182 articles from TUESDAY 10.9.2019

A little kindness goes a long way for worker performance and health

Small gestures of kindness by employers can have big impacts on employees' health and work performance, according to an international team of researchers. The team specifically examined the effects of employers enhancing the lunches of bus drivers in China with fresh fruit and found that it reduced depression among the drivers and increased their confidence in their own work performance.

Satellite data record shows climate change's impact on fires

While every fire needs a spark to ignite and fuel to burn, it's the hot and dry conditions in the atmosphere that determine the likelihood of a fire starting, its intensity and the speed at which it spreads. Over the past several decades, as the world has increasingly warmed, so has its potential to burn.

Satellite data record shows climate change's impact on fires

"Hot and dry" are the watchwords for large fires. In just seconds, a spark in hot and dry conditions can set off an inferno consuming thick, dried-out vegetation and almost everything else in its path. While every fire needs a spark to ignite and fuel to burn, hot and dry conditions in the atmosphere play a significant role in determining the likelihood of a fire starting, its intensity and the...

New method of analyzing networks reveals hidden patterns in data

A new way of measuring how relationships in a network change over time can reveal important details about the network, according to researchers at Penn State and the Korean Rural Economic Institute. For example, when applied to the world economy, the method detected the greatest amount of network change during 2008-2009, the time of the global financial crisis.

Government housing voucher program effectively reduces homeless veteran population

Homelessness is a persistent and significant public policy and public health challenge, disproportionately affecting veterans. However, the fiscal year 2020 budget negotiated between President Donald Trump and Speaker Nancy Pelosi includes no growth in funding for the Housing and Urban Development-Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing (HUD-VASH) voucher program.

Satellite Data Record Shows Climate Change's Impact on Fires

Portal origin URL: Satellite Data Record Shows Climate Change's Impact on FiresPortal origin nid: 451542Published: Tuesday, September 10, 2019 - 14:30Featured (stick to top of list): noPortal text teaser: While every fire needs a spark to ignite and fuel to burn, it's the hot and dry conditions in the atmosphere that determine the likelihood of a fire starting, its...

Foot artists have finely-tuned 'toe-maps' in their brains

Artists who paint with their feet because they were born without arms have individualized areas of the brain assigned to each of their toes, a trait not found in handed people, scientists have reported. "We're trying to find the relationship between behavior and how that shapes representations in our brain," co-author Daan Wesselink told AFP, specifically the somatosensory...

Promising mobile technologies find methane leaks quickly, study finds

On trucks, drones and airplanes, 10 promising technologies for finding natural gas leaks swiftly and cheaply competed in the Mobile Monitoring Challenge, the first independent assessment of moving gas leak detectors at well sites. The organizers of the contest—Stanford University's Natural Gas Initiative and the Environmental Defense Fund—describe the outcomes in a study published Sept. 10 in...

A little kindness goes a long way for worker performance and health

Small gestures of kindness by employers can have big impacts on employees' health and work performance, according to an international team of researchers. The team specifically examined the effects of employers enhancing the lunches of bus drivers in China with fresh fruit and found that it reduced depression among the drivers and increased their confidence in their own work performance.

How babies absorb calcium could be key to treating osteoporosis in seniors

New research reveals the mechanism that allows breastfeeding babies to absorb large amounts of calcium and build healthy bones -- a discovery that could lead to treatment for osteoporosis and other bone diseases later in life. The researchers identified calcium-absorbing channels in the lower two-thirds of the small intestines of breastfed infant mice.

Tides don't always flush water out to sea

In Willapa Bay in Washington state, scientists discovered that water washing over tidal flats during high tides is largely the same water that washed over them during the previous high tide. This 'old' water has not been mixed with 'new' water and has lower levels of food for creatures in the bay. Oysters grown on flats where 'old' water stays longer showed a 25% drop in dry tissue weight per...

Electric eel produces highest voltage discharge of any known animal

South American rivers are home to at least three different species of electric eels, including a newly identified species capable of generating a greater electrical discharge than any other known animal, according to a new analysis of 107 fish collected in Brazil, French Guiana, Guyana and Suriname in recent years.

Scientists discover hidden differences among cells that may help them evade drug therapy

Researchers have discovered that seemingly identical cells can use different protein molecules to carry out the same function in an important cellular process. The scientists named this newly discovered variability 'functional mosaicism,' and it has significant implications for the development of therapeutic treatments, which are often designed to target a specific molecule, or a gene that...

Studying vision in pitch-darkness shines light on how a mammal's brain drives behavior

By studying behavior of mice navigating a maze in near-complete darkness using infra-red cameras and deep-learning trained models, neuroscientists are able to interpret what neural signals mean to the brain with unprecedented resolution. Their first discovery, that spike trains in ON channel neurons control vision behavior in low light, threatens to overturn a decades-old assumption in...

Breast cancer cells 'stick together' to spread through the body during metastasis

Researchers have discovered that a cell adhesion protein, E-cadherin, allows breast cancer cells to survive as they travel through the body and form new tumors, a process termed metastasis. Their conclusions, obtained through laboratory experiments and in mouse models, help explain how metastasis works in the most common form of breast cancer, invasive ductal carcinoma. E-cadherin appears to limit...

What the noggin of modern humans' ancestor would have looked like

Despite having lived about 300,000 years ago, the oldest ancestor of all members of our species had a surprisingly modern skull -- as suggested by a new model. After comparing the virtually rendered skull to five African fossil specimens contemporaneous with the first appearance of Homo sapiens, the two researchers posit that our species emerged through interbreeding of South and East African...

How salamanders harness limb regeneration to buffer selves from climate change

Researchers have shown for the first time that salamanders inhabiting the Southern Appalachian Mountains use temperature rather than humidity as the best cue to anticipate changes in their environment. Significantly, they observed that these salamanders actually harness their unique ability to regenerate limbs to rapidly minimize the impact of hot temperatures. The findings may have implications...

From New York to Chile, lead contamination project develops citizen science

If you live in an industrial-era urban setting, chances are that soil in your vicinity is contaminated with lead, arsenic, or other heavy metals. With support from the National Science Foundation, a team of researchers is developing a "citizen science" soil research project in Troy, New York and Tierra Amarilla, Chile that engages residents in greater understanding of contaminants in their midst...

Tides don't always flush water out to sea, study shows

By area, tidal flats make up more than 50 percent of Willapa Bay in southwest Washington state, making this more than 142-square-mile estuary an ideal location for oyster farming. On some parts of these flats, oysters grow well, filling their shells with delicacies for discerning diners. But according to experienced oyster farmers, oysters raised in other parts of Willapa Bay don't yield as much...