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    Hamsters develop protective Immunity to COVID-19 and are Protected by Convalescent Sera

    June 24, 2020, Categories  Biology/Biotechnology, Health/Medical

    Three x-rays of hamster lungs
    Images of the lungs of hamsters before and after infection with SARS-CoV-2, from CT scans at UW Veterinary Care at the School of Veterinary Medicine. In blue are the trachea and bronchi. In red is a region of gas in the cavity just outside the lungs, indicating severe lung damage in the affected animal. The opaque clouding is similar to the “ground glass” appearance in the lungs of some human patients sick with COVID-19. Signs of severe disease in the lungs of hamsters became apparent within eight days of infection and began to improve by 10 days. The effects lingered for longer, as evident on the scan taken 16 days after initial infection. COURTESY OF YOSHIHIRO KAWAOKA

    In an animal model for COVID-19 that shares important features of human disease, scientists at the University...

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    Silicon Nanowire Transistors with both Learning and Memory Functions

    June 24, 2020, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics

    The brain-inspired dynamic neurotransistor chip developed by the researchers. Credit: Baek et al.

    Neuromorphic computing entails building architectures inspired by elements of the human brain, such as neural organization and synapses. These architectures have proved to be highly promising and advantageous for a number of applications, as they can have both memory and learning functions.

    Most current neuromorphic architectures artificially recreate the plasticity (i.e., ability to be easily shaped over time) of synapses, which are junctions between nerve cells that enable the propagation of impulses across brain regions...

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    Mystery Astronomical Object in ‘Mass Gap’: Neutron Star? Black Hole?

    June 24, 2020, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Dual_bhs_annotated
    In August of 2019, the LIGO-Virgo gravitational-wave network witnessed the merger of a black hole with 23 times the mass of our sun and a mystery object 2.6 times the mass of the sun. Scientists do not know if the mystery object was a neutron star or black hole, but either way it set a record as being either the heaviest known neutron star or the lightest known black hole. Image credit: LIGO/Caltech/MIT/R. Hurt (IPAC)

    Researchers have discovered what is either the heaviest known neutron star, or the lightest black hole. When the most massive stars die, they collapse under their own gravity and leave behind black holes; when stars that are a bit less massive die, they explode in supernovas and leave behind dense, dead remnants of stars called neutron stars...

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    Viruses can Steal our Genetic Code to create new Human-Virus Genes

    June 23, 2020, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    Highlights
    d A mechanism of hybrid gene birth is employed by many
    families of RNA viruses
    d Human RNA and viral RNA encode new genes together
    d Hybrid genes either make extensions of viral proteins or
    novel proteins (UFOs)
    d Human-virus genes and proteins play roles in pathogenesis
    and are conserved

    Like a scene out of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” a virus infects a host and converts it into a factory for making more copies of itself. Now researchers have shown that a large group of viruses, including the influenza viruses and other serious pathogens, steal genetic signals from their hosts to expand their own genomes.

    This finding is presented in a study published online today and in print June 25 in Cell...

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