New international study concludes digital media can fuel polarization and populism

Image Credit: Thomas Ulrich

The question of whether the rise in usage of digital media is contributing to the erosion of democracy is a source of popular debate, with tech companies arguing the findings are inconclusive.

But now a team of international researchers has carried out a comprehensive review of hundreds of studies globally, the biggest of its kind, exploring this claim and found that while social media is not exclusively bad, it can certainly stoke starkly conflicting views, populism, and political mistrust especially in established democracies.

The researchers, from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and the Hertie School in Germany, and the University of Bristol in the UK, systematically assessed studies investigating whether and how digital media impacts people’s political behavior. Studies show that although some effects may be beneficial for democracy, for instance digital media can increase political knowledge and diversity of news exposure, they also have detrimental effects, such as fostering polarization and populism.

Furthermore, the way consequences such as increased political mobilization and decreasing trust in institutions play out depends largely on the political context. Such developments were found to be beneficial in emerging democracies but can have destabilizing effects in established democracies.

Researchers develop superfast new method to manufacture high-performance thermoelectric devices

high-performance thermoelectric devices for energy harvesting and cooling
Source: University of Notre Dame

Yanliang Zhang, associate professor of aerospace and mechanical engineering at the University of Notre Dame, and collaborators Alexander Dowling and Tengfei Luo have developed a machine-learning assisted superfast new way to create high-performance, energy-saving thermoelectric devices.

The novel process uses intense pulsed light to sinter thermoelectric material in less than a second (conventional sintering in thermal ovens can take hours). The team sped up this method of turning nanoparticle inks into flexible devices by using machine learning to determine the optimum conditions for the ultrafast but complex sintering process.

The achievement was just published in the journal Energy and Environmental Science.

Flexible thermoelectric devices offer great opportunities for direct conversion of waste heat into electricity as well as solid-state refrigeration, Zhang said. They have additional benefits such as power sources and cooling devices — they don’t emit greenhouse gases, and they are durable and quiet since they don’t have moving parts.

Early planetary migration can explain missing planets

An illustration of the variations among the more than 5,000 known exoplanets discovered since the 1990s.
Image Credit: of NASA/JPL-Caltech

A new model that accounts for the interplay of forces acting on newborn planets can explain two puzzling observations that have cropped up repeatedly among the more than 3,800 planetary systems cataloged to date.

One puzzle known as the “radius valley” refers to the rarity of exoplanets with a radius about 1.8 times that of Earth. NASA’s Kepler spacecraft observed planets of this size about 2-3 times less frequently than it observed super-Earths with radii about 1.4 times that of Earth and mini-Neptunes with radii about 2.5 times Earth’s. The second mystery, known as “peas in a pod,” refers to neighboring planets of similar size that have been found in hundreds of planetary systems. Those include TRAPPIST-1 and Kepler-223, which also feature planetary orbits of near-musical harmony.

“I believe we are the first to explain the radius valley using a model of planet formation and dynamical evolution that self-consistently accounts for multiple constraints of observations,” said Rice University’s André Izidoro, corresponding author of a study published this week in Astrophysical Journal Letters. “We’re also able to show that a planet-formation model incorporating giant impacts is consistent with the peas-in-a-pod feature of exoplanets.”

University of Oxford study provides important insights into TB correlates of protection

Drug-resistant, Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria, the pathogen responsible for causing the disease tuberculosis (TB). A 3D computer-generated image.
Image Credit: CDC

Researchers from the University of Oxford have today reported findings from a study that investigated whether previously identified correlates of protection associated with risk of full-blown tuberculosis (TB) disease could also be associated with risk of infection from the bacteria that causes TB - highlighting certain correlates in the process.

In their paper on the TB020 study, published in Nature Communications, researchers identified that certain correlates of protection – inflammation and activation of the immune system (where the body responds to invading pathogens such as viruses and harmful bacteria) – were associated with the likelihood of becoming infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M.tb), the bacteria that causes TB disease.

However, their previously identified correlates of risk of TB disease were not associated with an increased risk of M.tb infection in infants who became infected with the bacteria but did not progress to active TB.

Most individuals infected with M.tb do not progress to full TB disease. Instead, infection is either eliminated or contained by the infected individual. This study improves understanding of the immune-related factors that drive infection and disease – necessary for an effective TB vaccine that is yet to be developed.

A Brain Stimulator That Powers with Breath Instead of Batteries

UConn researchers have developed a way of charging deep brain stimulators that don't require the battery power that's currently standard
Credit/Source: University of Connecticut Contributed Illustration

Implantable deep brain stimulators can help many people with neurological and psychiatric disease when traditional treatments fail. But surgery every time the batteries need to be changed is a major drawback. Now, UConn researchers report in Cell Reports Physical Sciences a new way to charge the devices using a person’s own breathing movements.

Deep brain stimulators are becoming more common, with about 150,000 new devices implanted each year. They are normally placed under the skin in the chest area and their electrodes implanted within the brain. The electrodes zap the brain with electrical pulses multiple times per second to regulate the brain’s abnormal electrical activity. Deep brain stimulators can help people with Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders to regain control over their muscle motions. Research has also shown the technique can significantly reduce the symptoms for psychiatric conditions such as treatment-resistant depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Just like a pacemaker, deep brain stimulators are battery powered. While most pacemaker batteries last from 7-10 years, deep brain stimulator batteries typically require changing every 2-3 years because of their high energy consumption. And each battery change requires surgery.

UConn chemists Esraa Elsanadidy, Islam Mosa, James Rusling, and their collaborators have developed a deep brain stimulator that never needs its batteries changed.

Summer camps promote altruism in children

After two weeks of camp, the participants’ level of altruism had increased significantly, while that of the other children had decreased.
Photo Credit: Anna Samoylova

Being able to control oneself, cooperate or help others: having socio-emotional abilities is essential for those who wish to interact positively with their peers. These skills are largely acquired during childhood and can be trained in different contexts, such as school, family or leisure. A team from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) has shown that holiday camps Favour their development. They found an increase in altruism among children returning from camps, unlike those who did not participate in this type of stay during their holidays. These results can be found in the journal PLOS ONE.

Knowing how to recognize and manage our own emotions, as well as those of others, and adapting our behavior accordingly: socio-emotional abilities play a key role in our daily lives. They enable us to make decisions that are beneficial to our own well-being and that of our peers, and to establish quality relationships with them. Fostering the development of children, from an early age, is therefore essential.

These skills can be acquired and trained directly or indirectly. They can also be learned in a variety of contexts, such as school, family or leisure. By stimulating prosocial acts such as altruistic behavior, they are a prime target for the prevention of antisocial behavior, i.e. behavior that is confrontational towards others and society. A team from the UNIGE has studied the development of these abilities in a specific context: holiday camps.

First ever clinical trial underway of laboratory grown red blood cells being transfused into another person

Microscope image Example of a RESTORE laboratory grown young red blood cell
Image Credit: NHS Blood and Transplant

The manufactured blood cells were grown from stem cells from donors. The red cells were then transfused into volunteers in the RESTORE randomized controlled clinical trial.

This is the first time in the world that red blood cells that have been grown in a laboratory have been given to another person as part of a trial into blood transfusion.

If proved safe and effective, manufactured blood cells could in time revolutionize treatments for people with blood disorders such as sickle cell and rare blood types. It can be difficult to find enough well-matched donated blood for some people with these disorders.

Chief Investigator Professor Cedric Ghevaert, Professor in Transfusion Medicine and Consultant Haematologist at the University of Cambridge and NHS Blood and Transplant, said: “We hope our lab grown red blood cells will last longer than those that come from blood donors. If our trial, the first such in the world, is successful, it will mean that patients who currently require regular long-term blood transfusions will need fewer transfusions in future, helping transform their care.”

The RESTORE trial is a joint research initiative by NHS Blood and Transplant and the University of Bristol, working with the University of Cambridge, Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, NIHR Cambridge Clinical Research Facility, and Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. It is part-funded by a National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) grant.

Limiting antibiotics for cows may create a new dairy market

Photo Credit: David Mark

Consumers would be willing to buy milk from cows only treated with antibiotics when medically necessary – as long as the price isn’t much higher than conventional milk, according to researchers at the College of Veterinary Medicine.

The findings suggest conventional farmers could tap a potentially large market for this type of milk if they can find the right price point – and that dairy consumers can help slow the rise of antimicrobial resistance.

“Most of the antibiotics produced throughout the world are used for animal agriculture. Therefore, reducing antibiotic use in animals, including dairy cattle, is necessary to tackle antibiotic resistance at a global scale,” said Dr. Renata Ivanek, professor in the Department of Population Medicine and Diagnostic Sciences. She is senior author on the study, which was published Nov. 4 in the Journal of Dairy Science.

In the paper, the researchers propose a new label for milk that indicates responsible antibiotic use (RAU), which would leverage consumer preferences to reduce the use of antibiotics on commercial dairy farms. The study showed that, although a consumer’s willingness to pay for the RAU-labeled milk was comparable to how much they would pay for the unlabeled milk, they strongly preferred the RAU-labeled milk over the unlabeled milk option. Therefore, the researchers hypothesize this new RAU label would entice farmers to minimize antibiotics more than they do for conventional, unlabeled milk.

Therapeutic HIV vaccine with Oxford technology achieves encouraging results

Artist illustration of the HIV virus.
Illustration Credit: Darwin Laganzon

A phase I/IIa clinical trial that the University of Oxford collaborated on has demonstrated that a T-cell therapeutic HIV vaccine was associated with better control of the virus rebound when antiretroviral therapy (ART) was temporarily withdrawn.

Researchers carrying out the AELIX-002 study, whose results have been published in Nature Medicine, reported that two fifths of participants without any genetic background associated with spontaneous HIV control were able to stay off ART for the six-month duration of the supervised ART pause.

The vaccine in the study – developed by AELIX Therapeutics – delivered the HIVACAT T-cell Immunogen (HTI) using a combination of DNA vector, modified vaccinia virus Ankara (MVA) vector and simian adenovirus vector ChAdOx1. The latter two vaccines were constructed at Oxford.

Tomáš Hanke, Professor of Vaccine Immunology at the Jenner Institute, Nuffield Department of Medicine, who leads on HIV vaccine development, said:

‘This result provides further encouragement that active immunization against HIV may be possible, slowing HIV replication, providing a window of treatment holidays for people living with HIV and eventually leading to HIV cure. T cells/T-cell vaccines are likely to play an important part in the final package for HIV cure and, perhaps, other advanced therapies for difficult diseases.’

Endangered Devils Hole pupfish is one of the most inbred animals known

A curious, captive-raised Devils Hole pupfish at the Ash Meadows Fish Conservation Facility in Nevada. The facility maintains a refuge population of pupfish as a backup to the wild population, which fluctuates over decades and once dipped to a mere 35 individuals.
Resized Image using AI by SFLORG
Photo Credit: Olin Feuerbacher/USFWS

As its name implies, the Devil’s Hole pupfish lives in a truly hellish environment.

Confined to a single deep limestone cave in Nevada’s Mojave Desert, 263 of them live in water that hovers around 93 degrees Fahrenheit year-round, with food resources so scarce that they are always on the edge of starvation, and with oxygen levels so low that most other fish would die immediately. The pupfish, Cyprinodon diabolis, lives in the smallest habitat of any known vertebrate.

New research now documents the extreme effect that these harsh and isolated conditions have had on this fish’s genetic diversity.

In a paper published this week in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, University of California, Berkeley, biologists report the first complete genome sequences of eight pupfish species from the American Southwest — 30 individuals in all, including eight Devils Hole pupfish. Astoundingly, the Devils Hole pupfish is so inbred that 58% of the genomes of these eight individuals are identical, on average.

“High levels of inbreeding are associated with a higher risk of extinction, and the inbreeding in the Devils Hole pupfish is equal to or more severe than levels reported so far in other isolated natural populations, such as the Isle Royale wolves in Michigan, mountain gorillas in Africa and Indian tigers,” said lead researcher Christopher Martin, UC Berkeley associate professor of integrative biology and curator of ichthyology in the campus’s Museum of Vertebrate Zoology. “Although we were not able to directly measure fitness, the increased inbreeding in these pupfish likely results in a substantial reduction in fitness.”