The US firm’s boss responds to critics, saying “much of the room wants it to be 2016, but it’s not”
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Physicists Built a Black Hole in a Lab. Then It Swallowed Sound
Sound can be a tricksy beast to try to harness.
It fills the world around us, bursting from its multitudinous sources, bouncing off surfaces as echoes – a property that makes sound both incredibly useful and deeply vexing, depending on where and how its reverberations occur.
There are some circumstances where echoes can cause problems. The most obvious example is sound recording studios, but one major problem area is probably less obvious because it’s far more ubiquitous – pipes.
Magnetic sculpting transforms single-source fields into predetermined shapes with mathematical precision
Magnetic fields are invisible yet essential components in technologies ranging from MRI scanners and particle accelerators to atomic clocks and future quantum computers. Each of these applications requires magnetic fields with specific shapes and properties. Today, creating such tailored magnetic fields requires researchers and engineers to design specialized, carefully optimized magnets or large systems of coils for each individual application—a complex and resource-intensive process.
Now, a team of physicists from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) and Chalmers University of Technology has developed a method that makes it possible to transform the magnetic field from a single source, such as a coil or a permanent magnet, into a broad class of predetermined magnetic fields with exact mathematical precision.
Known as magnetic omniconversion, the method enables simple magnetic sources to be used for a wide range of important applications. The research is published in the journal Science Advances.
The human gut microbiome primes fever after vaccination
Fever is a common adverse reaction to vaccination, contributing to vaccine hesitancy and reduced uptake. To understand variation in fever risk, we longitudinally profiled fecal microbiota, oral temperature, and serological markers in 171 healthy adults receiving Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 mRNA vaccines. Fever risk correlated with low-grade intestinal inflammation, increased abundance of flagellated Lachnospiraceae bacteria, and increased flagellin expression prevaccine. Microbiomes from fever-high donors triggered stronger inflammation in human intestinal organoids and drove flagellin-dependent vaccine reactions in gnotobiotic mice. Moreover, microbiome flagellin phenotypes and murine vaccine reactions were modifiable by diet. Consistent with this, human fever risk was associated with self-reported diet and metabolic markers.
Disease Stage and Efficacy Interpretation in Gene Therapy for Arrhythmogenic Cardiomyopathy
Department of Molecular Medicine University of Pavia Pavia Italy Department of Cardiology IRCCS ICS Maugeri Pavia Italy View all articles by Andrea Mazzanti*Correspondence to: Andrea Mazzanti, MD, PhD, Department of Molecular Medicine, University of Pavia, Pavia, Italy. Department of Cardiology, IRCCS ICS Maugeri, Pavia, Italy. Email: [email protected]
Tumor-derived Ilp8 and Upd3 contribute to intestinal progenitor cells depletion during cachexia in Drosophila larvae
Falconi et al. show that neoplastic tumors in Drosophila wing discs trigger cachexia-like distant organ wasting, and alter larval midgut development by depleting adult midgut precursors and inducing premature differentiation of peripheral niche cells. These early defects define a previously unrecognized paraneoplastic phenotype controlled by tumor-derived Ilp8 and Upd3.
A planetarium for the brain
An important innovation for communication of neuroscience to the public! “Sloan’s planetarium film premiered during the weeklong BrainFest event in Seattle in March… Sloan says he plans to make the film freely available and hopes it will eventually be shown at planetariums around the world.”
Neuroscientists should take a cue from astrophysicists and use planetariums to inspire awe, argues Tyler Sloan. His new film takes a first step.