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    Dramatic Stellar fireworks of Star Birth

    April 8, 2017, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Astronomers captured these dramatic images of the remains of a 500-year-old explosion as they explored the firework-like debris from the birth of a group of massive stars, demonstrating that star formation can be a violent and explosive process too. The colors in the ALMA data represent the relative Doppler shifting of the millimeter-wavelength light emitted by carbon monoxide gas. The blue color in the ALMA data represents gas approaching at the highest speeds; the red color is from gas moving toward us more slowly. The background image includes optical and near-infrared imaging from both the Gemini South and ESO Very Large Telescope. The famous Trapezium Cluster of hot young stars appears towards the bottom of this image. The ALMA data do not cover the full image shown here. Credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), J. Bally/H. Drass et al

    Astronomers captured these dramatic images of the remains of a 500-year-old explosion as they explored the firework-like debris from the birth of a group of massive stars, demonstrating that star formation can be a violent and explosive process too. The colors in the ALMA data represent the relative Doppler shifting of the millimeter-wavelength light emitted by carbon monoxide gas. The blue color in the ALMA data represents gas approaching at the highest speeds; the red color is from gas moving toward us more slowly. The background image includes optical and near-infrared imaging from both the Gemini South and ESO Very Large Telescope. The famous Trapezium Cluster of hot young stars appears towards the bottom of this image. The ALMA data do not cover the full image shown here...

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    Gut Microbe may improve Fatty Liver

    April 7, 2017, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    Scanning electron microscopy images of F. prausnitzii grown in LYBHI medium.

    Scanning electron microscopy images of F. prausnitzii grown in LYBHI medium.

    Oral administration of a commensal gut microbe, Faecalibacterium prausnitzii, improves fatty liver in mice. F. prausnitzii is considered one of the most important bacterial indicators of a healthy gut. Due to the central role of liver in the whole body metabolism, fatty liver is a major health problem. In Finland alone, it affects around 1,000,000 people of the general population and has an occurrence of 90% among obese individuals. Humans with high liver fat content had less F. prausnitzii and more inflammation in the subcutaneous adipose tissue. The researchers, therefore, decided to study whether oral F...

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    Deep Sleep may act as Fountain of Youth in Old Age

    April 7, 2017, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    This image shows neural activity during sleep differs between older and younger adults. Credit: Courtesy of Matthew Walker and Bryce Mander

    This image shows neural activity during sleep differs between older and younger adults. Credit: Courtesy of Matthew Walker and Bryce Mander

    Restorative, sedative-free slumber can ward off mental and physical ailments. As we grow old, our nights are frequently plagued by bouts of wakefulness, bathroom trips and other nuisances as we lose our ability to generate the deep, restorative slumber we enjoyed in youth. But does that mean older people just need less sleep? Not according to UC Berkeley researchers, who argue in an article published April 5 in the journal Neuron that the unmet sleep needs of the elderly elevate their risk of memory loss and a wide range of mental and physical disorders.

    “Nearly every disease killing us in later life has a causal link to lack of sleep,” said Matthew Wa...

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    Major Breakthrough in Smart Printed Electronics

    April 7, 2017, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics

    Prof Jonathan Coleman and team have fabricated printed transistors consisting entirely of 2-dimensional nanomaterials for the first time. Credit: AMBER, Trinity College Dublin

    Prof Jonathan Coleman and team have fabricated printed transistors consisting entirely of 2-dimensional nanomaterials for the first time. Credit: AMBER, Trinity College Dublin

    Researchers in AMBER, the Science Foundation Ireland-funded materials science research centre hosted in Trinity College Dublin, have fabricated printed transistors consisting entirely of 2D nanomaterials for the first time. These 2D materials combine exciting electronic properties with the potential for low-cost production. This breakthrough could unlock the potential for applications such as food packaging that displays a digital countdown to warn you of spoiling, wine labels that alert you when your white wine is at its optimum temperature, or even a window pane that shows the day’s forecast.

    This discovery opens t...

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