Giant planet atmospheres vary widely, JWST confirms

 A ‘hot Jupiter’ called HD 149026b, is about 3 times hotter than the rocky surface of Venus, the hottest planet in our solar system.
Illustration Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Gas giants orbiting our sun show a clear pattern; the more massive the planet, the lower the percentage of “heavy” elements (anything other than hydrogen and helium) in the planet’s atmosphere. But out in the Galaxy, the atmospheric compositions of giant planets do not fit the solar system trend, an international team of astronomers has found.

Using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the researchers discovered that the atmosphere of exoplanet HD149026b, a ‘hot Jupiter’ orbiting a star comparable to our sun, is super-abundant in the heavier elements carbon and oxygen – far above what scientists would expect for a planet of its mass. In addition, the diagnostic carbon-to-oxygen ratio of HD149026b, also known as “Smertrios,” is elevated relative to our solar system.

A ‘hot Jupiter’ called HD 149026b, is about 3 times hotter than the rocky surface of Venus, the hottest planet in our solar system.

These findings, published in “High atmospheric metal enrichment for a Saturn-mass planet,” in Nature on [March 27] are an important first step toward obtaining similar measurements for a large sample of exoplanets in order to search for statistical trends, the researchers said. They also provide insight into planet formation.

Beaver Fossil Named After Buc-ee’s

Matthew Brown (left) and Steve May with beaver skulls new and old in the vertebrate paleontology collections at the Jackson School of Geosciences. Brown, the director of the collections, holds a skull from a modern North American Beaver. May, a research associate, holds a skull from Anchitheriomys buceei, a new species of ancient beaver that he discovered in the collections and named.
Photo Credit: UT Jackson School of Geosciences.

A new species of ancient beaver that was rediscovered by researchers in The University of Texas Austin’s fossil collections has been named after Buc-ee’s, a Texas-based chain of popular travel centers known for its cartoon beaver mascot.

The beaver is called Anchitheriomys buceei, or “A. buceei” for short.

Steve May, a research associate at the UT Jackson School of Geosciences, said that the beaver’s Texas connection and a chance encounter with a Buc-ee’s billboard are what inspired the name.

May is the lead author of the paper that describes A. buceei, along with another, much smaller, species of fossil beaver. Published in the journal Palaeontologia Electronica, the paper provides an overview of beaver occurrences along the Texas Gulf Coast from 15 million to 22 million years ago based on bones and archival records in the UT collections.

While driving down a highway in 2020, May spotted a Buc-ee’s billboard that said “This is Beaver Country.” The phrase brought to mind the Texas beaver fossils he had been studying at UT’s Texas Vertebrate Paleontology Collections.

Understanding nitrogen metabolism could revolutionize TB treatment, finds study

Illustration Credit: Courtesy of University of Surrey

Development of new drugs to effectively target the bacterium that causes tuberculosis (TB) could be one step closer following an important discovery from the University of Surrey.

The Surrey study used a technology called fluxomics to reveal important information about how cells process nitrogen, which could help us better understand how harmful bacteria survive and cause disease. These findings have significant implications for studying the behavior and impact of pathogenic bacteria on human health.

In the most comprehensive study of its kind, the research team from Surrey conducted a study on the bacterium that causes tuberculosis, called Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb). They wanted to understand how nitrogen is processed within Mtb cells, which is essential for the bacterium's survival. Surprisingly, previous studies had mostly examined the role of carbon in Mtb's survival, leaving the role of nitrogen poorly understood.

Earth’s first plants likely to have been branched, study finds

Selaginella
Photo Credit: Vicky Spencer

A new discovery by scientists at the University of Bristol changes ideas about the origin of branching in plants.

By studying the mechanisms responsible for branching, the team have determined what the first land plants are likely to have looked like millions of years ago. 

Despite fundamentally different patterns in growth, their research has identified a common mechanism for branching in vascular plants.

Dr Jill Harrison from Bristol’s School of Biological Sciences explained: “Diverse shapes abound in the dominant flowering plant group, and gardeners will be familiar with ‘pinching out’ plants’ shoot tips to stimulate side branch growth, leading to a bushier overall form.

“However, unlike flowering plants, other vascular plants branch by splitting the shoot apex into two during growth, a process known as ‘dichotomy’.

As an ancient vascular plant lineage that formed coal seams during the Carboniferous era, lycophytes preserve the ancestral pattern of dichotomous branching.

Surprise effect: Methane cools even as it heats

Annual mean near-surface air temperature response to methane, decomposed into (a) longwave and shortwave effects; (b) longwave effects only; and (c) shortwave effects only.
Full size Image
Illustration Credit: Robert Allen / University of California, Riverside

Most climate models do not yet account for a new UC Riverside discovery: methane traps a great deal of heat in Earth’s atmosphere, but also creates cooling clouds that offset 30% of the heat. 

Greenhouse gases like methane create a kind of blanket in the atmosphere, trapping heat from Earth’s surface, called longwave energy, and preventing it from radiating out into space. This makes the planet hotter. 

“A blanket doesn’t create heat, unless it’s electric. You feel warm because the blanket inhibits your body’s ability to send its heat into the air. This is the same concept,” explained Robert Allen, UCR assistant professor of Earth sciences.

In addition to absorbing longwave energy, it turns out methane also absorbs incoming energy from the sun, known as shortwave energy. “This should warm the planet,” said Allen, who led the research project. “But counterintuitively, the shortwave absorption encourages changes in clouds that have a slight cooling effect.”

Fish Will Help Scientists to Measure Levels of Radiation

Researchers' finding will supplement the radiation monitoring of rivers and lakes in the Southern Urals.
 Photo Credit: Rodion Narudinov

The method showed its effectiveness in radionuclide-contaminated waters of the South Urals

Otoliths are hearing and equilibrium maintenance organs of fish that do not contain living cells. They can be used as individual dosimeters for radiobiology and radioecology studies. This was discovered by a team of scientists from the Ural Federal University along with their colleagues from the Chelyabinsk State University and the Ural Scientific-Practical Center of Radiation Medicine.

When exposed to ionizing radiation, otolith hydroxyapatite crystals accumulate stable radicals. These radicals are proportional to the absorbed dose. Dosimetry using electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) detects carbonate ions. As a result, the total radiation accumulated by the fish can be quantified.

The findings of the researchers will supplement the radiation monitoring of rivers and lakes in the Southern Urals, in particular, to detect the impact of radiation from strontium-90 radionuclides in the influence zone of the "Mayak" production association. Scientists concluded that EPR dosimetry in fish otoliths is a promising tool for external or comparable internal exposure.

Researchers develop electrolyte enabling high efficiency of safe, sustainable zinc batteries

Photo Credit: Courtesy of Oregon State University

Scientists led by an Oregon State University researcher have developed a new electrolyte that raises the efficiency of the zinc metal anode in zinc batteries to nearly 100%, a breakthrough on the way to an alternative to lithium-ion batteries for large-scale energy storage.

The research is part of an ongoing global quest for new battery chemistries able to store renewable solar and wind energy on the electric grid for use when the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing.

Xiulei “David” Ji of the OSU College of Science and a collaboration that included HP Inc. and GROTTHUSS INC., an Oregon State spinout company, reported their findings in Nature Sustainability.

“The breakthrough represents a significant advancement toward making zinc metal batteries more accessible to consumers,” Ji said. “These batteries are essential for the installation of additional solar and wind farms. In addition, they offer a secure and efficient solution for home energy storage, as well as energy storage modules for communities that are vulnerable to natural disasters.”

A battery stores electricity in the form of chemical energy and through reactions converts it to electrical energy. There are many different types of batteries, but most of them work the same basic way and contain the same basic components.

Revolutionary discovery for blood clotting

Treatment with soluble GPV prevents the formation of a vascular-closing thrombus in an experimental mouse model for thrombosis formation (right). On the left is a vascular-closing thrombus of an untreated mouse.
Image Credit: Sarah Beck / University Hospital Würzburg

The platelet glycoprotein V is an important switching point for hemostasis and thrombus formation. This new finding could have great clinical potential.

If our blood vessels are injured by cuts or abrasions or bruises, it is vital that the bleeding is stopped and the wound closed. In technical terms, this process is called hemostasis. This consists of two processes: the hemostasis, in which platelets (platelets) attach to the wound edges, form a plug and temporarily seal the injury. And the blood clotting or coagulation cascade, in which long fibers are formed from fibrin, which together with the platelets seal the wound firmly.

However, if fibrin is formed in excess, for example in chronic wounds, vascular occlusions, so-called thrombosis, can occur. Strict regulation of fibrin formation is therefore important. However, how coagulation is limited has not yet been fully understood.

In an international project coordinated by Würzburg University Medicine, researchers have now deciphered a central regulatory mechanism for fibrin formation and derived new therapeutic approaches from it. The results are released in the renowned journal Nature Cardiovascular Research.

A readily available dietary supplement may reverse organ damage caused by HIV and antiretroviral therapy

Photo Credit: Courtesy of MitoQ

MitoQ, a mitochondrial antioxidant that is available to the public as a diet supplement, was found in a mouse study to reverse the detrimental effects that HIV and antiretroviral therapy (ART) have on mitochondria in the brain, heart, aorta, lungs, kidney and liver.

The researchers used a molecular method to measure the ratio of human and murine mitochondrial (mtDNA) to nuclear DNA (ntDNA) ratio, a measure of mitochondrial dysfunction. Reduction in this ratio reflects mitochondrial dysfunction. Compared to uninfected mice, HIV infected mice treated with ART had mitochondrial dysfunction in the human immune cells in the brain, heart, liver, lungs, and gut. ART itself also affected mitochondrial function in mouse heart cells. When treated with MitoQ for 90 days, HIV infected mice had reduced mitochondrial dysfunction in organs compared to HIV infected mice on ART.

Mitochondria are the key cell structures that are important for the smooth function of organs such as the brain, heart, liver and kidney. HIV causes a chronic state of inflammation and immune dysfunction that contribute to damage to organs. The reasons for this are unclear, but it is known that mitochondrial dysfunction contributes to organ damage and is present in chronic HIV. There are no therapies for HIV associated diseases that affect organs such as the brain, heart and liver.

Climate change threatens global fisheries

Euchaeta marina (Calanoid Copepod).
Photo Credit: Julian Uribe-Palomino IMOS-CSIRO.

A major study has found that the diet quality of fish across large parts of the world’s oceans could decline by up to 10 per cent as climate change impacts an integral part of marine food chains.

QUT School of Mathematical Sciences researcher Dr Ryan Heneghan led the study published in Nature Climate Change that included researchers from the University of Queensland, University of Tasmania, University of NSW and CSIRO.

They modeled the impact of climate change on zooplankton, an abundant and extremely diverse group of microscopic animals accounting for about 40 per cent of the world’s marine biomass.

Zooplankton is the primary link between phytoplankton—which converts sunlight and nutrients into energy like plants do on land—and fish.  Zooplankton includes groups such as Antarctic krill—a major food source for whales—and even jellyfish.