ResearchBlogging.org News

Vincent Racaniello selects several notable posts each week from molecular and cellular biology and virology. He unravels viruses at virology blog.

• In mammals, prions can be bad news: they can morph into infectious pathogens that cause neurologic disease. In other organisms, they are important for gene regulation, particularly for responding to environmental changes.
• Neuraminidase inhibitors such as Tamiflu will likely be important for defense against avian influenza viruses should they ever establish in humans. Resistance emerges, but usually comes with a fitness cost.
• The disease cholera is caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae, which colonizes the intestine and causes massive and potentially lethal diarrhea. In water the bacterium exists as biofilms that colonize plankton, particularly copepods, from which they obtain chitin.

I’ll be back next Friday with more selections.

Sarah Kendrew selects interesting and notable ResearchBlogging.org posts in the physical sciences, chemistry, engineering, computer science, geosciences and mathematics. She blogs about astronomy at One Small Step.

Here are some highlights from the last week’s postings in the physical sciences and engineering on ResearchBlogging!

Need your appendix removed on a long space journey to a distant exoplanet? With robotic telesurgery, now for the first time demonstrated in zero gravity, this is no longer a problem. Jason Carr describes this exciting advance on Wired Cosmos.

On Miss Atomic Bomb, Kelly discusses the significance of the newly published results from the fascinating ice-bound Antarctic IceCube experiment. It seems like high energy cosmic rays will remain a mystery for some time yet.

What caused supernova SN 2009z? This great post on Supernova Condensate describes this intriguing stellar explosion, which took place in a galaxy where such events are entirely unexpected.

I hope you all have a great week, and I’ll be back next Monday with more picks.

Vincent Racaniello selects several notable posts each week from molecular and cellular biology and virology. He unravels viruses at virology blog.

• Mice lacking the gene encoding the innate immune sensor TLR2 exhibit insulin-resistance. The cause is an altered gut microbiome, which allows LPS to enter the blood and trigger inflammation.
• Yersinia pestis was made luminescent by insertion of lux gene and used to track the spread of infection in mice. The approach provides a continuous picture of how infection moves from injection site to target organs.
• A case of Baylisascariasis in a 73-year-old woman challenges the idea that this infection only targets infants and toddlers. It also emphasizes the importance of autopsies in understanding disease.

I’ll be back next Friday with more selections.

Krystal D’Costa selects notable ResearchBlogging.org posts in the social sciences, covering anthropology, research, and philosophy. She blogs about anthropology, technology, and urban life at Anthropology in Practice. Follow her on Twitter @krystaldcosta.

An eclectic collection this week, but all well worth the read:

• At EvoAnth, Adam Benton wonders whether human ancestors may have mastered tool use earlier than we think. He shares research (containing admittedly scant evidence) that includes a nice discussion of the challenges of this data.
• Sarah Jane Alger of The Scorpion and the Frog delivers a hair raising tale about obligate brood parasites— insidious offspring that are actually transplants who usurp resources to boost their survival. She asks why these invaders are sometimes murderous and sometimes not, and investigates whether their survival strategy is actually adaptive.
• The Neuroskeptic maintains that there is a degree of universality to some facial expressions despite the assertions otherwise of a recent paper. The skeptic dissects the study’s results to demonstrate that recognition of “basic” emotions (e.g., happy, sad) is relatively consistent.
• How much has your hometown changed since you first moved there? At Per Square Mile, Tim DeChant discusses the “last settler syndrome,” explaining how this might color the way we see and remember the spaces around us.
• Have you been subject to gaslighting? Juliana Breines explains this subtle method of manipulation at Psych Your Mind which may leave you wondering why you believe the things you do.

Until next time, folks. I’ll be back next week with more from anthropology, philosophy, and research.

Vincent Racaniello selects several notable posts each week from molecular and cellular biology and virology. He unravels viruses at virology blog.

• A new type of DNA has been discovered in mammalian cells: microDNA. They are extrachromosomal circular DNA molecules, 200-400bp long, derived from non-repetitive genomic sequence. They could lead to large amounts of genetic variation between somatic cells.
• A flurry of recent scientific papers, and a blizzard of news hype, has led many to conclude that the mystery of colony collapse disorder (CCD), which causes beehives to die suddenly, has been solved. The hypothesis that low amounts of the insecticide imidacloprid are contributing to CCD is plausible, but remains untested.
• Prokaryotic toxin-antitoxin systems, found on many plasmids and chromosomes, depend on the differential stability of two gene products. The bacteriophage T4 circumvents these systems by producing a gene product that can substitute for the antitoxin.

I’ll be back next Friday with more selections.

Krystal D’Costa selects notable ResearchBlogging.org posts in the social sciences, covering anthropology, research, and philosophy. She blogs about anthropology, technology, and urban life at Anthropology in Practice. Follow her on Twitter @krystaldcosta.

• At Geneaology of Religion, Cris Campbell has a nice summary of dissociative speech patterns—in layman’s terms, that’s to say he breaks down different ways of “speaking in tongues.”
• The Neuroskeptic discusses a small, self-selected study on “bi-gendered” individuals which highlights the ways social pressures can color our identities.
• At NeuroDojo, Zen Faulkes presents another examination of the prisoner’s dilemma, which is the basis for a UK game show, considering whether there are cues that could tip off the potential course of action by the participants.

I’ll be back next week with more from anthropology, philosophy, and research.

Sarah Kendrew selects interesting and notable ResearchBlogging.org posts in the physical sciences, chemistry, engineering, computer science, geosciences and mathematics. She blogs about astronomy at One Small Step.

I hope many of you are enjoying a lengthy and sunny Easter weekend. Here is some great reading for the day from the physical sciences.

On Basic Space, Kelly Oakes describes recent research into a peculiar supernova, Cas A, whose explosion appears to have turned it inside out.

China, it seems, is mad for dams. A fascinating post on Hydro-Logic describes the country’s plans for building hydro-power dams that could have far-reaching implications for its neighbours.

I’m on a statistics high at the moment, so Neuroskeptic’s excellently title “Co-vary or Die” caught my eye. He gives a great example of the pitfalls of ignoring confounding variables in statistical analyses.

Enjoy your week all, and I’ll be back next Monday with more selections.

Vincent Racaniello selects several notable posts each week from molecular and cellular biology and virology. He unravels viruses at virology blog.

• Upon infection with dengue virus, the mosquito vector A. aegypti turns on a number of genes in the salivary glands involved in immunity. Two genes encode odorant-binding proteins that host seeking and blood feeding, meaning that the virus might be regulating how the vector finds a host.
• A study of all cases of primary pneumonic plague in the US between 1900-2009 revealed that most of the time the disease quickly reaches extinction due to poor transmission. The caveat is that super spreading events early in the outbreak can lead to an explosive increase in case numbers.
• Baylisascariasis describes the human infection with the raccoon roundworm Baylisascaris procyonis. The large worms can cause tissue trauma and neurological symptoms.

I’ll be back next Friday with more selections.

Jason Goldman selects several notable posts each week from Psychology and Neuroscience. He blogs at The Thoughtful Animal.

• Did language emerge from the neural systems supporting aimed throwing? The argument, explained by Andrew Wilson, is more reasonable than you might expect.
• Sex, Lies and… Spider Silk? At The Scorpion and the Frog, blogger Miss Behavior discusses the nursery web spider’s guide to love and sex.
• Here’s an easy way to modify your messy roommate’s behavior: make the place smell like citrus. At BPS Research Digest, find out why: Passengers litter less on carriages that smell of cleaning product.

That’s it for this week… Check back next week for more great psychology and neuroscience blogging!

Sarah Kendrew selects interesting and notable ResearchBlogging.org posts in the physical sciences, chemistry, engineering, computer science, geosciences and mathematics. She blogs about astronomy at One Small Step.

I’m back from a week of travels, and back too with some great ResearchBlogging selections from the past week.

On Green Screen, Whitney describes interesting engineering research into bioplastics. Looks like plastic and behaves like plastic, but without the oil.

Zombie neuroscientist Bradley Voytek has written some excellent thoughts on Deep Data and statistics, on his Oscillatory Thoughts blog.

In good weird things tradition, Greg Fish talks about how we might spot alien spacecraft travelling at relativistic speeds.

Have a great week all, and I’ll be back next Monday with new picks.