Latest News Releases 22 June

Rice University chemists developed a method to add two fragments to an alkene molecule in a single process. The discovery could simplify drug and materials design.

An estimated one-quarter of adults in the U.S. have nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), an excess of fat in liver cells that can cause chronic inflammation and liver damage, increasing the risk of liver cancer. Now, UT Southwestern researchers have developed a simple blood test to predict which NAFLD patients are most likely to develop liver cancer.

Ferroelectric materials based on the element hafnium show promise for data storage devices. They offer high speed, durability, lower operating power, and the ability to retain data when power is turned off. This research developed an innovative bulk hafnia-based ferroelectric material. Experiments with the material produced the first experimental evidence of room-temperature ferroelectricity in crystals made of a hafnium-based compound, bulk yttrium doped hafnium dioxide.

A new statistical tool for predicting protein function could help with tasks ranging from producing biofuels to improving crops to developing new disease treatments. Not only could it help with the difficult job of altering proteins in practically useful ways, but it also works by methods that are fully interpretable — an advantage over conventional AI.

Researchers at the Florida Museum of Natural History recently turned to pottery to tease apart the navigational history of the Caribbean, analyzing the composition of 96 fired clay fragments across 11 islands. The study, published in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, is the broadest of its kind yet conducted in the Greater Antilles and marks the first time that pottery artifacts from the Lucayan Islands — The Bahamas plus the Turks and Caicos Islands — have been analyzed to determine their elemental composition and origin.

Doctors at the UCLA Gender Health Program have developed a technique to reduce an Adam’s apple bump without leaving a scar on the patient’s neck.

The immune system may play a fundamental role along with the central nervous system in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as “Lou Gehrig’s disease,” Mount Sinai researchers report.

NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day website is available in 20 languages, seen by millions each day, and is used in classrooms throughout the world. APOD has now been honored in the International Astronomical Union’s first-ever round of outreach prizes.

Megalodon sharks, which went extinct about 3 million years ago, were three times longer than modern great white sharks and were apex predators at highest trophic level ever measured. Princeton's Danny Sigman and Emma Kast led a research team that used the traces of nitrogen trapped in shark tooth enamel to calculate the trophic levels of the prehistoric predators.

Delivering a targeted immunotoxin into breast ducts via openings in the nipple wiped out all visible and invisible precancerous lesions in laboratory studies, led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, of very early stage breast cancers.