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    Serotonin Booster leads to Increased Functional Brain Connectivity

    June 19, 2023, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    brain activity on prucalopride
    This figure shows that the healthy participants who received prucalopride had greater functional connectivity between key cognitive regions (the posterior / anterior cingulate cortices) and a major cognitive network (the central executive network). That is, they appeared to be strengthening their connectivity within cognitive networks (Credit: de Cates, et al., Biological Psychiatry: Cognitive Neuroscience and Neuroimaging).

    Cognitive deficits accompany mood disorders and other psychiatric conditions, often with debilitating effects. Limited treatments currently exist, but studies in animals and humans have pointed to drugs such as the laxative prucalopride that activate serotonin receptors as a potential therapeutic for the symptoms...

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    Hybrid AI-powered Computer Vision Combines Physics and Big Data

    June 19, 2023, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics

    Machine learning pipeline
    Graphic showing two techniques to incorporate physics into machine learning pipelines — residual physics (top) and physical fusion (bottom) Achuta Kadambi/UCLA

    Researchers from UCLA and the United States Army Research Laboratory have laid out a new approach to enhance artificial intelligence-powered computer vision technologies by adding physics-based awareness to data-driven techniques.

    Published in Nature Machine Intelligence, the study offered an overview of a hybrid methodology designed to improve how AI-based machinery sense, interact and respond to its environment in realtime — as in how autonomous vehicles move and maneuver, or how robots use the improved technology to carry out precision actions.

    Computer vision allows AIs to see and make sense of their surroundings by ...

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    Plate Tectonics Not Required for the Emergence of Life

    June 19, 2023, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Plate tectonics involves the horizontal movement and interaction of large plates on Earth’s surface. New research indicates that mobile plate tectonics—thought to be necessary for the creation of a habitable planet—was not occurring on Earth 3.9 billion years ago. (University of Rochester illustration / Michael Osadciw)

    The finding contradicts previous assumptions about the role of mobile plate tectonics in the development of life on Earth. New finding contradicts previous assumptions about the role of mobile plate tectonics in the development of life on Earth. Moreover, the data suggests that ‘when we’re looking for exoplanets that harbor life, the planets do not necessarily need to have plate tectonics,’ says the lead author of a new paper.

    Scientists have taken a journey ba...

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    A Plant-based, Oral delivery of Insulin Regulates Blood Sugar Levels Similar to Natural Insulin: Study

    June 16, 2023, Categories  Health/Medical, Biology/Biotechnology

    Oral versus injectable insulin and insulin drug delivery methods. (Image: Courtesy of Henry Daniell)

    Insulin production has, for the last 50 or so years, come with some risks to the patient. Even so, the medication is lifesaving for the estimated 537 million adults living with diabetes worldwide, with that number expected to grow.

    Recent clinical studies show that injection via insulin pens can cause insulin to reach the bloodstream so quickly that hypoglycemia, or blood sugar levels that dip below the healthy range, may result. Automated insulin pumps can deliver precise insulin and minimize this risk but are expensive and available only to a small portion of diabetes patients around the world.

    Now, a plant-based, oral delivery of proinsulin could address these drawbacks, accord...

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