*UCLA-launched partnership identifies genes that boost or lessen risk of brain atrophy, mental illness, Alzheimer’s disease*
In the world’s largest brain study to date, a team of more than 200 scientists from 100 institutions worldwide collaborated to map the human genes that boost or sabotage the brain’s resistance to a variety of mental illnesses and Alzheimer’s disease.
Published April 15 in the advance online edition of the journal Nature Genetics, the study also uncovers new genes that may explain individual differences in brain size and intelligence. (more…)
The iceberg wasn’t the only culprit in the Titanic’s sinking; In this edition of “Science Xplained,” scientist Ainissa Ramirez demonstrates how the metal rivets that held the ship together became brittle in the frigid waters and broke apart on impact with the iceberg, likely contributing to the enormity of the tragedy.(more…)
University research advance inspired by UD Nobel Prize winner Richard Heck
A chemical reaction reported by University of Delaware assistant professor Donald Watson and his laboratory group has set the chemistry world abuzz for its creativity and potential utility.(more…)
The brain’s ability to learn to recognize objects plays out in the inferior temporal cortex. A new study offers a possible explanation of how two classes of neurons play distinct roles to help that happen.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — No matter what novel objects we come to behold, our brains effortlessly take us from an initial “What’s that?” to “Oh, that old thing” after a few casual encounters. In research that helps shed light on the malleability of this recognition process, Brown University neuroscientists have teased apart the potentially different roles that two distinct cell types may play.
In a study published online in advance in the journal Neuron, the researchers document that this kind of learning is based in the inferior temporal cortex (ITC), a brain area buried deep in the skull. Scientists already knew the area was important for visual recognition of familiar items, but they hadn’t figured out the steps required to move from novelty to familiarity, a process they refer to as “plasticity.” (more…)
In order to accurately identify skulls as male or female, forensic anthropologists need to have a good understanding of how the characteristics of male and female skulls differ between populations. A new study from North Carolina State University shows that these differences can be significant, even between populations that are geographically close to one another.
The researchers looked at the skulls of 27 women and 28 men who died in Lisbon, Portugal, between 1880 and 1975. They also evaluated the skulls of 40 women and 39 men who died between 1895 and 1903 in the rural area of Coimbra, just over 120 miles north of Lisbon. (more…)
U researchers map emperor penguin colonies by satellite
Emperor penguins may be icons of the Antarctic, but they aren’t immune to disturbances in their environment.
As climatic and other changes unfold, emperors may dwindle in numbers. But how to tell, when researchers can’t access all the emperor colonies dotting the Antarctic ice shelves and count heads every year?
UCLA’s Ian McLean, colleagues build most advanced instrument of its kind
A new scientific instrument, a “time machine” of sorts, built by UCLA astronomers and colleagues, will allow scientists to study the earliest galaxies in the universe, which could never be studied before.(more…)
In a study that pushed quantum mechanical theory and research capabilities to the limit, UA researchers have found a way to see the molecule that likely made the universe – or at least the hot and fiery bits of it.
Lurking in the vast, chilly regions between stars, the unassuming molecule known as a triatomic hydrogen ion, or H3+, may hold secrets of the formation of the first stars after the Big Bang.(more…)
