Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog – Page 7256

Sneezes from people who have congested noses and a full set of teeth travel about 60% farther than from people who don’t, according to a new study.

New research from the University of Central Florida has identified physiological features that could make people super-spreaders of viruses such as COVID-19.

In a study appearing this month in the journal Physics of Fluids, researchers in UCF’s Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering used computer-generated models to numerically simulate sneezes in different types of people and determine associations between people’s physiological features and how far their sneeze droplets travel and linger in the air.

Read more | >

When COVID-19 reared its ugly head, wreaking havoc on education for students all over the world, CSU’s human virtual reality program stepped up to meet the moment.

“We knew that teaching an entire human gross anatomy class remotely with only pictures would not be ideal for students,” said Tod Clapp, an associate professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences and head of its human anatomy program.

Moving BMS 301, Human Gross Anatomy, to online-only instruction this summer meant that students would not only miss out on the chance to work with and learn from real human cadavers, they would also miss getting to experience the new 100-person virtual reality lab Clapp’s team built last fall.

Read more | >

Travel + Leisure reports the same company that operates luxury, glass-domed trains in Western Canada, Rocky Mountaineer, plans to launch a new route from Denver to Moab beginning August 2021. The route, named Rockies to the Red Rocks, will be two days with one night in a hotel in Glenwood Springs.

The train ride focuses on great views in glass-domed trains with outdoor viewing decks, gourmet dining and tremendous service while passing on the sleeping arrangements — leaving that up to the hotel in Glenwood Springs.

“Rocky Mountaineer will bring a new luxury train tour to explore the historic rail route between Denver and Moab. Over the past 30 years, Rocky Mountaineer has become renowned for our world-class train travel experiences, and now we are opening our newest train experience in the region where train travel history began,” said Peter Armstrong, founder of Rocky Mountaineer. “This region, with its magnificent scenery, national parks, vast opportunities to explore, will delight millions.”

Read more | >

Does the idea of miniature, insect-scale robots swarming toward their intended duties inside your body make your skin crawl?

Medical researchers led by Dr. Shen Yajing from City University of Hong Kong (CityU) don’t wish to alarm you but they’ve just devised a simple method of making millirobots which can be employed in various biomedical applications like targeted drug delivery and catheter navigation.

Read more | >

In a new realm of materials, PhD student Thanh Nguyen uses neutrons to hunt for exotic properties that could power real-world applications.

Thanh Nguyen is in the habit of breaking down barriers. Take languages, for instance: Nguyen, a third-year doctoral candidate in nuclear science and engineering (NSE), wanted “to connect with other people and cultures” for his work and social life, he says, so he learned Vietnamese, French, German, and Russian, and is now taking an MIT course in Mandarin. But this drive to push past obstacles really comes to the fore in his research, where Nguyen is trying to crack the secrets of a new and burgeoning branch of physics.

“My dissertation focuses on neutron scattering on topological semimetals, which were only experimentally discovered in 2015,” he says. “They have very special properties, but because they are so novel, there’s a lot that’s unknown, and neutrons offer a unique perspective to probe their properties at a new level of clarity.”

Read more | >

Scientists studying the aerodynamics of infectious disease share steps to curb transmission during indoor activities.

Wear a mask. Stay six feet apart. Avoid large gatherings. As the world awaits a safe and effective vaccine, controlling the COVID-19 pandemic hinges on widespread compliance with these public health guidelines. But as colder weather forces people to spend more time indoors, blocking disease transmission will become more challenging than ever.

At the 73rd Annual Meeting of the American Physical Society’s Division of Fluid Dynamics, researchers presented a range of studies investigating the aerodynamics of infectious disease. Their results suggest strategies for lowering risk based on a rigorous understanding of how infectious particles mix with air in confined spaces.

Read more | >

Applying the laws of life on Earth to the rest of the galaxy, a new series blends science fact and fiction to imagine alien life on other planets.

“Astronomers think it’s only a matter of time before some alien life forms are discovered,” says the narrator of Alien Worlds, which debuts exclusively on Netflix from 2nd December 2020.

But what might it look like, and how similar would it be to the animals and plants we are familiar with? The new show will attempt to answer that question as it features a dizzying variety of crawling, slithering, flying and swimming creatures depicted in gorgeous, high-quality CGI.

Read more | >