Hubble Releases a New Image of Neptune, Revealing a Rapidly Shifting Storm

Annotated view of Neptune with two dark spots. Credit: NASA, ESA, STScI, M.H. Wong (University of California, Berkeley), and L.A. Sromovsky and P.M. Fry (University of Wisconsin-Madison)

Storms on Neptune seem to follow a pattern of forming, strengthening and then dissipating over the course of about two Earth years. But a Neptunian storm spotted in the planet’s atmosphere over two years ago has done something quite different: it has reversed course and is still going strong.

The storm, which is wider than the Atlantic Ocean, originated in the planet’s northern hemisphere and seen with the Hubble Space Telescope in 2018. Observations a year later showed that it began drifting southward toward the equator, where previous similar whirling storms went to die...

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Blood Vessel cells implicated in Chronic Inflammation of Obesity

A UTSW study identified a type of blood vessel cell that triggers inflammation in fat tissue. Above, inflammatory immune cells (green) surround fat cells (red) in obesity and contribute to the development of metabolic disease.

When fat cells in the body are stuffed with excess fat, the surrounding tissue becomes inflamed. That chronic, low-level inflammation is one of the driving factors behind many of the diseases associated with obesity. Now, UT Southwestern scientists have discovered a type of cell responsible, at least in mice, for triggering this inflammation in fat tissue. Their findings, published in Nature Metabolism, could eventually lead to new ways to treat obesity.

“The inflammation of fat cells in obese individuals is linked to many of the comorbidities we associate wit...

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Stretching Diamond for Next-generation Microelectronics

Stretching of microfabricated diamonds pave ways for applications in next-generation microelectronics.  (credit: Dang Chaoqun / City University of Hong Kong)

Diamond is the hardest material in nature. But out of many expectations, it also has great potential as an excellent electronic material. A joint research team led by City University of Hong Kong (CityU) has demonstrated for the first time the large, uniform tensile elastic straining of microfabricated diamond arrays through the nanomechanical approach. Their findings have shown the potential of strained diamonds as prime candidates for advanced functional devices in microelectronics, photonics, and quantum information technologies.

The research was co-led by Dr Lu Yang, Associate Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engi...

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LSU Health New Orleans Discovers Potential New Rx Strategy for Stroke

Αmyloid β peptide–mediated damage

Research conducted at LSU Health New Orleans Neuroscience Center of Excellence reports that a combination of LSU Health-patented drug and selected DHA derivatives is more effective in protecting brain cells and increasing recovery after stroke than a single drug. The findings are published in Brain Circulation, available here.

Nicolas Bazan, MD, PhD, Boyd Professor, Professor of Neurology and Director of the Neuroscience Center of Excellence at LSU Health New Orleans School of Medicine, and Ludmila Belayev, MD, LSU Health New Orleans Professor of Neuroscience, Neurology, and Neurosurgery, discovered this novel therapeutic strategy for ischemic stroke using an experimental model

During an ischemic stroke, signals are produced from arriving blood white cells and primary brain immu...

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