Study shows how much enters air from plants, soil, surface water
More than a quarter of the rain and snow that falls on continents reaches the oceans as runoff. Now a new study helps show where the rest goes: two-thirds of the remaining water is released by plants, more than a quarter lands on leaves and evaporates and what’s left evaporates from soil and from lakes, rivers and streams. (more…)
Early Step toward Treatment for Diseases that Affect Blood Flow
University of Utah bioengineers showed that tiny blood vessels grow better in the laboratory if the tissue surrounding them is less dense. Then the researchers created a computer simulation to predict such growth accurately – an early step toward treatments to provide blood supply to tissues damaged by diabetes and heart attacks and to skin grafts and implanted ligaments and tendons.
“Better understanding of the processes that regulate the growth of blood vessels puts us in a position ultimately to develop new treatments for diseases related to blood vessel growth,” and to better understand cancer metastasis, says bioengineering professor Jeff Weiss of the university’s Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute. (more…)
Die EU könnte zu moderaten Kosten ein ehrgeizigeres Klimaziel erreichen. Würden die gegenwärtig bis 2020 geplanten 20 Prozent Minderung des Ausstoßes von Treibhausgasen auf 40 Prozent bis 2030 hochgesetzt, so lägen die zusätzlichen Kosten wahrscheinlich bei weniger als 0.7 Prozent der Wirtschaftskraft. Dies ist ein Kernergebnis der internationalen, mehrere Modelle vergleichenden Untersuchung des Stanford Modeling Forum (EMF28). Die Veröffentlichung kommt zu einem entscheidenden Zeitpunkt: Nächste Woche wird die Europäische Kommission verkünden, in welchem Maß sie ihre Emissionen im nächsten Jahrzehnt senken will. Allerdings sehen die Wissenschaftler für die Zeit nach 2040 ein Risiko stark steigender Kosten. Um dem entgegen zu wirken, sind technologische Innovationen nötig. (more…)
ANN ARBOR — In a sort of biological “spooky action at a distance,” water in a cell slows down in the tightest confines between proteins and develops the ability to affect other proteins much farther away, University of Michigan researchers have discovered.
On a fundamental level, the findings show some of the complex and unexpected ways that water behaves inside cells. In a practical sense, they could provide insights into how and why proteins clump together in diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Understanding how proteins aggregate could help researchers figure out how to prevent them from doing so. (more…)
Computer science researchers have programmed a computer to play the game Concentration (also known as Memory). The work could help improve computer security – and improve our understanding of how the human mind works.
The researchers developed a program to get the software system called ACT-R, a computer simulation that attempts to replicate human thought processes, to play Concentration. In the game, multiple matching pairs of cards are placed face down in a random order, and players are asked to flip over two cards, one at a time, to find the matching pairs. If a player flips over two cards that do not match, the cards are placed back face down. The player succeeds by remembering where the matching cards are located. (more…)
Mindfulness meditation training in awareness of present moment experience, such as body and breath sensations, prevents depression and reduces distress in chronic pain. In a new paper, Brown University scientists propose a neurophysiological framework to explain these clinical benefits.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Why does training in mindfulness meditation help patients manage chronic pain and depression? In a newly published neurophysiological review, Brown University scientists propose that mindfulness practitioners gain enhanced control over sensory cortical alpha rhythms that help regulate how the brain processes and filters sensations, including pain, and memories such as depressive cognitions. (more…)
Technologically valuable ultrastable glasses can be produced in days or hours with properties corresponding to those that have been aged for thousands of years, computational and laboratory studies have confirmed.
Aging makes for higher quality glassy materials because they have slowly evolved toward a more stable molecular condition. This evolution can take thousands or millions of years, but manufacturers must work faster. Armed with a better understanding of how glasses age and evolve, researchers at the universities of Chicago and Wisconsin-Madison raise the possibility of designing a new class of materials at the molecular level via a vapor-deposition process. (more…)
Berkeley Lab Scientists at Advanced Light Source Show Dislocations Can Be Induced by Pressure in Ultrafine Nanocrystals
Nanocrystals as protective coatings for advanced gas turbine and jet engines are receiving a lot of attention for their many advantageous mechanical properties, including their resistance to stress. However, contrary to computer simulations, the tiny size of nanocrystals apparently does not safeguard them from defects.
In a study by researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab)and collaborators from multiple institutions, nanocrystals of nickel subjected to high pressure continued to suffer dislocation-mediated plastic deformation even when the crystals were only three nanometers in size. These experimental findings, which were carried out at Berkeley Lab’s Advanced Light Source (ALS), a premier source of X-rays and ultraviolet light for scientific research, show that dislocations can form in the finest of nanocrystals when stress is applied. (more…)
