% as much as they would if they underwent surgery," said Peter Turnbaugh, a Bauer Fellow at Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) Center for Systems Biology, and one of two senior authors of the paper.

But as striking as those results were, they weren't as dramatic as they might have been.

"In some ways we were biasing the results against weight loss," Turnbaugh said, explaining that the mice used in the study hadn't been given a high-fat, high-sugar diet to increase their weight beforehand. "The question is whether we might have seen a stronger effect if they were on a different diet."

Quantum computing? Physicists' new technique for cooling molecules may be a stepping stone to quantum computing

The next generation of computers promises far greater power and faster processing speeds than today's silicon-based based machines. These "quantum computers" -- so called because they would harness the unique quantum mechanical properties of atomic particles -- could draw their computing power from a collection of super-cooled molecules.

But chilling molecules to a fraction of a degree above absolute zero, the temperature at which they can be manipulated to store and transmit data, has proven to be a difficult challenge for scientists.

Now, UCLA physicists have pioneered a new technique that combines two traditional atomic cooling technologies and brings normally springy molecules to a frozen standstill. Their research is published March 28 in the journal Nature.

"Scientists have been trying to cool molecules for a decade and have succeeded with only a few special molecules," said Eric Hudson, a UCLA assistant professor of physics and the paper's senior author. "Our technique is a completely different approach to the problem -- it is a lot easier to implement than the other techniques and should work with hundreds of different molecules."

March 27, 2013

Young women do not want to run for office, experts say

Despite some very high-profile female candidates and elected officials, and what looks like a changing landscape of U.S. politics, a new study conducted by American University professor and director of its Women and Politics Institute Jennifer L. Lawless and Richard L. Fox (Loyola Marymount University) reveals that young women are less likely than young men ever to have considered running for office, to express interest in a candidacy at some point in the future, or to consider elective office a desirable profession.

In their new report, Girls Just Wanna Not Run: The Gender Gap in Young Americans' Political Ambition, Lawless and Fox detail the results of a survey of a national sample of more than 2,100 college students. The authors find a dramatic gap between women and men's interest in running for office; men were twice as likely as women to have thought about running for office "many times," whereas women were 20 percentage points more likely than men never to have considered it. Importantly, the 20 point gap is just as large as the one we previously uncovered among adult professionals (in their 40s and 50s) who were well-situated to pursue a candidacy.

The report identifies five factors that contribute to the gender gap in political ambition among college students:

1. Young men are more likely than young women to be socialized by their parents to think about politics as a career path.

2. From their school experiences to their peer associations to their media habits, young women tend to be exposed to less political information and discussion than do young men.

3. Young men are more likely than young women to have played organized sports and care about winning.

4. Young women are less likely than young men to receive encouragement to run for office -- from anyone.

5. Young women are less likely than young men to think they will be qualified to run for office, even in the not-so-near future.

Saliva testing predicts aggression in boys

A new study indicates that a simple saliva test could be an effective tool in predicting violent behavior.

The pilot study, led by Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center and published this week online in the journal Psychiatric Quarterly, suggests a link between salivary concentrations of certain hormones and aggression.

Researchers, led by Drew Barzman, MD, a child and adolescent forensic psychiatrist at Cincinnati Children's, collected saliva samples from 17 boys ages 7-9 admitted to the hospital for psychiatric care to identify which children were most likely to show aggression and violence. The samples, collected three times in one day shortly after admission, were tested for levels of three hormones: testosterone, dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) and cortisol. The severity and frequency of aggression correlated with the levels of these hormones.

Planck telescope: A map of all the 'stuff' in the cosmos

Europe's Planck telescope, which last week showed us a picture of the oldest light streaming across the Universe, has another trick up its sleeve.

It has also mapped the distribution of all the matter in the cosmos.

This was done by analysing the subtle distortions in the ancient light introduced as it passed by the matter.

The effect is a direct consequence of Einstein's theory of general relativity which tells us that space is warped by the presence of mass.

Prof Simon White likens it to the way light is bent as it passes through the lumpiness of an old glass window pane.

March 26, 2013

Violent video games are a risk factor for criminal behavior and aggression, new evidence shows

People are quick to point the finger or dismiss the effect of violent video games as a factor in criminal behavior. New evidence from Iowa State researchers demonstrates a link between video games and youth violence and delinquency.

Matt DeLisi, a professor of sociology, said the research shows a strong connection even when controlling for a history of violence and psychopathic traits among juvenile offenders.

"When critics say, 'Well, it's probably not video games, it's probably how antisocial they are,' we can address that directly because we controlled for a lot of things that we know matter," DeLisi said. "Even if you account for the child's sex, age, race, the age they were first referred to juvenile court -- which is a very powerful effect -- and a bunch of other media effects, like screen time and exposure. Even with all of that, the video game measure still mattered."

The results were not unexpected, but somewhat surprising for Douglas Gentile, an associate professor of psychology, who has studied the effects of video game violence exposure and minor aggression, like hitting, teasing and name-calling.

"I didn't expect to see much of an effect when we got to serious delinquent and criminal level aggression because youth who commit that level of aggression have a lot of things going wrong for them. They often have a lot of risk factors and very few protective factors in their lives," Gentile said.

Discovery may allow scientists to make fuel from carbon dioxide in the atmosphere

Excess carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere created by the widespread burning of fossil fuels is the major driving force of global climate change, and researchers the world over are looking for new ways to generate power that leaves a smaller carbon footprint.

Now, researchers at the University of Georgia have found a way to transform the carbon dioxide trapped in the atmosphere into useful industrial products. Their discovery may soon lead to the creation of biofuels made directly from the carbon dioxide in the air that is responsible for trapping the sun's rays and raising global temperatures.

"Basically, what we have done is create a microorganism that does with carbon dioxide exactly what plants do-absorb it and generate something useful," said Michael Adams, member of UGA's Bioenergy Systems Research Institute, Georgia Power professor of biotechnology and Distinguished Research Professor of biochemistry and molecular biology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences.

During the process of photosynthesis, plants use sunlight to transform water and carbon dioxide into sugars that the plants use for energy, much like humans burn calories from food.

Noreena Hertz: Using social media to predict the future

Social media sites have evolved into the global equivalent of the office watercooler, but could the buzz they generate be analyzed to predict real-world outcomes?

Leading British economist Noreena Hertz thinks so. She believes analyzing the chatter from Twitter and Facebook for example, will become a dominant force in the business of forecasting.

"Over the past few years I have been really quite obsessed with how technology is changing the way that we make sense of the world," she told CNN at Names not Numbers, an idea-sharing and networking conference in the UK.

Speed of light may not be fixed, scientists suggest; Ephemeral vacuum particles induce speed-of-light fluctuations

Two forthcoming European Physical Journal D papers challenge established wisdom about the nature of vacuum. In one paper, Marcel Urban from the University of Paris-Sud, located in Orsay, France and his colleagues identified a quantum level mechanism for interpreting vacuum as being filled with pairs of virtual particles with fluctuating energy values. As a result, the inherent characteristics of vacuum, like the speed of light, may not be a constant after all, but fluctuate.

Meanwhile, in another study, Gerd Leuchs and Luis L. Sánchez-Soto, from the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Light in Erlangen, Germany, suggest that physical constants, such as the speed of light and the so-called impedance of free space, are indications of the total number of elementary particles in nature.

Vacuum is one of the most intriguing concepts in physics. When observed at the quantum level, vacuum is not empty. It is filled with continuously appearing and disappearing particle pairs such as electron-positron or quark-antiquark pairs. These ephemeral particles are real particles, but their lifetimes are extremely short. In their study, Urban and colleagues established, for the first time, a detailed quantum mechanism that would explain the magnetisation and polarisation of the vacuum, referred to as vacuum permeability and permittivity, and the finite speed of light. This finding is relevant because it suggests the existence of a limited number of ephemeral particles per unit volume in a vacuum.

Violins can mimic the human voice

For many years, some musical experts have wondered if the sound of the Stradivari and Guarneri violins might incorporate such elements of speech as vowels and consonants. A Texas A&M University researcher has now provided the first evidence that the Italian violin masters tried to impart specific vowel sounds to their violins.

Joseph Nagyvary, professor emeritus in biochemistry at Texas A&M, says of the various vowels he identified in their violins, only two were Italian -- the "i" and "e," while the others were more of French and English origin.

His findings published in the current issue of Savart Journal, a scientific journal of musical instrument acoustics, have the potential to change the way violins are made and how they are priced.
"I expected to find more Italian vowels, what experts call the 'Old Italian' sound actually has the mark of foreign languages," Nagyvary confirms.

Could that cold sore increase your risk of memory problems?

The virus that causes cold sores, along with other viral or bacterial infections, may be associated with cognitive problems, according to a new study published in the March 26, 2013, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

The study found that people who have had higher levels of infection in their blood (measured by antibody levels), meaning they had been exposed over the years to various pathogens such as the herpes simplex type 1 virus that causes cold sores, were more likely to have cognitive problems than people with lower levels of infection in the blood.

"We found the link was greater among women, those with lower levels of education and Medicaid or no health insurance, and most prominently, in people who do not exercise," said author Mira Katan, MD, with the Northern Manhattan Study at Columbia University Medical Center in New York and a member of the American Academy of Neurology. The study was performed in collaboration with the Miller School of Medicine at the University of Miami in Miami, FL.

Clean electricity from bacteria? Researchers make breakthrough in race to create 'bio-batteries'

Scientists at the University of East Anglia have made an important breakthrough in the quest to generate clean electricity from bacteria.

Findings published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) show that proteins on the surface of bacteria can produce an electric current by simply touching a mineral surface.

The research shows that it is possible for bacteria to lie directly on the surface of a metal or mineral and transfer electrical charge through their cell membranes. This means that it is possible to 'tether' bacteria directly to electrodes -- bringing scientists a step closer to creating efficient microbial fuel cells or 'bio-batteries'.

The team collaborated with researchers at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Washington State in the US.

Shewanella oneidensis is part of a family of marine bacteria. The research team created a synthetic version of this bacteria using just the proteins thought to shuttle the electrons from the inside of the microbe to the rock.

Harry Potter-Like Invisibility Cloak Works (in a Lab)

A miniature version of Harry Potter's invisibility cloak now exists, though it works only in microwave light, and not visible light, so far.

Still, it's a nifty trick, and the physicists who've created the new cloak say it's a step closer to realizing the kind of invisibility cloak that could hide a person in broad daylight.

The invention is made of a new kind of material called a metascreen, created from strips of copper tape attached to a flexible polycarbonate film. The copper strips are only 66 micrometers (66 millionths of a meter) thick, while the polycarbonate film is 100 micrometers thick, and the two are combined in a diagonal fishnet pattern.

Obesity may be linked to microorganisms living in the gut

How much a person eats may be only one of many factors that determines weight gain. A recent Cedars-Sinai study suggests that a breath test profile of microorganisms inhabiting the gut may be able to tell doctors how susceptible a person is to developing obesity.

The study, published online Thursday by The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, shows that people whose breath has high concentrations of both hydrogen and methane gasses are more likely to have a higher body mass index and higher percentage of body fat.

"This is the first large-scale human study to show an association between gas production and body weight -- and this could prove to be another important factor in understanding one of the many causes of obesity," said lead author Ruchi Mathur, MD, director of the Diabetes Outpatient Treatment and Education Center in the Division of Endocrinology at Cedars-Sinai.

The study, which will also appear in JCEM's April 2013 issue, analyzed the breath content of 792 people. Based on the breath tests, four patterns emerged. The subjects either had normal breath content, higher concentrations of methane, higher levels of hydrogen, or higher levels of both gases. Those who tested positive for high concentrations of both gases had significantly higher body mass indexes and higher percentages of body fat.

March 25, 2013

Science Fiction Comes Alive as Researchers Grow Organs in Lab

Reaching into a stainless steel tray, Francisco Fernandez-Aviles lifted up a gray, rubbery mass the size of a fat fist.

It was a human cadaver heart that had been bathed in industrial detergents until its original cells had been washed away and all that was left was what scientists call the scaffold.

Next, said Dr. Aviles, "We need to make the heart come alive."

Inside a warren of rooms buried in the basement of Gregorio Marañón hospital here, Dr. Aviles and his team are at the sharpest edge of the bioengineering revolution that has turned the science-fiction dream of building replacement parts for the human body into a reality.

Normal brain activity linked to DNA damage

Brain activity from experiences as common as exploring new locations surprisingly damages the noggin's DNA, hinting that such disruptions may be a key part of thinking, learning and memory, researchers say.

This damage normally heals rapidly, but abnormal proteins seen in Alzheimer's disease can increase this damage further, perhaps overwhelming the ability of brain cells to heal it. Further research into preventing this damage might help treat brain disorders, scientists added.

Could Coffee Protect Against Liver Disease in Alcohol Drinkers?

For guys who drink alcohol, heavy coffee consumption may protect against liver damage, according to a new study from Finland.

"Our findings suggest a possible protective effect for coffee intake in alcohol consumers," said study researcher Dr. Onni Niemelä, of Seinäjoki Central Hospital and the University of Tampere in Finland.

The researchers asked nearly 19,000 Finnish men and womenbetween ages 25 and 74 about their coffee and alcohol consumption. They also measured participants' blood levels of the liver enzyme gamma-glutamyl transferase (GGT).

Drinking alcohol raises levels of GGT in the blood. Over time, drinking can also lead to alcoholic liver disease. People with liver disease show higher levels of GGT in their blood. Men in the study who consumed more than 24 alcoholic drinks per week, or about 3.5 drinks daily, had the highest levels of the liver enzyme — about three times higher than men who did not drink alcohol.

But among the men who were heavy drinkers, those who also consumed five or more cups of coffee daily showed a 50 percent reduction in GGT compared with men who drank no coffee.

Laser empties atoms from the inside out

An international team of plasma physicists has used one of the world's most powerful lasers to create highly unusual plasma composed of hollow atoms.

The experimental work led by scientists from the University of York, UK and the Joint Institute for High Temperatures of Russian Academy of Sciences demonstrated that it is possible to remove the two most deeply bound electrons from atoms, emptying the inner most quantum shell and leading to a distinctive plasma state.

The experiment was carried out using the petawatt laser at the Central Laser Facility at the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) Rutherford Appleton Laboratory to further understanding of fusion energy generation, which employs plasmas that are hotter than the core of the Sun.

Old mice, young blood: Rejuvenating blood of mice by reprogramming stem cells that produce blood

The blood of young and old people differs. In an article published recently in the scientific journal Blood, a research group at Lund University in Sweden explain how they have succeeded in rejuvenating the blood of mice by reversing, or re-programming, the stem cells that produce blood.

Stem cells form the origin of all the cells in the body and can divide an unlimited number of times. When stem cells divide, one cell remains a stem cell and the other matures into the type of cell needed by the body, for example a blood cell.*

"Our ageing process is a consequence of changes in our stem cells over time," explained Martin Wahlestedt, a doctoral student in stem cell biology at the Faculty of Medicine at Lund University, and principal author of the article.

"Some of the changes are irreversible, for example damage to the stem cells' DNA, and some could be gradual changes, known as epigenetic changes, that are not necessarily irreversible, even if they are maintained through multiple cell divisions. When the stem cells are re-programmed, as we have done, the epigenetic changes are cancelled."**

‘Paintable’ Electronics Paves Way for Cheaper Gadgets

Researchers in the field of materials science are using a new technique to create “paint-on” plastic electronics that can be used to make popular gadgets less expensive and better for the environment.

Scientists at the University of Michigan (U-M) recently announced that they’ve discovered a way to make unruly semiconducting polymers- like those used in computer processors and LED displays- more manageable.

Most semiconductors used in modern electronics are inorganic, or based on materials other than carbon, like silicon or copper. While inorganic semiconductors do an excellent job of spreading a charge through an electronic device, they’re costly and impossible to produce without specialized equipment.

Organic and plastic semiconductors like the ones used by the U-M researchers, on the other hand, can be prepared on a basic lab bench. However, scientists have found that they’re not as efficient at carrying a charge through an electronic device as their inorganic brethren. Or at least, such was the case until recently.

The new “paintable” semiconducting polymers can be brushed over a surface to create a thin-layer film capable of carrying an uninterrupted charge.

March 22, 2013

Quantum computers coming soon? Metamaterials used to observe giant photonic spin Hall effect

Researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have once again demonstrated the incredible capabilities of metamaterials -- artificial nanoconstructs whose optical properties arise from their physical structure rather than their chemical composition. Engineering a unique two-dimensional sheet of gold nanoantennas, the researchers were able to obtain the strongest signal yet of the photonic spin Hall effect, an optical phenomenon of quantum mechanics that could play a prominent role in the future of computing.

"With metamaterial, we were able to greatly enhance a naturally weak effect to the point where it was directly observable with simple detection techniques," said Xiang Zhang, a faculty scientist with Berkeley Lab's Materials Sciences Division who led this research. "We also demonstrated that metamaterials not only allow us to control the propagation of light but also allows control of circular polarization. This could have profound consequences for information encoding and processing."

Metamaterials have garnered a lot of attention in recent years because their unique structure affords electromagnetic properties unattainable in nature. For example, a metamaterial can have a negative index of refraction, the ability to bend light backwards, unlike all materials found in nature, which bend light forward.

Energy drinks may increase blood pressure, disturb heart rhythm

Energy drinks may increase blood pressure and disturb your heart's natural rhythm, according to research presented at the American Heart Association's Epidemiology and Prevention/Nutrition, Physical Activity and Metabolism 2013 Scientific Sessions.

Researchers analyzed data from seven previously published observational and interventional studies to determine how consuming energy drinks might impact heart health.

In the first part of the pooled analysis, the researchers examined the QT interval of 93 people who had just consumed one to three cans of energy drinks. They found that the QT interval was 10 milliseconds longer for those who had consumed the energy drinks. The QT interval describes a segment of the heart's rhythm on an electrocardiogram; when prolonged, it can cause serious irregular heartbeats or sudden cardiac death.

"Doctors are generally concerned if patients experience an additional 30 milliseconds in their QT interval from baseline," said Sachin A. Shah, Pharm.D., lead author and assistant professor at University of the Pacific in Stockton, Calif.

Road traffic pollution as serious as passive smoke in the development of childhood asthma

New research conducted in 10 European cities has estimated that 14% of chronic childhood asthma is due to exposure to traffic pollution near busy roads.

The results are comparable to the burden associated with passive smoking: the World Health Organization estimates that between 4% and 18% of asthma cases in children are linked to passive smoking.

The findings, published online today (22 March 2013) ahead of print in the European Respiratory Journal, come as the European Commission has declared 2013 the 'Year of Air', which highlights the importance of clean air for all and focuses on actions to improve air quality across the EU.

Until now, traffic pollution was assumed to only trigger asthma symptoms and burden estimations did not account for chronic asthma caused by the specific range of toxicants that are found near heavily used roads along which many Europeans live.

Conscientious people are more likely to have higher GPAs

Conscientious people are more likely to have higher grade point averages, according to new research from psychologists at Rice University.

The paper examines previous studies that research the link between the "Big Five" personality traits -agreeableness, conscientiousness, extraversion, neuroticism and openness to experience -- and college grade point average. It finds that across studies, higher levels of conscientiousness lead to higher college grade point averages. It also shows that five common personality tests are consistent in their evaluation of the "Big Five" personality traits; all five measures found a positive correlation between conscientiousness and grade point average and virtually no correlation between the other four personality traits and grade point average.

According to Sam McAbee, a psychology graduate student at Rice and the study's lead author, the study has important implications for college admission offices and employers, who use personality tests to measure an individual's capacity for success.

"Research on these personality tests helps us gain a better understanding of how various personality traits may affect academic outcomes and other important life outcomes," McAbee said. "And although some researchers have questioned whether these personality measures might vary in their validity or effectiveness for predicting these outcomes, our analysis shows that all five measures produce similar results in the academic domain."

March 21, 2013

From Sleep Study, Clues to Happiness

In most people, laughter causes a surge of hypocretin, which maintains muscle tone. But in narcoleptics, the hormone is largely absent, and the system goes haywire.

In narcoleptics, the loss of this pleasure-seeking hormone has severe effects on mood. Narcoleptics are prone to depression, and they have a strange resistance to addiction. Some of the medications used to treat narcolepsy are notoriously addictive, like amphetamines and GHB, the so-called date-rape drug. Yet narcoleptics generally do not abuse them.

“They’re missing this working-for-pleasure system,” Dr. Siegel said. “When hypocretin is missing, you have a deficit in getting addicted and a deficiency in getting interested in things — that’s what depression is.”

So, could a sleep aid like suvorexant, which reduces hypocretin, lead to depression in a healthy person? In clinical trials involving thousands of patients, the drug helped people with insomnia fall asleep faster and stay asleep longer than placebo. And there were no signs that it induced depression or caused falls resembling cataplexy, said Dr. Darryle Schoepp, senior vice president at Merck.

NOAA: 'Robust, Unambiguous' Independent Evidence Confirms The Recent Global Warming Measured By Thermometers

A new compilation of temperature records etched into ice cores, old corals, and lake sediment layers reveals a pattern of global warming from 1880 to 1995 comparable to the global warming trend recorded by thermometers. This finding, reported by a team of researchers from NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, the University of South Carolina, the University of Colorado, and the University of Bern in Switzerland, resolves some of the uncertainty associated with thermometer records, which can be affected by land use changes, shifts in station locations, variations in instrumentation, and more.

“Using only temperature-sensitive paleoclimate proxy records, un-calibrated to instrument data, it is possible to conclude that the warming trend in the global surface temperature record is supported by independent evidence,” said David Anderson, head of the Paleoclimatology Branch at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center and lead author of the paper. The new research is detailed in “Global Warming in an Independent Record of the Past 130 Years,” published online this week in Geophysical Research Letters.

Autism diagnoses on the rise, study finds

U.S. schoolchildren are being diagnosed with some form of autism at a record rate of 1 in 50, according to a new government study.

That rate of 2% is based on a survey involving tens of thousands of children between the ages of 6 and 17. A similar survey in 2007 found a rate of 1.2%.

Though the increase is likely to fuel speculation that an expanding environmental threat is behind the rise in autism cases, the authors said their report did not support that view.

Rather, better detection appears to be driving the surge, according to the researchers, from the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services.

Women abused as children more likely to have children with autism

Women who experienced physical, emotional, or sexual abuse as children are more likely to have a child with autism than women who were not abused, according to a new study from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH). Those who experienced the most serious abuse had the highest likelihood of having a child with autism -- three-and-a-half times more than women who were not abused.

"Our study identifies a completely new risk factor for autism," said lead author Andrea Roberts, research associate in the HSPH Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences. "Further research to understand how a woman's experience of abuse is associated with autism in her children may help us better understand the causes of autism and identify preventable risk factors."

The study appears online March 20, 2013 and in the May 2013 print issue of JAMA Psychiatry. It is the first to explore the relationship between a mother's exposure to childhood abuse and risk of autism in her children.

Monarch Butterflies Hit New Low; "Worrisome" Trend

The king of the butterflies may reign no more: Monarch butterflies are experiencing a steady decline, a new report says, with the insects occupying the smallest area of land in one Mexican butterfly reserve than they have in two decades.

In December 2012, scientists surveying monarch habitat in Mexico's Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve found the insects occupied 59 percent less land than the previous year—the smallest area recorded in 20 years. (Watch a video of monarch butterflies.)

Nine butterfly colonies were found in just 2.94 acres (1.19 hectares) of land, compared with 7.14 acres (2.89 hectares) in 2011 and a high of 44.9 acres (18.19 hectares) in 1997, according to the report, released March 13.

Universe Older Than Thought, Best Space-Time Map Yet Reveals

The universe is 100 million years older than thought, according to the best-ever map of the oldest light in space.

The adjustment brings the universe's age to 13.82 billion years, and means space and time are expanding slightly slower than scientists thought.

March 19, 2013

Global rise in type 1 diabetes may be linked to reduced exposure to pathogens in early life

Countries with lower mortality from infectious disease exhibit higher rates of type 1 diabetes, according to a new study by Dr. A. Abela and Professor S. Fava of the University of Malta. The findings, collating data from three major international studies and presented at the Society for Endocrinology annual conference in Harrogate UK, suggest that the as yet unexplained global rise in type 1 diabetes may be linked to reduced exposure to pathogens in early life.

Type 1 diabetes is caused when the immune system destroys the cells of the pancreas that release insulin, leaving the patient unable to control his own blood sugar. It is estimated to affect around half a million children worldwide, increasing in incidence by an estimated 3% every year. This increase is well documented and is linked to the developed world, but is so far unexplained -- various theories put forward include the 'hygiene hypothesis', which suggests that encounters between the developing immune system and micro-organisms such as bacteria and parasites are part of human evolution and may therefore protect against the development of auto-immunity.

March 18, 2013

Chinese Physicists Measure Speed of "Spooky Action At a Distance"

Einstein railed against the possibility of spooky action at a distance because it violates relativity. Now Chinese physicists have clocked it travelling more than four orders of magnitude faster than light

One of the strangest concepts in quantum mechanics is the notion of entanglement. This is the idea that two quantum particles can be so deeply linked that they share the same existence. When that happens, a measurement on one immediately influences the other, regardless of the distance between them.

This “spooky action at a distance”, as Einstein called it, has puzzled and fascinated physicists since it was first discussed in the 1930s. Einstein initially used it as evidence of the failure of quantum mechanics since this instantaneous action clearly seemed to violate relativity.

March 14, 2013

Analysis: Antibiotic apocalypse

A simple cut to your finger could leave you fighting for your life. Luck will play a bigger role in your future than any doctor could.

The most basic operations - getting an appendix removed or a hip replacement - could become deadly.

Cancer treatments and organ transplants could kill you. Childbirth could once again become a deadly moment in a woman's life.

It's a future without antibiotics.

Bootstrapping biotechnology: Engineers cooperate to realize precision grammar for programming cells

An unprecedented collaboration among academia, industry, government and civil society has resulted in the launch of a professional-grade collection of public domain DNA parts that greatly increases the reliability and precision by which biology can be engineered.

Researchers at the International Open Facility Advancing Biotechnology (aka, BIOFAB) have just announced that they have, in effect, established rules for the first language for engineering gene expression, the layer between the genome and all the dynamic processes of life. The feat is all the more remarkable considering that just a few years ago several prominent scientists claimed that it would be impossible to develop frameworks enabling reliably reusable standard biological parts.

Electrons behaving like a particle and a wave: Feynman's double-slit experiment brought to life

The precise methodology of Richard Feynman's famous double-slit thought-experiment -- a cornerstone of quantum mechanics that showed how electrons behave as both a particle and a wave -- has been followed in full for the very first time.

Although the particle-wave duality of electrons has been demonstrated in a number of different ways since Feynman popularised the idea in 1965, none of the experiments have managed to fully replicate the methodology set out in Volume 3 of Feynman's famous Lectures on Physics.

"The technology to do this experiment has been around for about two decades; however, to do a nice data recording of electrons takes some serious effort and has taken us three years," said lead author of the study Professor Herman Batelaan from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

"Previous double-slit experiments have successfully demonstrated the mysterious properties of electrons, but none have done so using Feynman's methodology, specifically the opening and closing of both slits at will and the ability to detect electrons one at a time.

March 7, 2013

Flip of a single molecular switch makes an old mouse brain young

The flip of a single molecular switch helps create the mature neuronal connections that allow the brain to bridge the gap between adolescent impressionability and adult stability. Now Yale School of Medicine researchers have reversed the process, recreating a youthful brain that facilitated both learning and healing in the adult mouse.

Scientists have long known that the young and old brains are very different. Adolescent brains are more malleable or plastic, which allows them to learn languages more quickly than adults and speeds recovery from brain injuries. The comparative rigidity of the adult brain results in part from the function of a single gene that slows the rapid change in synaptic connections between neurons.

By monitoring the synapses in living mice over weeks and months, Yale researchers have identified the key genetic switch for brain maturation a study released March 6 in the journal Neuron. The Nogo Receptor 1 gene is required to suppress high levels of plasticity in the adolescent brain and create the relatively quiescent levels of plasticity in adulthood. In mice without this gene, juvenile levels of brain plasticity persist throughout adulthood. When researchers blocked the function of this gene in old mice, they reset the old brain to adolescent levels of plasticity.

March 6, 2013

Stressed-out tadpoles grow larger tails to escape predators

When people or animals are thrust into threatening situations such as combat or attack by a predator, stress hormones are released to help prepare the organism to defend itself or to rapidly escape from danger -- the so-called fight-or-flight response.

Now University of Michigan researchers have demonstrated for the first time that stress hormones are also responsible for altering the body shape of developing animals, in this case the humble tadpole, so they are better equipped to survive predator attacks.

Boys are right-handed, girls are left...

Well at least this is true for sugar gliders (Petaurus breviceps) and grey short-tailed opossums (Monodelphis domestica), finds an article in BioMed Central’s open access journal BMC Evolutionary Biology, and shows that handedness in marsupials is dependent on gender. This preference of one hand over another has developed despite the absence of a corpus collosum, the part of the brain which in placental mammals allows one half of the brain to communicate with the other.

Many animals show a distinct preference for using one hand/paw/hoof over another. This is often related to posture – an animal is more likely to show manual laterality if it is upright, related to the difficulty of the task, more complex tasks show a handed preference, or even with age. As an example of all three: crawling human babies show less hand preference than toddlers.

Some species also show a distinct sex effect in handedness but among non-marsupial mammals this tendency is for left-handed males and right-handed females. In contrast researchers from St Petersburg State University show that male quadruped marsupials, such as who walk on all fours, tend to be right-handed while the females are left-handed, especially as tasks became more difficult.

Females butterflies can smell if a male butterfly is inbred

The mating success of male butterflies is often lower if they are inbred. But how do female butterflies know which males to avoid? New research reveals that inbred male butterflies produce significantly less sex pheromones, making them less attractive to females.

If animals (and humans) breed with a relative their offspring will be inbred and more likely to have genetic disorders. Because of these disorders inbred males are often weaker and, for instance, less able to defend the nest or provide food for their youngsters. To make sure her offspring will have the highest chance of survival and reproduction, females are expected to avoid mating with a weak inbred male. That is, if she is able to recognize who is inbred and who is not.

March 5, 2013

Why fish is so good for you

Scientists of Friedrich Schiller University Jena and Jena University Hospital decode the antihypertensive impact of omega-3 fatty acids. In two newly published articles in the science journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences they describe how they analyzed the impact of omega-3 fatty acids at a systemic level and they also described the underlying molecular mechanisms for the first time.

Fish is healthy: easy to digest and with a high level of precious proteins, fish is considered an important part of a healthy diet. And with the so-called omega-3 fatty acids fish has an added bonus. These fatty acids -- like docosahexaeonic acid (DHA) occur mostly in fatty fish like herring, salmon and mackerel. They are thought to lower the blood pressure, to strengthen the immune system and to have positive effects on the development on the nervous system and the cardiovascular system.

"Clinical studies about the intake of nutritional supplements containing omega-3 fatty acids haven't provided complete clarity so far," Prof. Dr. Stefan H. Heinemann from Friedrich Schiller University Jena (Germany) says. "The molecular impact of the omega-3 fatty acids isn't fully understood yet," the biophysicist continues. But now scientists of the DFG research group FOR 1738 based at Jena University are able to bring new facts to light: in two newly published articles for the well-known science magazine 'Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA' they describe how they analyzed the impact of omega-3 fatty acids on a systemic level and they also described the underlying molecular mechanisms for the first time.

March 4, 2013

Life experiences put their stamp on the next generation: New insights from epigenetics

The 18th century natural philosopher Jean-Baptiste Lamarck proposed that the necks of giraffes lengthened as a consequence of the cumulative effort, across generations, to reach leaves just out of their grasp. This view of evolution was largely abandoned with the advent of modern genetic theories to explain the transmission of most important traits and many medical illnesses across generations.

However, there has long been the impression that major life events, like psychological traumas, not only have effects on individuals who directly experience these events, but also have effects on their children. For example, cross-generational effects have been well-documented in the children of Nazi death camp survivors. Similar issues have been reported in the context of mood disorders and addiction. Until recently, these trans-generational effects were attributed to changes in the way that parents treated their children or the child's reaction to learning about the parent's history.