Engineers have gotten quite good at designing ever more powerful and advanced electronics, but we’re not so good at properly disposing of them when they’re out of date. The United Nations Environment Program estimates almost 50 million tons of electronic waste will end up in landfills this year, a 20 …
Read More »Researchers Sequence Barley Genome
The International Barley Genome Sequencing Consortium, which is led by Dr. Nils Stein of the Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research, Germany, has mapped the entire genome of barley (Hordeum vulgare), the world’s fourth most important cereal crop after wheat, rice and maize. The research appears in …
Read More »Researchers Identify ‘Night Owl’ Gene Variant
An international team of scientists led by the Rockefeller University has discovered that a variant of the human gene CRY1 (cryptochrome circadian clock 1) slows the internal biological clock, which dictates rhythmic behavior such as sleep/wake cycles. The study was published in the April 6 issue of the journal Cell. …
Read More »ffVC and NYU are mixing researchers with investors in the name of machine intelligence
The timing was perfect. Just as startups were settling into NYU and ffVC’s new brains-meet-money accelerator, “AI Nexus Lab,” Uber acquired Geometric Intelligence. In a stroke of luck, the startup that would become Uber’s AI lab happened to have been raised by NYU Tandon’s Data Future Labs. Uber’s interest in Geometric helped …
Read More »Genetic Researchers Predict Children’s Reading Ability from DNA
An international team of scientists from the United Kingdom, the United States, and Sweden has used a genetic scoring technique to predict reading performance throughout school years from DNA alone. Calculating an individual’s GPS requires information from a genome-wide association study that finds specific genetic variants linked to particular traits. …
Read More »Researchers Identify Two Genes Responsible for Brain’s Aging
A duo of researchers at Columbia University has identified two genes (TMEM106B and GRN) that greatly impact normal brain aging, starting at around age 65. This drawing shows several of the most important brain structures. Image credit: National Institute for Aging. “If you look at a group of seniors, some …
Read More »Bees Have Profound Influence on Plant Evolution, Researchers Say
After only nine generations, the same plant species is larger and more fragrant if pollinated by bumblebees rather than flies, according to University of Zurich evolutionary biologists Florian Schiestl and Daniel Gervasi. The study by Florian Schiestl and Daniel Gervasi focuses on the role insect pollinators can play in plant …
Read More »Researchers Find Potential Cure for Tasmanian Devil Facial Tumor Disease
A study led by University of Tasmania researchers Cesar Tovar and Gregory Woods has shown that immunotherapy can cure Tasmanian devils (Sarcophilus harrisii) of the devil facial tumor disease. The findings are published in the journal Scientific Reports. Young Tasmanian devil. Image credit: Keres H. / CC BY-SA 4.0. Tasmanian …
Read More »Researchers Determine Age of Ceres’ Brightest Spot
Cerealia Facula, a dome-like feature located in the center of Ceres’ Occator crater, is only 4 million years old — approximately 30 million years younger than the crater itself, according to research led by Dr. Andreas Nathues of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research. Cerealia Facula, a bright …
Read More »Researchers Make Single-Atom Memory from Holmium
According to a research team led by scientists from IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose, California, and the Institute of Basic Science in Seoul, South Korea, one bit of digital information can now be successfully stored in an individual atom. The research appears today in the journal Nature. The …
Read More »