Wednesday, August 25
Sexually Frustrated Sea Snakes
Now, he knows why: It was mating season, and the males thought he was a potential mate.
In a new study, the diver and another researcher analyzed 158 of these interactions with olive sea snakes (Aipysurus laevis) over several years in the Great Barrier Reef and found that interactions were more common during the reptiles' mating season.
In a new study, the diver and another researcher analyzed 158 of these interactions with olive sea snakes (Aipysurus laevis) over several years in the Great Barrier Reef and found that interactions were more common during the reptiles' mating season.
The sexually frustrated snakes also displayed elaborate behaviors that are often used during courtship between the sea serpents.
"Males are very aroused and active while looking for 'girlfriends,'" lead author Rick Shine, an evolutionary biologist and reptile expert at Macquarie University in Australia, told Live Science.
"Males are very aroused and active while looking for 'girlfriends,'" lead author Rick Shine, an evolutionary biologist and reptile expert at Macquarie University in Australia, told Live Science.
But because the males can't tell the difference between female snakes and scuba divers, it can lead to some comical interactions, he added. READ MORE
Humaniod Robot Has Moves
Boston Dynamics, the company known for its robotic dogs, now has a humanoid robot capable of doing gymnastics.
The robotics company previously has shown how its robot dogs can go down stairs and open doors. Some police departments have begun using the robot dogs, typically called Spot, to help patrol. And Atlas, which the company dubbed "the world's most dynamic humanoid," showed in an earlier video how the robot can jog and jump over a log.
In a new video, Atlas now can do parkour – a sport of moving through obstacles – jumping and running along uneven platforms. Then, two humanoid robots do synchronized movements including turning, spinning and two flips, mirroring each other moves.
Having the robots perform parkour sequences including running along a balance beam, jumping and doing flips helps in the development of a robot capable of multiple tasks, “a go-anywhere, do-anything robot of the future," said Scott Kuindersma, leader of Boston Dynamics' Atlas team, in a blog post accompanying the new videos.
"The work that we are doing now is really just foundation building," he said. "We are building the core capabilities that we think any useful robot will need and in doing so we are really just defining the next set of challenges that we are going to be working on over the next two to five years." READ MORE
The robotics company previously has shown how its robot dogs can go down stairs and open doors. Some police departments have begun using the robot dogs, typically called Spot, to help patrol. And Atlas, which the company dubbed "the world's most dynamic humanoid," showed in an earlier video how the robot can jog and jump over a log.
In a new video, Atlas now can do parkour – a sport of moving through obstacles – jumping and running along uneven platforms. Then, two humanoid robots do synchronized movements including turning, spinning and two flips, mirroring each other moves.
Having the robots perform parkour sequences including running along a balance beam, jumping and doing flips helps in the development of a robot capable of multiple tasks, “a go-anywhere, do-anything robot of the future," said Scott Kuindersma, leader of Boston Dynamics' Atlas team, in a blog post accompanying the new videos.
"The work that we are doing now is really just foundation building," he said. "We are building the core capabilities that we think any useful robot will need and in doing so we are really just defining the next set of challenges that we are going to be working on over the next two to five years." READ MORE
Animals Growing Bigger
Human activity has shrunk the size of wild animals the world over, and yet recent research has found many mammals living near cities have become steadily larger, both in length and in weight.
The findings are unexpected. Sprawling urban environments, with their vast swathes of sun-soaked cement, can grow much hotter than natural habitats, and warmer temperatures usually benefit mammals that have a smaller, more energy efficient stature – a principle of biology known as Bergmann's rule.
As the world grows warmer, some scientists have worried that mammals living near cities are doomed to grow smaller, possibly reducing their fitness as a species and, no doubt, the fitness of their predators, too.
But even with climate change, that might not happen. As it turns out, there's another factor in determining a mammal's size that might rival or even exceed temperature, and that is food.
In and around cities with dense populations, where high-calorie human scraps are more widely available and predators are fewer and farther in between, new research discovered that most of the mammal species studied – such as coyotes and raccoons – appear to be growing in size, not shrinking.
That extra bulk has been noted before by both scientists and members of the public. Yet the reason or reasons why have rarely been explored. READ MORE
Tuesday, August 24
Mini Brains Grow Eyes
Scientists grew brain organoids with optic cups. (Image credit: Elke Gabriel)
Scientists recently grew mini brains with their own sets of "eyes," according to a new study.
Organoids are miniature versions of organs that scientists can grow in the lab from stem cells, or cells that can mature into any type of cell in the body. Previously, scientists have developed tiny beating hearts and tear ducts that could cry like humans do. Scientists have even grown mini brains that produce brain waves like those of preterm babies.
Now, a group of scientists has grown mini brains that have something their real counterparts do not: a set of eye-like structures called "optic cups" that give rise to the retina — the tissue that sits in the back of the eye and contains light-sensing cells, according to a statement.
In the human body, the retina sends signals to the brain via the optic nerve, allowing us to see images. "In the mammalian brain, nerve fibers of retinal ganglion cells reach out to connect with their brain targets, an aspect that has never before been shown in an in vitro system," senior author Jay Gopalakrishnan, a researcher at University Hospital Düsseldorf, said in the statement. (Ganglion cells are neurons located in the inner surface of the retina that communicate directly with the brain.)
Previously, researchers had grown optic cups individually in labs, but this is the first study that integrated optic cups into brain organoids, according to the statement.
Gopalakrishnan and his team adapted a technique they previously developed for turning stem cells into neural tissue in order to create the mini brains with optic cups. Once the stem cells had developed into mini brains, the organoids formed optic cups. The optic cups appeared as early as 30 days and matured within 50 days, a timeframe similar to how the retina develops in a human embryo, according to the statement.READ MORE
Scientists recently grew mini brains with their own sets of "eyes," according to a new study.
Organoids are miniature versions of organs that scientists can grow in the lab from stem cells, or cells that can mature into any type of cell in the body. Previously, scientists have developed tiny beating hearts and tear ducts that could cry like humans do. Scientists have even grown mini brains that produce brain waves like those of preterm babies.
Now, a group of scientists has grown mini brains that have something their real counterparts do not: a set of eye-like structures called "optic cups" that give rise to the retina — the tissue that sits in the back of the eye and contains light-sensing cells, according to a statement.
In the human body, the retina sends signals to the brain via the optic nerve, allowing us to see images. "In the mammalian brain, nerve fibers of retinal ganglion cells reach out to connect with their brain targets, an aspect that has never before been shown in an in vitro system," senior author Jay Gopalakrishnan, a researcher at University Hospital Düsseldorf, said in the statement. (Ganglion cells are neurons located in the inner surface of the retina that communicate directly with the brain.)
Previously, researchers had grown optic cups individually in labs, but this is the first study that integrated optic cups into brain organoids, according to the statement.
Gopalakrishnan and his team adapted a technique they previously developed for turning stem cells into neural tissue in order to create the mini brains with optic cups. Once the stem cells had developed into mini brains, the organoids formed optic cups. The optic cups appeared as early as 30 days and matured within 50 days, a timeframe similar to how the retina develops in a human embryo, according to the statement.READ MORE
Treated Violins
As it turns out, it's not just the quality of the craftsmanship that creates the superior sound of these classic violins – called Cremonese violins after the area where they were produced – but also the way the wood was processed.
This latest study focussed particularly on the soundboard of the violin, the part that's most crucial to the acoustic output of the instrument. Stradivari and Guarneri soundboards are relatively thin and light by modern day standards, and it's here that the chemicals would have originally been applied.
"This new study reveals that Stradivari and Guarneri had their own individual proprietary method of wood processing, to which they could have attributed a considerable significance," says biochemist Joseph Nagyvary, from Texas A&M University.
"They could have come to realize that the special salts they used for impregnation of the wood also imparted to it some beneficial mechanical strength and acoustical advantages."
The idea that chemical processing is the reason Stradivari and Guarneri violins stand out has been explored by Nagyvary and colleagues before, but this new work goes further into identifying the sort of substances that were probably used by the master violin makers. READ MORE
Tuesday 1
Supersonic flight is arriving—in a hurry. In the last 18 months, Boom has successfully tested its XB-1 demonstrator aircraft and pre-sold 15 of its still-in-development 30-seat Overture models to United Airlines. Virgin Galactic and Rolls Royce rolled out a partnership to develop a 19-seater. Even the Russian Federation revealed plans to build a supersonic jet for commercial use.
Then there’s the Hermeus Quarterhorse. Think supersonic or Mach 1—the speed of sound—multiply by five and you have the hypersonic Quarterhorse.
Last week, the Atlanta-based company announced a $60 million award from the US Air Force to finance testing of the aircraft. Like the Greek god Hermes, this Hermeus is designed to travel seamlessly between worlds, with a projected top speed of Mach 5.5—or 4,219 mph. That makes it the fastest reusable aircraft on the planet, so a New York-to-London flight will take less than an hour. READ MORE
Monday, August 23
Boiling Frog Phenomenon
Not fully, scientists say. New research demonstrates a terrifying adaptability of 21st century human beings: in the face of unprecedented climate change, we are normalising the weather temperatures, and not realising how truly bad things have become.
There's a famous analogue for this phenomenon; one that's both fitting and frightening. It's called the boiling frog effect – the notion that a frog immersed in gradually heating water will fail to notice the creeping change in its circumstances, even as it's literally being boiled alive.
Contemporary scientists no longer subscribe to this now discredited observation, but as a metaphor for the way in which humans are sailing unfazed into a dire-looking future of irreversible climate change, it's perfectly apt.
"This is a true boiling-frog effect," says climate scientist Frances C. Moore from the University of California, Davis.
"People seem to be getting used to changes they'd prefer to avoid. But just because they're not talking about it doesn't mean it's not making them worse off."
Moore and her team sampled over two billion geo-located tweets between March 2014 and November 2016, measuring the sentiment in public posts about weather, and cross-referencing them with localised temperatures, and comparing them against a baseline reference of weather data from 1981 to 1990.
Basically, they were looking for how people reacted to significant changes in localised weather conditions, to determine what kinds of weather people find normal or unusual. READ MORE
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