Molecule shown to repair damaged axons

Molecule shown to repair damaged axons
A foray into plant biology led one researcher to discover that a natural molecule can repair axons, the thread-like projections that carry electrical signals between cells. Axonal damage is the major culprit underlying disability in conditions such as spinal cord injury and stroke.

Andrew Kaplan, a PhD candidate at the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital of McGill University, was looking for a pharmacological approach to axon regeneration, with a focus on 14-3-3, a family of proteins with neuroprotective functions that have been under investigation in the laboratory of Dr. Alyson Fournier, professor of neurology and neurosurgery and senior author on the study.

During his search, he found research describing how plants respond to a specific type of fungal infection. When plants are exposed to fusicoccin-A, a small molecule produced by a certain strain of fungus, the leaves of the plant wilt but the roots grow longer. Fusicoccin-A affects 14-3-3 activity by stabilizing its interactions with other proteins.

“While 14-3-3 is the common denominator in this phenomenon, the identity of the other proteins involved and the resulting biological activities differ between plants and animals,” says Kaplan.

Kaplan theorized that fusicoccin-A could be an effective way of harnessing 14-3-3 to repair axons. To test this theory, he and his fellow researchers treated mechanically damaged neurons in culture with the molecule and observed the results.

“When I looked under the microscope the following day the axons were growing like weeds, an exciting result that led us to determine that fusicoccin-A can stimulate axon repair in the injured nervous system,” says Kaplan

Source and further reading:
http://www.mcgill.ca/neuro/channels/news/molecule-shown-repair-damaged-axons-266571

Journal article:
http://www.cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S0896-6273(17)30102-2

#neuroscience #axonrepair #research #medicine

Before going on a boat trip, remember ...

Before going on a boat trip, remember ...
Motion sickness, also known as kinetosis and travel sickness, is a condition in which a disagreement exists between visually perceived movement and the vestibular system's sense of movement.

Therefore take a couple of dramamines and you won't end up like me...sick and grumpy ;)

#personalnonsense #kinetosis

A Total Eclipse at the End of the World

A Total Eclipse at the End of the World
Would you go to the end of the world to see a total eclipse of the Sun? If you did, would you be surprised to find someone else there already? In 2003, the Sun, the Moon, Antarctica, and two photographers all lined up in Antarctica during an unusual total solar eclipse.

Even given the extreme location, a group of enthusiastic eclipse chasers ventured near the bottom of the world to experience the surreal momentary disappearance of the Sun behind the Moon. One of the treasures collected was the featured picture -- a composite of four separate images digitally combined to realistically simulate how the adaptive human eye saw the eclipse.

As the image was taken, both the Moon and the Sun peeked together over an Antarctic ridge. In the sudden darkness, the magnificent corona of the Sun became visible around the Moon. Quite by accident, another photographer was caught in one of the images checking his video camera. Visible to his left are an equipment bag and a collapsible chair. A more easily visible solar eclipse will occur in about three weeks and be visible from the USA.

Image and info via APOD
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Image Credit & Copyright: Fred Bruenjes (moonglow.net)

#space #NASA #naturalphenomena #eclipse

#mypretties

#mypretties

Probiotic in Yogurt Reverses Depression

Probiotic in Yogurt Reverses Depression
Researchers at the University of Virginia School of Medicine have reversed depression symptoms in mice by feeding them Lactobacillus , a probiotic bacteria found in live-cultures yogurt. Further, they have discovered a specific mechanism for how the bacteria affect mood, providing a direct link between the health of the gut microbiome and mental health.

Based on their findings, the researchers are optimistic that their discovery will hold true in people and are planning to confirm their findings in patients with depression.

“The big hope for this kind of research is that we won’t need to bother with complex drugs and side effects when we can just play with the microbiome,” explained lead researcher Alban Gaultier, PhD. “It would be magical just to change your diet, to change the bacteria you take, and fix your health and your mood.

Source and further reading:
http://newsroom.uvahealth.com/2017/03/07/probiotic-found-in-yogurt-can-reverse-depression-symptoms-in-mice-uva-finds/

Journal article:
https://www.nature.com/articles/srep43859

#neuroscience #depression #microbiota #probiotic #research #health

Noodle Mosaic of Saturn

Noodle Mosaic of Saturn
On April 26 the Cassini spacecraft swooped toward Saturn on the first of its Grand Finale dives between Saturn and rings. In this long, thin, noodle mosaic, a rapid series of 137 low resolution images captured by Cassini's wide-angle camera track its progress across the gas giant's swirling cloud tops.

The mosaic projection maps the arc along Saturn's atmospheric curve on to a flat image plane. At top, the first mosaic panel is centered at 90 degrees north, about 72,400 kilometers above Saturn's dark north polar vortex. As the mosaic progresses it narrows, the pixel scale shrinking from 8.7 kilometers to 1 kilometer per pixel.

For the last panel, the spacecraft is 8,374 kilometers above a region 18 degrees north of Saturn's equator. Frame orientation changes near the bottom as Cassini rotates to maneuver its large, dish-shaped, high-gain antenna forward, providing a shield before crossing Saturn's ring plane.

Image and info via APOD:
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, Space Science Institute, Hampton University

#science #universe #saturn #cassini #NASA #space

Milky Way's origins are not what they seem

Milky Way's origins are not what they seem
In a first-of-its-kind analysis, Northwestern University astrophysicists have discovered that, contrary to previously standard lore, up to half of the matter in our Milky Way galaxy may come from distant galaxies. As a result, each one of us may be made in part from extragalactic matter.

Using supercomputer simulations, the research team found a major and unexpected new mode for how galaxies, including our own Milky Way, acquired their matter: intergalactic transfer. The simulations show that supernova explosions eject copious amounts of gas from galaxies, which causes atoms to be transported from one galaxy to another via powerful galactic winds. Intergalactic transfer is a newly identified phenomenon, which simulations indicate will be critical for understanding how galaxies evolve.

"Given how much of the matter out of which we formed may have come from other galaxies, we could consider ourselves space travelers or extragalactic immigrants," said Daniel Anglés-Alcázar, a postdoctoral fellow in Northwestern's astrophysics center, CIERA (Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics), who led the study. "It is likely that much of the Milky Way's matter was in other galaxies before it was kicked out by a powerful wind, traveled across intergalactic space and eventually found its new home in the Milky Way."

Source and further reading:
https://phys.org/news/2017-07-milky.html

Journal article:
https://arxiv.org/abs/1610.08523

Photo via Reddit
Photo credit: Fred Herrmann

#science #physics #intergalactictransfer #matter #space #research #astrophysics

Sussex scientists pinpoint sensory links between autism and synaesthesia

Sussex scientists pinpoint sensory links between autism and synaesthesia
Concrete links between the symptoms of autism and synaesthesia have been discovered and clarified for the first time, according to new research by psychologists at the University of Sussex.

The study, conducted by world-leading experts in both conditions at Sussex and the University of Cambridge and published in the journal Scientific Reports, found that both groups experience remarkably similar heightened sensory sensitivity, despite clear differences in communicative ability and social skills.

Two previous studies had found an increased prevalence of synaesthesia in autistic subjects, suggesting that although they are not always found in conjunction, the two conditions occur together more often than would be expected by chance alone. However, this is the first study that has attempted to draw a definitive symptomatic link between the two.

Synaesthesia and autism seem on the surface to be rather different things, with synaesthesia defined as a 'joining of the senses' in which music may trigger colours or words may trigger tastes, and autism defined by impaired social understanding and communication.

The new research shows that both groups report heightened sensory sensitivity, such as an aversion to certain sounds and lights, as well as reporting differences in their tendency to attend to detail.

However, the synaesthetes tended not to report difficulties on the traditional communicative symptoms that usually define autism. While the research shows that there are certainly links between the two conditions, these appear to be sensory rather than social.

Source and further reading:
http://m.sussex.ac.uk/newsandevents/index?id=39479

Journal article:
https://www.nature.com/articles/srep41155

#neuroscience #synaesthesia #autism #research #brain

A Sagittarius Triplet

A Sagittarius Triplet
These three bright nebulae are often featured on telescopic tours of the constellation Sagittarius and the crowded starfields of the central Milky Way. In fact, 18th century cosmic tourist Charles Messier cataloged two of them; M8, the large nebula above and left of center, and colorful M20 near the bottom of the frame.

The third emission region includes NGC 6559, right of M8 and separated from the larger nebula by a dark dust lane. All three are stellar nurseries about five thousand light-years or so distant. Over a hundred light-years across the expansive M8 is also known as the Lagoon Nebula. M20's popular moniker is the Trifid.

Glowing hydrogen gas creates the dominant red color of the emission nebulae. In striking contrast, blue hues in the Trifid are due to dust reflected starlight. The colorful composite skyscape was recorded with two different telescopes to capture a widefield image of the area and individual close-ups at higher resolution.

Image & info via APOD:
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Image Credit & Copyright: Josep Drudis

#NASA #space #science #universe #nebulae

The quantum carrier pigeon that wasn’t there

The quantum carrier pigeon that wasn’t there
Counterfactual communication is a puzzling quantum concept in which two parties can exchange information without any photon or other physical messenger passing between them.

Here's how it's done:
http://physicstoday.scitation.org/do/10.1063/PT.6.1.20170720a/full/

Journal article:
http://m.pnas.org/content/114/19/4920

#physics #science #counterfactualcommunication #research

There's a sunrise and a sunset every single day, and they're absolutely free. Don't miss so many of them.

There's a sunrise and a sunset every single day, and they're absolutely free. Don't miss so many of them.

#personalnonsense

Infant MRIs show autism linked to increased cerebrospinal fluid

Infant MRIs show autism linked to increased cerebrospinal fluid
A national research network led by UNC School of Medicine’s Joseph Piven, MD, found that many toddlers diagnosed with autism at two years of age had a substantially greater amount of extra-axial cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) at six and 12 months of age, before diagnosis is possible. They also found that the more CSF at six months – as measured through MRIs – the more severe the autism symptoms were at two years of age.

“The CSF is easy to see on standard MRIs and points to a potential biomarker of autism before symptoms appear years later,” said Piven, co-senior author of the study, the Thomas E. Castelloe Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry, and director of the Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities (CIDD). “We also think this finding provides a potential therapeutic target for a subset of people with autism.”

The findings, published in Biological Psychiatry, point to faulty CSF flow as one of the possible causes of autism for a large subset of people.

“We know that CSF is very important for brain health, and our data suggest that in this large subset of kids, the fluid is not flowing properly,” said Mark Shen, PhD, CIDD postdoctoral fellow and first author of the study. “We don’t expect there’s a single mechanism that explains the cause of the condition for every child. But we think improper CSF flow could be one important mechanism.”

Source and further reading:
http://news.unchealthcare.org/news/2017/march/infant-mris-show-autism-linked-to-increased-cerebrospinal-fluid

Image:
Right: MRI of a baby at 6 months who was diagnosed with autism at 2 years. The dark space between the brain folds and skull indicate increased amounts of cerebrospinal fluid.
Left: MRI of a baby who was not diagnosed with autism at age 2.

#neuroscience #research #autism #CSF #medicine #brain

Catching speeding stars

Catching speeding stars
This animation reveals the evolution of stars in our Galaxy over the past million of years.

It starts from the positions of stars in the sky 1 035 000 years ago, which were calculated using data from the Tycho-Gaia Astrometric Solution, or TGAS, one of the products of the first Gaia data release. The video follows the evolution of stellar positions until the present day, ending with a view of the sky as measured by Gaia between 2014 and 2015.

Highlighted in yellow are the trajectories of six special stars: these are hypervelocity stars, moving through the Galaxy at several hundred of km/s. While it might not be apparent from the video, which shows the motions of stars as projected on the sky, they are moving through space much faster than the galactic average.

Scientists spotted these speeding stars from the TGAS data set of two million stars with the help of an artificial neural network – software that mimics a human brain – and they are looking forward to finding many more in future Gaia data releases.

These stars owe their high speeds to past interactions with the supermassive black hole that sits at the centre of the Milky Way and, with a mass of four million Suns, governs the orbits of stars in its vicinity. Having travelled great distances through the Galaxy, they provide crucial information about the gravitational field of the Milky Way from the centre to its outskirts.

One of the six stars (labelled 1 at the end of the video) seems to be speeding so fast, at over 500 km/s, that it is no longer bound by the gravity of the Galaxy and will eventually leave. The other five stars are somewhat slower (over 400 km/s for the stars labelled 2, 3, 4 and 6, and 360 km/s for the star labelled 5) and are still bound to the Galaxy.

These slightly slower stars are perhaps even more fascinating, as scientists are eager to learn what slowed them down – the invisible dark matter that is thought to pervade the Milky Way might also have played a role.

The stars are plotted in Galactic coordinates and using a rectangular projection: in this, the plane of the Milky Way stands out as the horizontal band with greater density of stars. The stripes visible in the final frames reflect the way Gaia scans the sky and the preliminary nature of the first data release; these artefacts are gradually washed out in the video as stars move across the sky.

Source and further reading:
http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/Gaia/Artificial_brain_helps_Gaia_catch_speeding_stars

Credit:
ESA/Gaia/DPAC

#universe #Gaia #ESA #exploration #science #stars

Mercury as Revealed by MESSENGER

Mercury as Revealed by MESSENGER
Mercury had never been seen like this before. In 2008, the roboticMESSENGER spacecraft buzzed past Mercury for the second time and imaged terrain mapped previously only by comparatively crude radar. The featured image was recorded as MESSENGER looked back 90 minutes after passing, from an altitude of about 27,000 kilometers.

Visible in the image, among many other newly imaged features, are unusually long rays that appear to run like meridians of longitude out from a young crater near the northern limb.MESSENGER entered orbit around Mercury in 2011 and finished its primary mission in 2012, but took detailed measurements until 2015, at which time it ran out of fuel and so was instructed to impact Mercury's surface.

Image and info via APOD:
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap170723.html
Image Credit: MESSENGER, NASA, JHU APL, CIW

#space #NASA #science #universe #exploration #Mercury

Apollo 11: Catching Some Sun

Apollo 11: Catching Some Sun
Bright sunlight glints and long dark shadows mark this image of the lunar surface. It was taken July 20, 1969 by Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong, the first to walk on the Moon. Pictured is the mission's lunar module, the Eagle, and spacesuited lunar module pilot Buzz Aldrin unfurling a long sheet of foil also known as the Solar Wind Composition Experiment.

Exposed facing the Sun, the foil trapped particles streaming outward in the solar wind, catching a sample of material from the Sunitself. Along with moon rocks and lunar soil samples, the solar wind collector was returned for analysis in earthbound laboratories.

Image and info via APOD:
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

Image Credit: Apollo 11, NASA (Image scanned by Kipp Teague)

#universe #exploration #science #NASA #moon #apollo11

Precise technique tracks dopamine in the brain

Precise technique tracks dopamine in the brain
MIT researchers have devised a way to measure dopamine in the brain much more precisely than previously possible, which should allow scientists to gain insight into dopamine’s roles in learning, memory, and emotion.

Dopamine is one of the many neurotransmitters that neurons in the brain use to communicate with each other. Previous systems for measuring these neurotransmitters have been limited in how long they provide accurate readings and how much of the brain they can cover. The new MIT device, an array of tiny carbon electrodes, overcomes both of those obstacles.

“Nobody has really measured neurotransmitter behavior at this spatial scale and timescale. Having a tool like this will allow us to explore potentially any neurotransmitter-related disease,” says Michael Cima, the David H. Koch Professor of Engineering in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, a member of MIT’s Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, and the senior author of the study.

Source & further reading:
http://news.mit.edu/2017/precise-technique-tracks-dopamine-brain-0303

Journal article:
http://pubs.rsc.org/en/Content/ArticleLanding/2017/LC/C6LC01398H#!divAbstract

#neuroscience #research #dopamine #brain

What is quantum teleportation and more importantly, what it isn't?

What is quantum teleportation and more importantly, what it isn't?
Quantum teleportation transfers the quantum state of one particle onto another, identical particle, and at the same time erases the state in the original. This situation can’t be meaningfully distinguished from one in which the original particle itself has been moved to the target location: that transport has not really happened, but to all appearances it might as well have.

Crucially, however, this works only if you do not know what ‘information’ you are sending — that is, what the quantum state of the original particle actually is.

Teleportation of a quantum state uses the phenomenon of quantum entanglement as a means of transmission. When two or more particles are entangled, their quantum states are interdependent, no matter how far apart they are. In effect, they act as a single quantum object, described by a single wavefunction — the mathematical construct that encodes all the quantum properties of the object.

Here's a good explainer of what quantum teleportation is, and perhaps more importantly, what it isn't via Nature:
http://www.nature.com/news/quantum-teleportation-is-even-weirder-than-you-think-1.22321

Infographic via JPL/NASA
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=4384

#science #physics #quantumteleportation #JPL

Ireson Hill on Mars

Ireson Hill on Mars
What created this unusual hill on Mars? Its history has become a topic of research, but its shape and two-tone structure makes it one of the more unusual hills that the robotic Curiosity rover on Mars has rolled near. Dubbed Ireson Hill, the mound rises about 5 meters high and spans about 15 meters across. Ireson Hill is located on the Bagnold Dune fieldon the slope of Mount Sharp in Gale Crater on Mars.

The featured 41-image panorama has been horizontally compressed to include the entire hill. The image was taken on February 2 and released last week. Because Mars is moving behind the Sun as seen from the Earth, NASA will soon stop sending commands to its Martian orbiters and rovers until about August 1. 

Image and info via APOD:
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Image Credit: NASA, JPL-Caltech, MSSS

#space #universe #exploration #science #NASA #mars

CRISPR Biologists Use Gene Editing to Store Movies in DNA

CRISPR Biologists Use Gene Editing to Store Movies in DNA
Researchers have used the microbial immune system CRISPR–Cas to encode a movie into the genome of the bacterium Escherichia coli.

The technical achievement, reported on July 12 in Nature, is a step towards creating cellular recording systems that are capable of encoding a series of events, says Seth Shipman, a synthetic biologist at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts. While studying brain development, Shipman became frustrated by the lack of a technique to capture how cells in the brain take on distinct identities. This inspired him to explore the possibility of making cellular recorders.

“Cells have this privileged access to all sorts of information,” he says. “I would like to have these molecular recordings functioning in the developing nervous system and recording information.”

Source and further reading:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/lights-cameras-crispr-biologists-use-gene-editing-to-store-movies-in-dna1/?sf98331545=1

Image:
Original images of the galloping mare Annie G. (left) are shown next to images encoded into bacterial DNA and recovered (right) using the gene-editing tool CRISPR.
Credit: Seth Shipman via GIPHY

#science #scitech #CRISPR #BIOTECH #medicine #research

Bastille Day Solar Flare and a Coronal Mass Ejection

Bastille Day Solar Flare and a Coronal Mass Ejection
A flare medium-sized (M2) flare and a coronal mass ejection erupted from the same, large active region (July 14, 2017). The flare lasted almost two hours, quite a long duration. Coronagraphs on the SOHO spacecraft show a substantial cloud of charged particles blasting into space just after the blast.

The coils arcing over this active region are particles spiraling along magnetic field lines, which were reorganizing themselves after the magnetic field was disrupted by the blast. Images were taken in a wavelength of extreme ultraviolet light.

Source:
https://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/potw/item/820
Credit: Solar Dynamics Observatory, NASA

#space #universe #exploration #science #sun #coronalmassejection #Sdo #NASA

New role of cholesterol in regulating brain proteins discovered

New role of cholesterol in regulating brain proteins discovered
A study led by researchers at the Hospital del Mar Medical Research Institute (IMIM) and the Institute of Medical Physics and Biophysics at the Faculty of Medicine in Charité Hospital, Berlin, published in the journal Nature Communications, demonstrates that the cholesterol present in cell membranes can interfere with the function of an important brain membrane protein, through a previously unknown mode of interaction.

Specifically, cholesterol is capable of regulating the activity of the adenosine receptor, by invading it and accessing the active site. This will allow new ways of interacting with these proteins to be devised that in the future could lead to drugs for treating diseases like Alzheimer's.

Source and further reading:
https://www.imim.cat/news/247/new-role-of-cholesterol-in-regulating-brain-proteins-discovered

Journal article:
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms14505

#neuroscience #research #braincells #cholesterol #brainproteins

Light Pillars appear when either natural or artificial light bounces off ice crystals floating close to the ground.

Light Pillars appear when either natural or artificial light bounces off ice crystals floating close to the ground. In this case the air was so cold that the ice crystals were forming in the air, reflecting the city's street and business lights.

Read & Learn:
http://www.atoptics.co.uk/halo/lpil.htm

Photo: light pillars in North Bay, Ontario
Photo credit: Timothy Joseph Elzinga

#naturalphenomena #lightpillars #science

Repurposed asthma drug shows blood sugar improvement among some diabetics

Repurposed asthma drug shows blood sugar improvement among some diabetics
Researchers at the University of San Diego School of Medicine have completed a study that shows that an anti-asthma drug may have a positive benefit on blood sugar levels in patients with diabetes.

After 12 weeks of taking an anti-asthma drug, a subset of patients with type 2 diabetes showed a clinically significant reduction in blood glucose during the randomized, double blind, placebo controlled clinical trial.

The results of the trial were published in Cell Metabolism.
"When we looked at the drug-treated group we saw a bimodal distribution, that is, there were some responders and some non-responders. We didn't understand why, so we did a molecular analysis from biopsies of fat cells we took from patients at the beginning and end of the study," said Alan Saltiel, PhD, director of the UC San Diego Institute for Diabetes and Metabolic Health.

"In the responder group, the level of inflammation in fat was higher than in the non-responder group at the beginning of the study, indicating that there is something about inflammation that predisposes a person to respond. And, what was really amazing was that there were more than 1,000 gene changes that occurred exclusively in the respinders".

Source and further reading:
https://health.ucsd.edu/news/releases/Pages/2017-07-05-repurposed-asthma-drug-shows-blood-sugar-improvement-among-some-diabetics.aspx

Journal article:
http://www.cell.com/cell-metabolism/fulltext/S1550-4131%2817%2930348-0

#research #asthma #bloodsugar #diabetes #medicine

Playing Favorites: Brain Cells Prefer One Parent’s Gene Over the Other’s

Playing Favorites: Brain Cells Prefer One Parent’s Gene Over the Other’s
Most kids say they love their mom and dad equally, but there are times when even the best prefers one parent over the other. The same can be said for how the body’s cells treat our DNA instructions. It has long been thought that each copy - one inherited from mom and one from dad - is treated the same. A new study from scientists at the University of Utah School of Medicine shows that it is not uncommon for cells in the brain to preferentially activate one copy over the other. The finding breaks basic tenants of classic genetics and suggests new ways in which genetic mutations might cause brain disorders.

In at least one region of the newborn mouse brain, the new research shows, inequality seems to be the norm. About 85 percent of genes in the dorsal raphe nucleus, known for secreting the mood-controlling chemical serotonin, differentially activate their maternal and paternal gene copies. Ten days later in the juvenile brain, the landscape shifts, with both copies being activated equally for all but 10 percent of genes.  

More than an oddity of the brain, the disparity also takes place at other sites in the body, including liver and muscle. It also occurs in humans.

Source and further reading
https://healthcare.utah.edu/publicaffairs/news/2017/02/chris-gregg-genetics-close-up.php

Journal article:
http://www.cell.com/neuron/fulltext/S0896-6273(17)30057-0

Image Credit: Spherical Chicken Studios

#neuroscience #research #braincells #serotonin

Lightning Eclipse from the Planet of the Goats

Lightning Eclipse from the Planet of the Goats
Thunderstorms almost spoiled this view of the spectacular 2011 June 15 total lunar eclipse. Instead, storm clouds parted for 10 minutes during the total eclipse phase and lightning bolts contributed to the dramatic sky. Captured with a 30-second exposure the scene also inspired one of the more memorable titles (thanks to the astrophotographer) in APOD's now 22-year history.

Of course, the lightning reference clearly makes sense, and the shadow play of the dark lunar eclipse was widely viewed across planet Earth in Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia. The picture itself, however, was shot from the Greek island of Ikaria at Pezi. That area is known as "the planet of the goats" because of the rough terrain and strange looking rocks.

Image and info via APOD
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Image Credit & Copyright: Chris Kotsiopoulos (GreekSky)

#space #universe #exploration #science #naturalphenomena

Unfolded

Unfolded
"See with a different eye, visualize with a colorful mind, manifest your thoughts with the energy within. "
~ M.B. Johnson

Work by Felipe Mahalem
http://felipemahalem.com/

#math #C4D #animation #creativity

Teach yourself everyday happiness with imagery training

Teach yourself everyday happiness with imagery training
In a recently published paper in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, scientists at the Smartbrain Clinic in Oslo, Norway find that self-guided positive imagery training can successfully combat negative emotions in our daily lives. This tool is so powerful that it also changes the way our brain functions.

Flashbacks of scenes from traumatic events often haunt those suffering from psychiatric conditions, such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). “The close relationship between the human imagery system and our emotions can cause deep emotional perturbations”, says Dr Svetla Velikova of Smartbrain in Norway. “Imagery techniques are often used in cognitive psychotherapy to help patients modify disturbing mental images and overcome negative emotions.” Velikova and her team set out to see if such techniques could become self-guided and developed at home, away from the therapist’s chair.

To find out if we can train ourselves to use imagery techniques and optimize our emotional state, Velikova and co-workers turned to 30 healthy volunteers. During a two-day workshop the volunteers learnt a series of imagery techniques. They learnt how to cope with negative emotions from past events through imagery transformation, how to use positive imagery for future events or goals, and techniques to improve social interactions and enhance their emotional balance in daily life.  They then spent the next 12 weeks training themselves at home for 15-20 minutes a day, before attending another similar two-day workshop.

Velikova compared the results of participant psychological assessment and brain activity, or electroencephalographic (EEG), measurement, before and after the experiment. “The psychological testing showed that depressive symptoms were less prominent. The number of those with subthreshold depression, expressing depressive symptoms but not meeting the criteria for depression, was halved. Overall, volunteers were more satisfied with life and perceived themselves as more efficient” she explains.

Following analysis, the EEG data showed significant changes in the beta activity in the right medial prefrontal cortex of the brain. Velikova notes that this region is known to be involved in imaging pleasant emotions and contributing to the degree of satisfaction with life. There were also changes in the functional connectivity of the brain, including increased connectivity between the temporal regions from both hemispheres, which Velikova attributes to enhanced coordination of networks linked to processing of images. She concludes, “this combination of EEG findings also suggests a possible increase in the activity of GABA (gamma -aminobutyric acid), well known for its anti-anxiety and antidepressant properties.”

Source and further reading:
https://blog.frontiersin.org/2017/03/01/teach-yourself-everyday-happiness-with-imagery-training/

Journal article:
http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnhum.2016.00664/full#

#neuroscience #research #imagerytraining #happiness #science

NGC 4449: Close-up of a Small Galaxy

NGC 4449: Close-up of a Small Galaxy
Grand spiral galaxies often seem to get all the glory. Their young, blue star clusters and pink star forming regions along sweeping spiral arms are guaranteed to attract attention. But small irregular galaxies form stars too, like NGC 4449, about 12 million light-years distant. Less than 20,000 light-years across, the small island universe is similar in size, and often compared to our Milky Way's satellite galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud(LMC).

This remarkable Hubble Space Telescope close-up of the well-studiedgalaxy was reprocessed to highlight the telltale reddish glow of hydrogen gas. The glow traces NGC 4449's widespread star forming regions, some even larger than those in the LMC, with enormous interstellar arcs and bubbles blown by short-lived, massive stars. NGC 4449 is a member of a group of galaxies found in the constellation Canes Venatici. It also holds the distinction of being the first dwarf galaxy with an identified tidal star stream.

Image and info via APOD
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Image Credit & Copyright: Data - Hubble Legacy Archive, ESA, NASA; 
Processing - Domingo Pestana Galvan, Raul Villaverde Fraile

#NASA #space #universe #exploration #science

Quantum computing with neutral atoms

Quantum computing with neutral atoms
As researchers rush to develop powerful quantum computers, a handful of physical platforms have emerged as prime contenders for use as quantum bits, or qubits. They include trapped ions, superconductors, photons, quantum dots, and spins in solid-state hosts. David Weiss and Mark Saffman make the case for using neutral atoms as qubits.

Neutral atoms are all identical and can readily be prepared by optical pumping in well-defined initial states. Their qubit states can be precisely measured using fluorescence. And in some cases they can be well isolated from the environment, which allows for long decoherence times; last year, more than seven seconds was demonstrated for an array of single atoms. Most notably, many atoms can be trapped in close proximity without affecting each other’s quantum states unless they are called on to do so.

Interesting article via Physics Today:
http://physicstoday.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/PT.3.3626

Image:
This hexagonal vacuum cell was used for quantum gate experiments in a 49-site, two-dimensional array at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. The cell was fabricated by ColdQuanta Inc out of antireflection-coated pieces of glass. The all-glass construction provides access for numerous laser beams to cool and trap atoms and to control an array of qubits.

#physics #quantumcomputing #research #science #qubits

NASA's SDO Watches a Sunspot Turn Toward Earth

NASA's SDO Watches a Sunspot Turn Toward Earth
An active region on the sun — an area of intense and complex magnetic fields — has rotated into view on the sun and seems to be growing rather quickly in this video captured by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory between July 5-11, 2017.

Such sunspots are a common occurrence on the sun, but are less frequent as we head toward solar minimum, which is the period of low solar activity during its regular approximately 11-year cycle. This sunspot is the first to appear after the sun was spotless for two days, and it is the only sunspot group at this moment. Like freckles on the face of the sun, they appear to be small features, but size is relative: The dark core of this sunspot is actually larger than Earth.

Source:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2017/nasas-sdo-watches-a-sunspot-turn-toward-earth

Credits: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/SDO/Joy Ng, producer

#universe #SDO #NASA #sun #science

Jupiter's Great Red Spot

Jupiter's Great Red Spot
Images of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot reveal a tangle of dark, veinous clouds weaving their way through a massive crimson oval. The JunoCam imager aboard NASA's Juno mission snapped pics of the most iconic feature of the solar system’s largest planetary inhabitant during its Monday (July 10) flyby. The images of the Great Red Spot were downlinked from the spacecraft’s memory on Tuesday and placed on the mission’s JunoCam website Wednesday morning.

“For hundreds of years scientists have been observing, wondering and theorizing about Jupiter’s Great Red Spot,” said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. “Now we have the best pictures ever of this iconic storm. It will take us some time to analyze all the data from not only JunoCam, but Juno’s eight science instruments, to shed some new light on the past, present and future of the Great Red Spot.”

Source & further reading:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/nasa-s-juno-spacecraft-spots-jupiter-s-great-red-spot

JunoCam site:
https://www.missionjuno.swri.edu/junocam/processing

Image: This enhanced-color image of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot was created by citizen scientist Jason Major using data from the JunoCam imager on NASA’s Juno spacecraft.
Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Jason Major

#nasa #Juno #jupiter #GreatRedSpot #Science #universe #research

Regrowing Hearts

Regrowing Hearts
For centuries, humans have marveled at lizards’ ability to regrow lost tails. Our fragile bodies just don’t have this same natural capacity for regrowth, but other species’ tricks of regeneration do present a tantalizing prospect: if we can understand them, can we harness similar mechanisms ourselves?

Zebrafish, for example, can recover from heart injuries in a way humans cannot. The zebrafish heart pictured is well on the way to recovery one week after an injury (bottom), as new cardiomyocytes – heart muscle cells – are generated by nearby cells to replace lost ones.

Most of our heart cells don’t have that same instinct to kick into action and produce new material when needed, but recent research suggests that if we can pinpoint the mechanism that prompts it in zebrafish cells, there’s a chance the human equivalents could be encouraged to do the same, meaning broken hearts could heal themselves.

Source: Anthony Lewis/ BPoD
http://www.bpod.mrc.ac.uk/archive/2017/7/10

Image by Amy L. Dickson and Kenneth D. Poss, Duke University.
First published on the cover of Science, June 2017

Image copyright held by original authors
Related research published in Science, November 2016
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/354/6312/630

#research #science #heartregrowth #medicine

Messier 63: The Sunflower Galaxy

Messier 63: The Sunflower Galaxy
A bright spiral galaxy of the northern sky, Messier 63 is about 25 million light-years distant in the loyal constellation Canes Venatici. Also cataloged as NGC 5055, the majestic island universe is nearly 100,000 light-years across. That's about the size of our own Milky Way Galaxy. Known by the popular moniker, The Sunflower Galaxy, M63 sports a bright yellowish core in this sharp composite image from space- and ground-based telescopes. 

Its sweeping blue spiral arms are streaked with cosmic dust lanes and dotted with pink star forming regions. A dominant member of a known galaxy group, M63 has faint, extended features that are likely star streams from tidally disrupted satellite galaxies. M63 shines across the electromagnetic spectrum and is thought to haveundergone bursts of intense star formation.

Image and info via APOD
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Image Credit & Copyright: Data - Hubble Legacy Archive, Subaru Telescope (NAOJ), Don Goldman 
Processing - Robert Gendler, Roberto Colombari, Don Goldman

#universe #exploration #science #space #universe #NASA #Hubble

The human brain - in stunning detail.

The human brain - in stunning detail.
The world's most detailed scan of the brain's internal wiring has been produced by scientists at Cardiff University in the UK.

The MRI machine reveals the fibers which carry all the brain's thought processes. Doctors hope it will help increase understanding of a range of neurological disorders and could be used instead of invasive biopsies.

Source & further reading:
http://www.bbc.com/news/health-40488545

#neuroscience #science #research #MRI #humanbrain #medicine

Visualizing the Innards of Subatomic Particles

Visualizing the Innards of Subatomic Particles
Last week, a new kind of heavy particle was discovered by physicists using the Large Hadron Collider.

“The particle, known as Xi-cc++ (pronounced “Ksī-CC plus-plus”), is composed of three smaller elementary particles called quarks—specifically, one lighter-weight ‘up’ quark like those found in protons and neutrons and two ‘charm’ quarks, which are a heavier and more exotic variety.”

For context, here’s a peek inside a more familiar particle—the proton—and a visual guide to other theoretical quark-gluon combinations.

Source and further reading
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/sa-visual/visualizing-the-innards-of-subatomic-particles/

Reference
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/lhc-physicists-unveil-a-charming-new-particle/

#physics #science #research #LHC #particle

Star Cluster Omega Centauri in HDR

Star Cluster Omega Centauri in HDR
Behold the largest ball of stars in our galaxy.Omega Centauri is packed with about 10 million stars, many older than our Sun and packed within a volume of only about 150 light-years in diameter. The star cluster is the largest and brightest of 200 or so known globular clusters that roam thehalo of our Milky Way galaxy. Though most star clusters consist of stars with the same age and composition, the enigmatic Omega Cen exhibits the presence of different stellar populations with a spread of ages and chemical abundances.

In fact, Omega Cen may be the remnant core of a small galaxy merging with the Milky Way. The featured image shows so many stars because it merged different exposures with high dynamic range (HDR) techniques. Omega Centauri, also known as NGC 5139, lies about 15,000 light-years away toward the southern constellation of the Centaurus. 

Image and info via APOD
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Image Credit & Copyright: Mike O'Day

#NASA #space #universe #exploration #science

July 10 is reserved to Nikola Tesla

July 10 is reserved to Nikola Tesla
Today is the birthday of Nikola Tesla (Никола Тесла), who was born in 1856 in Smiljan, in what is now Croatia. Tesla's first technical job was at the Budapest Telephone Exchange, where he made several improvements to the equipment and rose to become chief electrician. His next job, in 1882, was for Continental Edison Co in France. Two years later, he was at the company's Manhattan office, working to redesign and improve Thomas Edison's DC generators and associated equipment.

With financial backing, Tesla set up his own company, which developed a revolutionary AC induction motor and transformer. Those inventions and others, licensed by George Westinghouse, helped AC defeat DC in the so-called War of the Currents, which was all but over by the early 1890s. Tesla's research interests shifted focus to the generation and uses of wireless electrical power. Thanks to the royalties he earned from his 300 patents, Tesla could finance extensive research projects at labs in Colorado and New York.

Those high-voltage, high-frequency experiments did not result in profitable devices—at least not in Tesla's lifetime. He died alone of coronary thrombosis on 7 January 1943 in room 3327 of the New Yorker Hotel.

You can read about Tesla's battles with depression and the strange radio signals he received in Colorado Springs in this interview with Tesla biographer Bernie Carlson.
http://physicstoday.scitation.org/do/10.1063/PT.5.3007/full/

Bio: http://www.teslasociety.com/biography.htm

#history #NikolaTesla #physics #science

The ultimate roadmap of metabolic pathways to produce ATP

The ultimate roadmap of metabolic pathways to produce ATP
The source of energy, for every cell in your body, that keeps everything going is called ATP.
Adenosine triphosphate (ATP) is the biochemical way to store and use energy.

Reference:
http://study.com/academy/lesson/atp-definition-molecules-quiz.html

Infographic by Eleanor Lutz
https://www.behance.net/gallery/42807461/A-galaxy-of-molecules

#medicine #biology #molecules #ATP #infographic

Spiral Galaxy NGC 1512: The Nuclear Ring

Spiral Galaxy NGC 1512: The Nuclear Ring
What's happening around the center of this spiral galaxy? Seen in total, NGC 1512 appears to be a barred spiral galaxy -- a type of spiral that has a straight bar of stars across its center. This bar crosses an outer ring, though, a ring not seen as it surrounds the pictured region. Featured in this Hubble Space Telescope image is an inner ring -- one that itself surrounds the nucleus of the spiral.

The two rings are connected not only by a bar of bright stars but by dark lanes of dust. Inside of this inner ring, dust continues to spiral right into the very center -- possibly the location of a large black hole. The rings are bright with newly formed stars which may have been triggered by the collision of NGC 1512 with its galactic neighbor, NGC 1510.

Image and info via APOD
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Image Credit: NASA, ESA, Hubble, LEGUS; Acknowledgement: Judy Schmidt

#NASA #space #universe #exploration #science

Spotted lanternfly (Lycorma delicatula)

Spotted lanternfly (Lycorma delicatula)
The spotted lanternfly is a planthopper native to China, India, and Vietnam. Although it has two pairs of wings, it jumps more than it flies. Its host plants are grapes, pines, stone fruits, and Malus spp. In its native habitat it is kept in check by natural predators or pathogens. It was accidentally introduced in Korea in 2006 and is since considered a pest. In September 2014, it was first spotted in the U.S.

Reference:
http://ucanr.edu/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=15861
Photo credit: Sam Droege
https://www.flickr.com/photos/usgsbiml/

#biodiversity #coolbugs #lanternfly

Untreatable gonorrhoea on the rise worldwide

Untreatable gonorrhoea on the rise worldwide
Gonorrhoea is becoming as incurable as it was in the 1920s, before the first drugs to treat it were discovered. More than 60% of countries surveyed around the world have reported cases that resist last-resort antibiotics, according to an announcement by the World Health Organization(WHO) on 6 July. The announcement included information about a new gonorrhoea drug in development.

Since the 1930s, several classes of antibiotics have been used to kill the bacterium that causes gonorrhoea, Neisseria gonorrhoeae. Widespread use — and misuse — of these drugs, however, has led to a rise of antibiotic-resistant strains of the bacteria. “The best time to have had gonorrhoea was the eighties, since there were many drugs to treat it with,” says Ramanan Laxminarayan, director of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy in Washington DC. Increasingly, that's no longer the case, he says.

Health agencies in the United States, Europe and Canada have in recent years flagged drug-resistant gonorrhoea as an emerging threat. If left untreated, gonorrhoea can increase a woman’s risk of developing HIV infection, infertility or ectopic pregnancy — among other effects. When the WHO partnered with the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi), a non-governmental organization in Geneva, Switzerland, in May 2016 to confront antimicrobial resistance, gonorrhoea was at the top of the list.


Source and further reading
https://www.nature.com/news/untreatable-gonorrhoea-on-the-rise-worldwide-1.22270

#medicine #gonorrhea #research #WHO

CREATIVE PEOPLE HAVE BETTER-CONNECTED BRAINS

CREATIVE PEOPLE HAVE BETTER-CONNECTED BRAINS
Seemingly countless self-help books and seminars tell you to tap into the right side of your brain to stimulate creativity. But forget the “right-brain” myth -- a new study suggests it’s how well the two brain hemispheres communicate that sets highly creative people apart.

For the study, statisticians David Dunson of Duke University and Daniele Durante of the University of Padova analyzed the network of white matter connections among 68 separate brain regions in healthy college-age volunteers.

The brain’s white matter lies underneath the outer grey matter. It is composed of bundles of wires, or axons, which connect billions of neurons and carry electrical signals between them.

A team led by neuroscientist Rex Jung of the University of New Mexico collected the data using an MRI technique called diffusion tensor imaging, which allows researchers to peer through the skull of a living person and trace the paths of all the axons by following the movement of water along them. Computers then comb through each of the 1-gigabyte scans and convert them to three-dimensional maps -- wiring diagrams of the brain.

Source and further reading
https://today.duke.edu/2017/02/creative-people-have-better-connected-brains

Journal article
http://projecteuclid.org/euclid.ba/1479179031

Image: an MRI technique called diffusion tensor imaging traces the bundles of nerve fibers that carry electrical signals between different areas of the brain.
Image by Thomas Schultz, Wikimedia Commons

#neuroscience #brain #creativity #whitematter #frontalcortex

Hidden Galaxy IC 342

Hidden Galaxy IC 342
Similar in size to large, bright spiral galaxies in our neighborhood, IC 342 is a mere 10 million light-years distant in the long-necked, northern constellation Camelopardalis. A sprawling island universe, IC 342 would otherwise be a prominent galaxy in our night sky, but it is hidden from clear view and only glimpsed through the veil of stars, gas and dust clouds along the plane of our own Milky Way galaxy.

Even though IC 342's light is dimmed by intervening cosmic clouds, this sharp telescopic image traces the galaxy's own obscuring dust, blue star clusters, and glowing pink star forming regions along spiral arms that wind far from the galaxy's core. IC 342 may have undergone a recent burst of star formation activity and is close enough to have gravitationally influenced the evolution of the local group of galaxies and the Milky Way.

Image and info via APOD
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Credit & Copyright: T. Rector (U. Alaska Anchorage), H. Schweiker, WIYN, NOAO, AURA, NSF

#NASA #space #universe #exploration #science

Sphdoodle

Sphdoodle
This is twisting my brain..

Work by Charlie Deck bigblueboo​

#processing #math #loop

Bond...Ionic Bond

Bond...Ionic Bond

#personalnonsense #sciencejokes

The Secret to Deep-Water Corals’ Radiance

The Secret to Deep-Water Corals’ Radiance
Researchers have pinpointed the reason that deep-water corals emit an erie glow. Scientists know that in shallow waters, the organisms light up green, using fluorescent proteins as kind of sun block. The proteins soak up harmful ultraviolet rays, re-emit green light and shield their symbiotic algae, which supply most of the corals’ energy needs through photosynthesis.

In 2015, a team led by Jörg Wiedenmann at the University of Southampton, UK, found that deep-dwelling corals also fluoresce—this time in an array of vivid yellows, oranges and reds. Some of these organisms live in water as deep as 165 metres, where little sunlight reaches them, and most of what does is in the blue part of the spectrum. So the researchers suspected a different reason for the glow.

Now, Wiedenmann thinks his team has the answer: the corals use a fluorescent protein to optimize the small amount of light available in their habitats for photosynthesis. In other words, the deep-water corals and their shallow relatives fluoresce for opposite reasons.

Blue light is more useful for photosynthesis, but red light penetrates farther into coral tissues. So corals use a red fluorescent protein to convert the blue light into orange–red wavelengths. That means it reaches more of the organisms’ symbiotic algae, helping the corals to survive by making as much food as possible through photosynthesis.

Journal article:
http://www.nature.com/news/radiant-reefs-found-deep-in-the-red-sea-1.17840

Source and further reading:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/get-the-glow-the-secret-to-deep-water-corals-rsquo-radiance/

#biodiversity #research #marinecritters #corals #science

Zoom-in on Epimetheus

Zoom-in on Epimetheus
This zoomed-in view of Epimetheus, one of the highest resolution ever taken, shows a surface covered in craters, vivid reminders of the hazards of space.

Epimetheus (70 miles or 113 kilometers across) is too small for its gravity to hold onto an atmosphere.  It is also too small to be geologically active.  There is therefore no way to erase the scars from meteor impacts, except for the generation of new impact craters on top of old ones.

This view looks toward anti-Saturn side of Epimetheus. North on Epimetheus is up and rotated 32 degrees to the right. The image was taken with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Feb. 21, 2017 using a spectral filter which preferentially admits wavelengths of near-infrared light centered at 939 nanometers.

The view was acquired at a distance of approximately 9,300 miles (15,000 kilometers) from Epimetheus and at a Sun-Epimetheus-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 71 degrees. Image scale is 290 feet (89 meters) per pixel.

Source:
https://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/

Photo Credit:
NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute

#nasa #space #universe #exploration #science

How humans bond: The brain chemistry revealed

How humans bond: The brain chemistry revealed
We’ve all seen it: moms and dads cradling their infants, cooing, smiling, widening their eyes, in a preverbal dance of expression and movement as parent and child each anticipate the other’s response, creating the life-affirming parent-child bond.

It’s an interaction known in child-development circles as “synchrony.” Northeastern psychology professor Lisa Feldman Barrett and her colleagues at Massachusetts General Hospital set out to uncover its neurobiological underpinnings.

In new research published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, they found, for the first time, that the neurotransmitter dopamine is involved in human bonding, bringing the brain’s reward system into our understanding of how we form human attachments. The results, based on a study with 19 mother-infant pairs, have important implications for therapies addressing postpartum depression as well as disorders of the dopamine system such as Parkinson’s disease, addiction, and social dysfunction.

“The infant brain is very different from the mature adult brain—it is not fully formed,” says Barrett, University Distinguished Professor of Psychology and author of the forthcoming book How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain.

“Infants are completely dependent on their caregivers. Whether they get enough to eat, the right kind of nutrients, whether they’re kept warm or cool enough, whether they’re hugged enough and get enough social attention, all these things are important to normal brain development. Our study shows clearly that a biological process in one person’s brain, the mother’s, is linked to behavior that gives the child the social input that will help wire his or her brain normally. That means parents’ ability to keep their infants cared for leads to optimal brain development, which over the years results in better adult health and greater productivity.”

Source & further reading:
https://news.northeastern.edu/2017/02/how-humans-bond-the-brain-chemistry-revealed/

Journal article:
http://www.pnas.org/content/114/9/2361.full

#neuroscience #brain #dopamine #research #medicine