Understanding mutualism can help control the spread of invasive species

The subalpine fir has a mutualistic relationship with belowground fungi.
Photo Credit: Khilav Majmudar, University of Minnesota

Cooperation between species to help each other's survival is known as mutualism. It is seen among many types of organisms, such as plants and fungi that exchange nutrients with one another, plants that provide bees with nectar in exchange for pollination, and sea anemones that provide protection for clown-fish in exchange for excreted nutrients. Recently, scientists have found evidence that some invasive plants become even more invasive in the presence of helpful partners, as can happen with certain pine trees and fungi or fig trees and wasps. But other studies have suggested that species that didn't rely on mutualist partners were more invasive. 

Recent research at the University of Minnesota, published in the journal Ecology, attempted to identify the conditions under which a mutualistic partner could make a species more or less invasive. To study this, they built mathematical models called integro-difference equations (IDEs). IDEs take into account the effects of mutualism on growth and dispersal of species and are useful tools to model spatial processes. Mathematical models are helpful in understanding ecological processes like invasion that occur over many years and can be difficult to study in the field.

Electrons are quick-change artists in molten salts, chemists show

When exposed to radiation, electrons produced within molten zinc chloride, or ZnCl2, can be observed in three distinct singly occupied molecular orbital states, plus a more diffuse, delocalized state.
Illustration Credit: Hung H. Nguyen/University of Iowa

In a finding that helps elucidate how molten salts in advanced nuclear reactors might behave, scientists have shown how electrons interacting with the ions of the molten salt can form three states with different properties. Understanding these states can help predict the impact of radiation on the performance of salt-fueled reactors.

The researchers, from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the University of Iowa, computationally simulated the introduction of an excess electron into molten zinc chloride salt to see what would happen.

They found three possible scenarios. In one, the electron becomes part of a molecular radical that includes two zinc ions. In another, the electron localizes on a single zinc ion. In the third, the electron is delocalized, or spread out diffusely over multiple salt ions.

Because molten salt reactors are one of the reactor designs under consideration for future nuclear power plants, “the big question is what happens to molten salts when they’re exposed to high radiation,” said Vyacheslav Bryantsev, leader of the Chemical Separations group at ORNL and one of the scientists on the study and an author of the paper. “What happens to the salt that is used to carry the fuel in one of those advanced reactor concepts?”

Lactate-producing bacteria inside tumors promote resistance to radiation therapy

Lactobacillus iners taken from cervical cancer tumor samples spread on agar plate.
Image Credit: Courtesy of David Lo.

Researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center have discovered that lactate-producing intratumoral bacteria drives resistance to radiation therapy, suggesting that lactic acid-producing bacteria present in various cancers may serve as novel therapeutic targets.

The study, published today in Cancer Cell, reported that a particular bacterial species, Lactobacillus iners (L. iners), caused cancer cells to respond to radiation by rewiring metabolic signaling pathways to resist treatment. The researchers also found that L. iners was associated with poorer clinical outcomes in patients with cervical cancer.

“These lactic acid-producing bacteria are seemingly responsible for changing signaling pathways by priming cancer cells to use lactate instead of glucose to fuel growth and proliferation from oxidative stress following radiation therapy,” said corresponding author Lauren Colbert, M.D., assistant professor of Radiation Oncology. “This is potentially paradigm shifting, and we currently are working on novel approaches to target these specific intratumoral bacteria. We are hopeful that these efforts will lead us to approaches that can benefit patients across several types of cancer.”

Astronomers detect most distant fast radio burst to date

This artist’s impression (not to scale) illustrates the path of the fast radio burst FRB 20220610A, from the distant galaxy where it originated all the way to Earth, in one of the Milky Way’s spiral arms. The source galaxy of FRB 20220610A, pinned down thanks to ESO’s Very Large Telescope, appears to be located within a small group of interacting galaxies. It’s so far away its light took eight billion years to reach us, making FRB 20220610A the most distant fast radio burst found to date. 
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Credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser

An international team has spotted a remote blast of cosmic radio waves lasting less than a millisecond. This 'fast radio burst' (FRB) is the most distant ever detected. Its source was pinned down by the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT) in a galaxy so far away that its light took eight billion years to reach us. The FRB is also one of the most energetic ever observed; in a tiny fraction of a second it released the equivalent of our Sun’s total emission over 30 years.

The discovery of the burst, named FRB 20220610A, was made in June last year by the ASKAP radio telescope in Australia and it smashed the team’s previous distance record by 50 percent.

“Using ASKAP’s array of dishes, we were able to determine precisely where the burst came from,” says Stuart Ryder, an astronomer from Macquarie University in Australia and the co-lead author of the study published today in Science. “Then we used [ESO’s VLT] in Chile to search for the source galaxy, finding it to be older and further away than any other FRB source found to date and likely within a small group of merging galaxies.”

Rice researcher scans tropical forest with mixed-reality device

Rice doctoral alumnus Daniel Gorczynski wearing a Microsoft HoloLens headset.
Photo Credit: Jeff Fitlow/Rice University

Rice University scientists used a commercially available mixed-reality headset with custom-designed software to measure and analyze forest floor vegetation, demonstrating a correlation between animal diversity and the mapped habitat of a Tanzanian national park. According to the paper published in the journal Ecology, the greater the microhabitat surface area, the richer the biodiversity of its mammals.

Traditional habitat field research requires a significant amount of time and effort, but Rice postdoctoral researcher Daniel Gorczynski reduced those costs by incorporating a Microsoft HoloLens with his innovative VegSense software. Gorczynski and his advisor, assistant professor of biosciences Lydia Beaudrot, created VegSense to help researchers measure animal habitats, while the HoloLens was initially designed to improve work quality and outcomes in manufacturing, engineering, healthcare and education.

“Because the HoloLens is a mixed-reality device, you can see both the projected mesh over the forest structure as well as your local surroundings,” Gorczynski said.

New mollusk and crustacean species in symbiosis with worms in dead coral rocks

Bonellia sp. aff. minor (green) and its burrow associates -- Basterotia bonelliphila (right) and Leucothoe bonelliae (left) -- in dead coral rock. The inside of the burrows is partly occupied by sandy sediments collected by Bo. sp. aff. minor.
Image Credit: KyotoU/Ryutaro Goto

Good real estate is not easy to find, even for sea creatures. Sometimes, push comes to shove, and species resort to competition or conquering before weighing the benefits of sharing an ecosystem like housemates.

There is abundant research on live-in symbionts, which share the burrows of other organisms in sand and mud on the seabed. However, studies on burrow niches in rigid substrates, such as rocks on the seabed, have been scarce.

Now, a research team led by Kyoto University has discovered the symbiotic communities of invertebrates in dead coral gravel on the shallow, warm-temperate coast of the Kii Peninsula in western Japan. New bivalve species and sideswimmers have been found to live communally with the greenish Bonellia spoonworm.

A miniature magnetic resonance imager made of diamond

Prof. Dominik Bucher uses defects in diamond (NV-centers) as quantum sensors for NMR spectroscopy on the nano- to microscale. His research group works at the unique interface between quantum sensing and (bio) chemistry with interdisciplinary approaches from applied quantum physics, chemical synthesis and biophysics. The over goal is to perform NMR spectroscopy on smallest length-scales - from nano- and surface science to microfluidics and single-cell biology.
Photo Credit: Andreas Heddergott / TUM

The development of tumors begins with minuscule changes within the body's cells; ion diffusion at the smallest scales is decisive in the performance of batteries. Until now the resolution of conventional imaging methods has not been high enough to represent these processes in detail. A research team led by the Technical University of Munich (TUM) has developed diamond quantum sensors which can be used to improve resolution in magnetic imaging.

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is an important imaging method in research which can be used to visualize tissue and structures without damaging them. The technique is better known from the medical field as Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), where the patient is moved into the bore of a large magnet on a table. The MRI device creates a very strong magnetic field which interacts with the tiny magnetic fields of the hydrogen nuclei in the body. Since the hydrogen atoms are distributed in a particular way amongst different types of tissues, it becomes possible to differentiate organs, joints, muscles and blood vessels.

Physical theory improves protein folding prediction

Protein folding models. Four iterations of WSME, from the original to the new, and two specialized versions for more specific circumstances.
Illustration Credit: ©2023 Ooka & Arai CC-BY

Proteins are important molecules that perform a variety of functions essential to life. To function properly, many proteins must fold into specific structures. However, the way proteins fold into specific structures is still largely unknown. Researchers from the University of Tokyo developed a novel physical theory that can accurately predict how proteins fold. Their model can predict things previous models cannot. Improved knowledge of protein folding could offer huge benefits to medical research, as well as to various industrial processes.

You are literally made of proteins. These chainlike molecules, made from tens to thousands of smaller molecules called amino acids, form things like hair, bones, muscles, enzymes for digestion, antibodies to fight diseases, and more. Proteins make these things by folding into various structures that in turn build up these larger tissues and biological components. And by knowing more about this folding process, researchers can better understand more about the processes that constitute life itself. Such knowledge is also essential to medicine, not only for the development of new treatments and industrial processes to produce medicines, but also for knowledge of how certain diseases work, as some are examples of protein folding gone wrong. So, to say proteins are important is putting it mildly. Proteins are the stuff of life.

Biodegradable plastics still damaging to fish

Professor Indrawati Oey, of the Department of Food Science, and Dr Bridie Allan, of the Department of Marine Science, hold the biodegradable plastic used in the study and a photo of the mottled triplefin, the species analyzed.
Photo Credit: University of Otago

Biodegradable plastics may not be the solution to plastic pollution many hoped for, with a University of Otago study showing they are still harmful to fish.

Petroleum-derived microplastics are known to impact marine life, but little is known about the impact of biodegradable alternatives.

The study, published in Science of the Total Environment and funded by a University of Otago Research Grant, is the first to assess the impact petroleum-derived plastic and biodegradable plastic have on wild fish.

Lead author Ashleigh Hawke, who completed a Master of Science in Otago’s Department of Marine Science, says petroleum-derived plastic exposure negatively affected the fish’s escape performance, routine swimming, and aerobic metabolism.

New insights into the genetics of the common octopus: genome at the chromosome level decoded

Octopus vulgaris
Photo Credit: ©Antonio, Valerio Cirillo (BEOM SZN), 2023

Octopuses are fascinating animals – and serve as important model organisms in neuroscience, cognition research and developmental biology. To gain a deeper understanding of their biology and evolutionary history, validated data on the composition of their genome is needed, which has been lacking until now. Scientists from the University of Vienna together with an international research team have now been able to close this gap and, in a study, determined impressive figures: 2.8 billion base pairs - organized in 30 chromosomes. What sounds so simple is the result of complex, computer-assisted genome analyses and comparisons with the genomes of other cephalopod species. This groundbreaking research has just been published in the renowned journal G3: Genes / Genomes / Genetics.

Octopuses, together with squid and cuttlefish, belong to a group of coleoid cephalopods consisting of several hundreds of species that are characterized by highly diversified lifestyles, body structure and adaptations to their environment. The study of these animals looks back on a long tradition, especially since the neuronal plasticity of the octopus brain – meaning the brain's ability to change and adapt as you learn and experience new things – provides evidence for the existence of functionally analogous structures to the brains of mammals. This is making them a comparative model group for neurophysiological studies. Also, their ability to regenerate parts of their bodies as well as the rapid changes of their body patterns, which are important for camouflage and communication, make octopuses a popular research subject for studying how these innovative traits arose – and how they have changed – during evolution.