Scientists recently announced the discovery of a novel antibiotic produced by bacteria living inside a nematode (roundworm). Although this molecule needs further analyses, the finding, published in Nature, brings hope to the fight against antimicrobial or antibiotic resistance, the growing ability of infectious and sometimes lethal bacteria to survive drug treatment.

Humans have an early understanding of the laws of physical reality. Infants, for instance, hold expectations for how objects should move and interact with each other, and will show surprise when they do something unexpected, such as disappearing in a sleight-of-hand magic trick.

People around the world consume rice in their daily diets. But in addition to its nutrient and caloric content, rice can contain small amounts of arsenic, which in large doses is a toxin linked to multiple health conditions and dietary-related cancers.

Now researchers at the University of Washington have found that warmer temperatures, at levels expected under most climate change projections, can lead to higher concentrations of arsenic in rice grains. The team will present these findings Dec. 10 at the American Geophysical Union’s Fall Meeting in San Francisco.

Every year, a lack of vaccination leads to about 1.5 million preventable deaths, primarily in developing nations. One factor that makes vaccination campaigns in those nations more difficult is that there is little infrastructure for storing medical records, so there’s often no easy way to determine who needs a particular vaccine.

Commercially available antivenoms in India can be ineffective in treating bites from certain medically important neglected snakes, a new study has shown. These snakes are those whose bites are harmful to humans, yet are poorly studied. The study was conducted by scientists from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), in collaboration with their counterparts from the Gerry Martin Project and the Madras Crocodile Bank Trust and Centre for Herpetology. “India is the snakebite capital of the world,” says Kartik Sunagar, Assistant Professor at the Centre for Ecological Sciences, IISc, and senior author of the study published in PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases. Each year, about 46,000 people die and 140,000 people are disabled in the country because of snakebites.

For most people, getting an ultrasound is a relatively easy procedure: As a technician gently presses a probe against a patient’s skin, sound waves generated by the probe travel through the skin, bouncing off muscle, fat, and other soft tissues before reflecting back to the probe, which detects and translates the waves into an image of what lies beneath.

The brain's complex tangle of interconnected nerve cells processes visual images, recalls memories, controls motor function, and coordinates countless other functions. A major goal of neuroscience is understanding how the brain is "wired"—in other words, how do all of its neurons know how they should connect to each other to achieve optimum function?

The cause of a disease often affects its treatment plan. The need to fill this gap in our understanding of disease biology is further exaggerated in the case of ‘rare’ diseases.

So, what is a rare disease? Currently, there is no universal definition for a rare disease since it depends on the country’s population and the availability of treatment. In the case of India, a disease is considered rare if less than one person among 5000 is affected by it. In such a scenario, the hope is that efforts are intensified to understand the biology of such rare conditions, strategize treatments and thus create some respite for those affected.

Genes conferring antibiotic resistance (AR) in bacteria (blue arrow) are often carried on circular mini-chromosome elements referred to as plasmids. Site-specific cutting of these plasmids using the CRISPR system, which results in destruction of the plasmid, has been used to reduce the incidence of AR by approximately 100 fold. Pro-Active Genetics (Pro-AG) employs a highly efficient cut-and-paste mechanism that inserts a gene cassette (red box) into the gene conferring AR thereby disrupting its function. The Pro-AG donor cassette is flanked with sequences corresponding to its AR target (blue boxes) to initiate the process. Once inserted into an AR target gene, the Pro-AG element copies itself through a self-amplifying mechanism leading to an approximately 100,000-fold reduction in AR bacteria

An emerging way to treat cancer is immunotherapy, where the patient’s immune system is strengthened to attack cancer cells. It is less painful than surgery, chemotherapy or radiation therapy, and is known to lower the relapse of cancer. Now, researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT Bombay) have developed a patented technology to leverage the patient’s immune system to cure cancer.

The causes of autism spectrum disorder or ASD are not fully understood; researchers believe both genetics and environment play a role. In some cases, the disorder is linked to de novo mutations that appear only in the child and are not inherited from either parent’s DNA.

In a study published December 23, 2019 in Nature Medicine, an international team of scientists, led by researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine, describe a method to measure disease-causing mutations found only in the sperm of the father, providing a more accurate assessment of ASD risk in future children.

A new study in Nature details this “weird” finding by showing how droplets containing chain-like liquid crystal molecules transform into complex shapes when the temperature drops. Conducted by Wei, graduate student Sophie Ettinger, Ph.D. alum Yu Xia, Shu Yang, and Arjun Yodh, this unexpected discovery provides new understanding about how molecular polydispersity—a condition where the lengths of liquid crystal molecules vary widely—can drive simple droplets to change into unusual shapes.

UCLA scientists James Gimzewski and Adam Stieg are part of an international research team that has taken a significant stride toward the goal of creating thinking machines. Led by researchers at Japan’s National Institute for Materials Science, the team created an experimental device that exhibited characteristics analogous to certain behaviors of the brain — learning, memorization, forgetting, wakefulness and sleep. The paper, published in Scientific Reports, describes a network in a state of continuous flux.

Equipped with cutting-edge scientific instruments to measure the environment around the spacecraft, the Parker Solar Probe—designed, built, and managed for NASA by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory—has completed three of its 24 planned passes through never-before-explored parts of the sun's atmosphere.

Four new papers in the journal Nature describe what scientists have learned from this groundbreaking study of our star—and what they look forward to learning next.

An international group of scientists, including from the University of Cambridge, have developed a graphene composite that can ‘eat’ common atmospheric pollutants, and could be used as a coating on pavements or buildings.

Working in collaboration with the Italcementi  Heidelberg Cement Group and other partners, the Cambridge scientists developed a photocatalyst that degrades up to 70% more atmospheric nitrogen oxides (NO_x) than standard titania nanoparticles in tests on real pollutants.

By capturing and analyzing nearly all of the brain signals sent to the wing muscles of hawk moths (Manduca sexta), which feed on such nectar, researchers have shown that precise timing within rapid sequences of neural signal spikes is essential to controlling the flight muscles necessary for the moths to eat.

The research shows that millisecond changes in timing of the action potential spikes, rather than the number or amplitude of the spikes, conveys the majority of information the moths use to coordinate the five muscles in each of their wings. The importance of precise spike timing had been known for certain specific muscles in vertebrates, but the new work shows the general nature of the connection. 

A team of researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology and The Ohio State University has developed a soft polymer material, called magnetic shape memory polymer that uses magnetic fields to transform into a variety of shapes. The material could enable a range of new applications from antennas that change frequencies on the fly to gripper arms for delicate or heavy objects.

The material is a mixture of three different ingredients, all with unique characteristics: two types of magnetic particles, one for inductive heat and one with strong magnetic attraction, and shape-memory polymers to help lock various shape changes into place.