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Jul 30, 2022

Children who lack sleep may experience detrimental impact on brain and cognitive development that persists over time

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, health, neuroscience

Elementary school-age children who get less than nine hours of sleep per night have significant differences in certain brain regions responsible for memory, intelligence and well-being compared to those who get the recommended nine to 12 hours of sleep per night, according to a new study led by University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM) researchers. Such differences correlated with greater mental health problems, like depression, anxiety, and impulsive behaviors, in those who lacked sleep. Inadequate sleep was also linked to cognitive difficulties with memory, problem solving and decision making. The findings were published today in the journal The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine recommends that aged six to 12 years of age sleep 9 to 12 hours per night on a regular basis to promote optimal health. Up until now, no studies have examined the long-lasting impact of insufficient sleep on the neurocognitive development of pre-teens.

To conduct the study, the researchers examined data that were collected from more than 8,300 children aged nine to 10 years who were enrolled in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study. They examined MRI images, , and surveys completed by the participants and their parents at the time of enrollment and at a two-year follow-up visit at 11 to 12 years of age. Funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the ABCD study is the largest long-term study of brain development and child health in the U.S.

Jul 29, 2022

Transparent solar panels could soon turn windows into energy harvesters

Posted by in categories: solar power, sustainability

A new solar panel design can efficiently convert light into electricity, while still allowing almost 80% of incoming light to pass through.

Jul 29, 2022

Skyscraper-sized asteroids will fly past the Earth today and tomorrow

Posted by in category: space

Watching asteroids can help us prepare for the unfortunate one that might be headed straight towards us and how it can be avoided.

Jul 29, 2022

Trade In Your Old Fossil Car in France & Get An Affordable New Stellantis — “Electric As You Go”

Posted by in categories: sustainability, transportation

Presently available in France, the “Electric As You Go” program is for private customers who wish to change their old vehicle to an affordable, sustainable one. Trying to break through ‘” the cost is too much to invest in an EV” scenario (which becomes more disputable each hour of each day), Stellantis introduced “Electric As You Go” and is promoting a more affordable long-term rental program dedicated to battery electric vehicles (BEVs).

The program claims it is efficiently designed to offer breakthrough competitive prices to Stellantis customers. The offer is starting in France and looks hopeful.

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Jul 29, 2022

Why is gravity so weak? The answer may lie in the very nature time

Posted by in category: particle physics

The solution as to why gravity is so weak may come from taking a closer look at the Higgs boson.

Jul 29, 2022

ACS Synthetic Biology Call for Papers for Synthetic Cells

Posted by in categories: bioengineering, biological

Living organisms offer extensive diversity in terms of their phenotypes, metabolic processes, and adaptation to various niches. However, the basic building blocks that create this diversity are remarkably similar. How can we advance our understanding of the fascinating mechanisms that drive biological complexity and how can we harness biological components to build entirely new materials and devices?

A new Special Issue from ACS Synthetic Biology will focus on this dynamic topic, including contributions that deconstruct as well as build up and mimic biological systems. The resulting work serves both to test our scientific understanding and to extend known biology to develop new concepts and applications. The issue will be led by Associate Editor Michael Jewett with Guest Editors Kate Adamala, Marileen Dogterom, and Neha Kamat.

Jul 29, 2022

A hyperparameter optimization library for reproducible research

Posted by in categories: mapping, robotics/AI

The table also shows the average normalized rank of transfer learning approaches. Hyperparameter transfer learning uses evaluation data from past HPO tasks in order to warmstart the current HPO task, which can result in significant speed-ups in practice.

Syne Tune supports transfer-learning-based HPO via an abstraction that maps a scheduler and transfer learning data to a warmstarted instance of the former. We consider the bounding-box and quantile-based ASHA, respectively referred to as ASHA-BB and ASHA-CTS. We also consider a zero-shot approach (ZS), which greedily selects hyperparameter configurations that complement previously considered ones, based on historical performances; and RUSH, which warmstarts ASHA with the best configurations found for previous tasks. As expected, we find that transfer learning approaches accelerate HPO.

Our experiments show that Syne Tune makes research on automated machine learning more efficient, reliable, and trustworthy. By making simulation on tabulated benchmarks a first-class citizen, it makes hyperparameter optimization accessible to researchers without massive computation budgets. By supporting advanced use cases, such as hyperparameter transfer learning, it allows better problem solving in practice.

Jul 29, 2022

The other end of a black hole — with James Beacham

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics, quantum physics

What would happen if you fell into a black hole? Join James Beacham, particle physicist at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, as he explores what happens when the fabric of reality – physical or societal – gets twisted beyond recognition.

Watch the Q&A with James here: https://youtu.be/Q37oEB4bNSI
Subscribe for regular science videos: http://bit.ly/RiSubscRibe.

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Jul 29, 2022

NOTHING: The Science of Emptiness

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics, science

Why is there something rather than nothing? And what does ‘nothing’ really mean? More than a philosophical musing, understanding nothing may be the key to unlocking deep mysteries of the universe, from dark energy to why particles have mass. Journalist John Hockenberry hosts Nobel laureate Frank Wilczek, esteemed cosmologist John Barrow, and leading physicists Paul Davies and George Ellis as they explore physics, philosophy and the nothing they share.

This program is part of the Big Ideas Series, made possible with support from the John Templeton Foundation.

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Jul 29, 2022

You Can Build A Giant 7-Segment Display Of Your Very Own

Posted by in category: internet

Sometimes you need to display a number nice and large, making it easily readable at a good distance. [Lewis] has just the thing for that: a big expandable 7-segment display.

The build is modular, allowing it to be extended from 2 to 10 digits and beyond. The digits themselves are made of 3D-printed parts assembled onto acrylic. These can then be ganged up in a wooden frame for displaying larger numbers with more digits. Individual elements are lit by addressable LEDs, and the project can be built using an Arduino Nano or an ESP8266 for control. The latter opens up possibilities for controlling the screen over WiFi, which could prove useful.

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