‘Alien’ wasps thriving in tropical forests, study finds

Dolichomitus
Photo Credit: Pjt56
(CC BY-SA 4.0 DEED)

Researchers say they have discovered high diversity of Darwin wasps in a tropical rainforest in Brazil, wasps which were previously thought to thrive more in cooler habitats.

The wasps, which survive by living off host insects and spiders until adult-sized, were discovered on a mountain in the Brazilian Atlantic Rainforest. The number of types found were similar to that previously found in the whole of the UK.

The latest findings adds to a growing body of evidence that debunks the widely held belief that the Darwin wasp does not thrive in tropical environments and points to the possibility of many wasp species unknown to researchers in the past.

Researchers say it also provides further evidence of the biodiversity of the Brazilian Atlantic Rainforest and the significance of protecting and restoring the land from the effects of climate change and damage caused by human activities.

Physicists trap electrons in a 3D crystal for the first time

The rare electronic state is thanks to a special cubic arrangement of atoms (pictured) that resembles the Japanese art of “kagome.” 
Image Credit: Courtesy of the researchers / MIT

Electrons move through a conducting material like commuters at the height of Manhattan rush hour. The charged particles may jostle and bump against each other, but for the most part they’re unconcerned with other electrons as they hurtle forward, each with their own energy.

But when a material’s electrons are trapped together, they can settle into the exact same energy state and start to behave as one. This collective, zombie-like state is what’s known in physics as an electronic “flat band,” and scientists predict that when electrons are in this state, they can start to feel the quantum effects of other electrons and act in coordinated, quantum ways. Then, exotic behavior such as superconductivity and unique forms of magnetism may emerge.

Now, physicists at MIT have successfully trapped electrons in a pure crystal. It is the first time that scientists have achieved an electronic flat band in a three-dimensional material. With some chemical manipulation, the researchers also showed they could transform the crystal into a superconductor — a material that conducts electricity with zero resistance.

Scientists engineer potent immune cells for ‘off-the-shelf’ cancer immunotherapy

Illustration Credit: Scientific Frontline

UCLA scientists have developed a new method to engineer more powerful immune cells that can potentially be used for “off-the-shelf” cell therapy to treat challenging cancers.

“Off-the-shelf” cell therapy, also known as allogenic therapy, uses immune cells derived from healthy donors instead of patients. The approach can bring cell therapies, like chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cell therapy, to more patients in a timelier manner, which is one of the major barriers in getting these life-saving treatments to patients.

“Time is often of the essence when it comes to treating people with advanced cancers,” said Lili Yang, associate professor of microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics and member of the UCLA Health Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center. “Currently, these types of therapies need to be tailored to the individual patient. We have to extract white blood cells from a patient, genetically engineer the cells and then re-infuse them back into the patient. This process can take weeks to months and can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to treat each patient.”

Experts predict ‘catastrophic ecosystem collapse’ of UK forests within the next 50 years if action not taken

Photo Credit: Greg Larcombe

A team of experts from across Europe has produced a list of 15 overlooked and emerging issues that are likely to have a significant impact on UK forests over the next 50 years.

This is the first ‘horizon scanning’ exercise – a technique to identify relatively unknown threats, opportunities, and new trends – of UK forests. The aim is to help researchers, practitioners, policymakers, and society in general, better prepare for the future and address threats before they become critical.

Dr Eleanor Tew, first author, visiting researcher at Cambridge’s Department of Zoology and Head of Forest Planning at Forestry England said: “The next 50 years will bring huge changes to UK forests: the threats they face, the way that we manage them, and the benefits they deliver to society.”

Forestry England, a part of the Forestry Commission, collaborated with the University of Cambridge on the study, which was published today in the journal, Forestry.

TUM makes first daily current measurements of changes in the earth's rotation

The ring laser in Wettzell has been continuously improved since its commissioning.
Photo Credit: Astrid Eckert / TUM 

Researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) have succeeded in measuring the earth's rotation more exactly than ever before. The ring laser at the Geodetic Observatory Wettzell can now be used to capture data at a quality level unsurpassed anywhere in the world. The measurements will be used in determining the earth's position in space, will benefit climate research and will make climate models more reliable.

Care to take a quick step down to the basement and see how fast the earth has been turning in the last few hours? Now you can at the Geodetic Observatory Wettzell. TUM researchers have improved the ring laser there so that it can provide daily current data, which until now has not been possible at comparable quality levels.

What exactly does the ring laser measure? On its journey through space the earth rotates on its axis at slightly varying speeds. In addition, the axis around which the planet spins is not completely static, it wobbles a bit. This is because our planet is not completely solid, but is made up of various component parts, some solid, some liquid. So, the insides of the earth itself are constantly in motion. These shifts in mass accelerate or brake the planet's rotation, differences which can be detected using measurement systems like the TUM ring laser.

Poison dart frogs: Personality determines reproductive strategies

The Allobates femoralis species of poison dart frogs follows different strategies during reproduction according to their behavioral type.
Photo Credit: Eva Ringler

Poison frogs of the species Allobates femoralis are common in the rainforests in South America. Their highly poisonous relatives, such as frogs of the genus Phyllobates, were frequently used by indigenous people of Colombia to extract toxins by rubbing the skin onto arrowheads for the purposes of hunting and fighting. Allobates femoralis frogs are not poisonous. Like many other animal species, however, they have distinct personality traits. Both the males and females, for example, may be particularly bold, aggressive, or eager to explore. Poison frogs mate with several partners over the course of a reproductive period and their character traits have a considerable influence on the reproductive strategies employed by individual animals. 

Most of the previous studies in other animal taxa have examined the effect of personality traits on a single measure of reproductive success. In two recently published studies, researchers in the Institute of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Bern have presented new results on the effects of different combinations of personality traits in both males and females on different components of reproductive success. They examined the influence of personality on mating success, the number of clutches produced, as well as the numbers of offspring that survive into adulthood. The researchers were able to show that certain personality traits are already present in poison dart frogs at tadpole stage and that they also persist after the subsequent metamorphosis. 

Ural Scientists Have Synthesized a New Substance for the Treatment of Alzheimer’s Disease

Scientists from the Ural Federal University, the Institute of Organic Synthesis of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, together with colleagues from India have developed a method for creating safe and non-toxic substances that could become the basis for drugs for Alzheimer's disease. Using the new technology, they synthesized and tested several compounds of tacrine analogues, which toxicity is estimated to be from two to five times lower than that of the known drug. The description of the new method and the compounds obtained was published in the Journal of Heterocyclic Chemistry. 

"We believe that our technology will help to create safe substances that will become the basis for future drugs for Alzheimer's disease. Our studies have shown that the toxicity of the resulting substances is two to five times lower than that of tacrine. At the same time, they are effective as they help to increase the level of acetylcholine in the cerebral cortex, which slows down the destruction of neuronal connections. This allows patients to maintain their cognitive functions and lead an active and fulfilling life for as long as possible," explains Nibin Joy Muthipeedika, Senior Researcher at the UrFU Organic Synthesis Laboratory.

Why do climate models underestimate polar warming? ‘Invisible clouds’ could be the answer

Polar stratospheric clouds, also called nacreous or mother-of-pearl clouds, are not normally visible to the naked eye.
Photo Credit: Alan Light
(CC BY 4.0 DEED)

Stratospheric clouds over the Arctic may explain the differences seen between the polar warming calculated by climate models and actual recordings, find researchers from UNSW Sydney.  

The Earth’s average surface temperature has increased drastically since the start of the Industrial Revolution, but the warming effect seen at the poles is even more exaggerated. While existing climate models consider the increased heating in the Arctic and Antarctic poles, they often still underestimate the warming in these regions. This is especially true for climates millions of years ago, when greenhouse gas concentrations were very high. 

This is a problem because future climate projections are generated with these same models: if they do not produce enough warming for the past, we might underestimate polar warming – and therefore the associated risks, such as ice sheet or permafrost melting – for the future. 

This missing information caught the attention of scientists from the UNSW Climate Change Research Centre. 

How Mega-Floods can be Predicted

Flooding in Germany 2021
Photo Credit: Martin Seifert
Public Domain

When floods are predicted only on the basis of local data, there may be unpleasant surprises. A new method makes it possible to significantly improve predictions - using international data from hydrologically similar areas.

What can we expect in the worst-case scenario? In regions with a high risk of flooding, this is an important question: what extreme events should the protective measures be designed for? Often this is answered simply by looking at history: The worst flood events of the past decades or centuries are regarded as a realistic upper limit for what can be expected in the future.

However, this can be misleading, as so-called "mega-floods" have shown in recent years. Time and again, extreme flood events occur, extraordinary outliers that were not considered possible on the basis of local data. However, a major research project carried out under the leadership of TU Wien (Vienna) has now been able to demonstrate: If one considers the entire European continent, these local surprises are no longer surprising at all. If data from other regions with similar hydrological conditions is taken into account, the extent of these "mega-floods" suddenly becomes predictable. This has drastic consequences for the way in which flood protection must be dimensioned. The results have now been presented in the journal Nature Geoscience.

SwRI-led Lucy observes first-ever contact binary orbiting an asteroid

This image shows the asteroid Dinkinesh and its satellite as seen by the Lucy Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI). As NASA's Lucy Spacecraft departed the system, the SwRI-led Lucy team captured this image at 1 p.m. EDT (1700 UTC) Nov. 1, 2023, about six minutes after closest approach. From a range of approximately 1,010 miles (1,630 km), the satellite is revealed to be a contact binary, the first time such an object has been seen orbiting another asteroid.
Image Credit: NASA/Goddard/SwRI/Johns Hopkins APL

After the Southwest Research Institute-led Lucy mission flew past the asteroid Dinkinesh, the team discovered that it is even more “marvelous” as its newly discovered satellite is now shown to be a double-lobed moonlet. As NASA’s Lucy spacecraft continued to return data acquired during its first asteroid encounter on Nov. 1, 2023, the team discovered that Dinkinesh’s surprise satellite is itself a contact binary, made of two smaller objects touching each other.

In the first image of Dinkinesh and its satellite taken at closest approach, the two lobes of the contact binary lined up, one behind the other, appearing to be one body from Lucy’s point of view. When the team downlinked additional images captured after the closest encounter, the data revealed that Dinkenesh has a double moonlet.

“Contact binaries seem to be fairly common in the solar system,” said John Spencer, Lucy deputy project scientist, of the Boulder, Colorado, branch of the San Antonio-based SwRI. “We haven’t seen many up close, and we’ve never seen one orbiting another asteroid. We’d been puzzling over odd variations in Dinkinesh’s brightness that we saw on approach, which gave us a hint that Dinkinesh might have a moon of some sort, but we never suspected anything so bizarre!”

Why are songbirds larger in colder climates?

A song-sparrow
Photo Credit: Anish Lakkapragada

Scientists have unlocked the genetic basis underlying the remarkable variation in body size observed in song sparrows, one of North America’s most familiar and beloved songbirds. This discovery also provides insights into this species’ capacity to adapt to the challenges of climate change.

The study, published today in Nature Communications, used genomic sequencing to successfully pinpoint eight genetic variants, or DNA mutations, largely responsible for the nearly threefold difference in body size observed across the song sparrow range from Mexico to Alaska. For instance, song sparrows that live year-round in the Aleutian Islands can be up to three times larger than their counterparts in the coastal marshes of California.

Katherine Carbeck, the study’s first author and a PhD candidate in the faculty of forestry, University of British Columbia, explains that body size varies predictably in many species that inhabit vastly different climatic conditions, aligning with “Bergmann’s rule” which states that organisms in cooler climates tend to be larger as an adaptation to regulate body temperature.

Under Pressure: Seeing the Squeeze in Living Organisms

Double emulsion droplet (pink and cyan) located in between cells (yellow) of a living zebrafish embryo. Monitoring the changes in droplet size allows scientists to measure the osmotic pressure in the tissue.
Image Credit: © PoL / Antoine Vian

In order to survive, organisms must control the pressure inside them, from the single-cell level to tissues and organs. Measuring these pressures in living cells and tissues in physiological conditions has been very challenging. Now, researchers from the Cluster of Excellence Physics of Life (PoL) at the Technical University in Dresden (TU Dresden), Germany, report in the journal Nature Communications a new technique to ‘visualize’ these pressures as organisms develop. These measurements can help understand how cells and tissues survive under pressure, and reveal how problems in regulating pressures lead to disease. 

When molecules dissolved in water are separated into different compartments, water has the tendency to flow from one compartment to another to equilibrate their concentrations, a process known as osmosis. If some molecules cannot cross compartments, a pressure imbalance, known as osmotic pressure, builds up across them. This principle is the basis for many technical applications, such as the desalination of seawater or the development of moisturizing creams. It turns out that maintaining a healthy functioning organism makes the list too. 

30-foot whale shark spotted off Kāneʻohe Bay by UH researchers

University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa researchers spotted the world’s largest fish species, a 30-foot whale shark, a mile off Kāneʻohe Bay near Kualoa Ranch on November 2.

Researchers from the Hawaiʻi Institute of Marine Biology (HIMB) Shark Research Lab were returning from conducting field work when they spotted seabirds flying over what they suspected was a bait ball, where small fish swarm in a tightly packed spherical formation near the surface while being pursued and herded by predators below.

Mark Royer, a HIMB shark researcher, went into the water to see what sealife had gathered to feed and was surprised to see the whale shark.

“It is surprising,” said Royer. “[Whale sharks] are here more often than we think, however they are probably hard to come across, because I didn’t see this animal until I hopped in the water.”

Scientists use quantum biology, AI to sharpen genome editing tool

ORNL scientists developed a method that improves the accuracy of the CRISPR Cas9 gene editing tool used to modify microbes for renewable fuels and chemicals production. This research draws on the lab’s expertise in quantum biology, artificial intelligence and synthetic biology.
Illustration Credit: Philip Gray/ORNL, U.S. Dept. of Energy

Scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory used their expertise in quantum biology, artificial intelligence and bioengineering to improve how CRISPR Cas9 genome editing tools work on organisms like microbes that can be modified to produce renewable fuels and chemicals.

CRISPR is a powerful tool for bioengineering, used to modify genetic code to improve an organism’s performance or to correct mutations. The CRISPR Cas9 tool relies on a single, unique guide RNA that directs the Cas9 enzyme to bind with and cleave the corresponding targeted site in the genome. Existing models to computationally predict effective guide RNAs for CRISPR tools were built on data from only a few model species, with weak, inconsistent efficiency when applied to microbes.

“A lot of the CRISPR tools have been developed for mammalian cells, fruit flies or other model species. Few have been geared towards microbes where the chromosomal structures and sizes are very different,” said Carrie Eckert, leader of the Synthetic Biology group at ORNL. “We had observed that models for designing the CRISPR Cas9 machinery behave differently when working with microbes, and this research validates what we’d known anecdotally.”

New strategy may halt tumors' aggressive response to glucose deprivation

The figure shows the expression of a differentiation marker in the tumors of mice treated with the glucose inhibitor, the epigenetic inhibitor, or both. Top left image is the placebo, top right is the glucose inhibitor, bottom left is the epigenetic inhibitor and bottom right is the glucose inhibitor and epigenetic inhibitor. The brown signal indicates the presence of the differentiation marker. The treatment with the glucose inhibitor (top right) reduces the brown signal, whereas the addition of the epigenetic inhibitor rescues the expression of the differentiation marker.
Image Credit: Dr. Claudio Scafoglio.

One of the hallmarks of cancer cell development is its dependence on sugar, especially glucose, to grow and divide. Scientists have long been studying how to restrict or block this process that promotes tumor growth, called glycolysis, from happening as a possible effective strategy against cancer.

Previously, researchers from the UCLA Health Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center identified a specific protein sodium glucose transporter 2, or SGLT2, as a mechanism that lung cancer cells can utilize to obtain glucose. Drugs that inhibit SGLT2 are already FDA approved for other conditions and the UCLA team found these drugs could also delay the development of lung cancer and improved survival when tested in mice, suggesting these drugs could be repurposed for lung cancer treatment.

However, while inhibiting glycolysis can slow down the growth of tumors, the researchers found it can also make cancer cells more aggressive, making the cancer harder to treat. This led the team to look at other mechanisms of resistance in the tumors that still grow while being treated with SGLT2 inhibition that may link glucose restriction to increases aggression.