What makes birdsong beautiful? Answering this question could help us understand how soundscapes make the natural world relaxing for humans, opening the door to improving parks, upgrading the design of stressful places like waiting rooms and promoting conservation through birds with especially lovely songs.
Local action may offer a model for waste management in rural tourism, according to research published in the International Journal of Tourism Anthropology. The study of waste problems in Kampung Nipah, a coastal tourism hamlet in North Sumatra, Indonesia, argues that rural communities with limited public services may need locally governed waste systems rather than relying solely on municipal services.
We know from a wealth of research that children's picture books support language learning.
For too long, the United States has relied on foreign sources for most of the raw materials powering its technological future: the essential minerals in every smartphone, battery pack and semiconductor. What if one answer to the supply crisis isn't buried in a mine shaft but growing quietly in a field? Scientists are betting on a resource-efficient, highly effective strategy: using engineered plants and symbiotic microbes to absorb critical minerals directly from the Earth in a process called phytomining.
Microbes from space have fueled the plots of science fiction mainstays like "Project Hail Mary" and "The Andromeda Strain." But with more space missions launching each year, finding extraterrestrial life in a microbial form is becoming more plausible. What will the response be back here on Earth if—or when—scientists discover extraterrestrial microbes? Will the international policy and security communities be prepared for the fallout?
Nearly four out of five children's toys purchased in the El Paso-Ciudad Juárez region contain at least one toxic element, according to a new study led by researchers at The University of Texas at El Paso. The findings, just published in the journal Environmental Pollution, represent the first binational screening of hazardous metals in toys sold on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border.
A research team has developed a reliable, economical laboratory method that uses tiny magnetic beads to study proteins with sugar molecules attached to them in blood and tissue samples. A better understanding of their pathological changes could help researchers diagnose and treat diseases, including cancer.
Halogenated organic compounds (HOCs) are widely used in industrial and consumer products, but some are highly persistent and difficult to analyze and manage. In a new study, researchers developed an innovative approach for carbon isotope ratio analysis of these compounds, which has previously been difficult. This approach will help track the sources and environmental pathways of such pollutants, contributing to the development of effective management strategies.
Influenza viruses constantly shapeshift to evade recognition by the immune system. This shapeshifting occurs in critical proteins like hemagglutinin (HA), which controls how the virus attaches to human cells before entering them. Influenza viruses can evade immunity in two major ways: through the gradual accumulation of mutations that make HA harder for the immune system to recognize or through reassortment events that can introduce substantially different viral proteins and potentially lead to flu pandemics. To address this challenge, seasonal flu vaccines remain the primary approach because they can be developed to target the flu viruses circulating most predominantly in a given season.
Single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) is a method for measuring gene expression in individual cells, allowing observation of various cellular processes, including cell differentiation, the cell cycle and stimulus response, for each unique cell instead of averaging across millions of cells. It provides high-resolution snapshots of biological processes. However, it does not track the same cell continuously over time. To address this limitation, trajectory inference approaches have been developed that computationally arrange cellular snapshots along an inferred developmental trajectory known as pseudotime.
