UNDERSTANDING ECOSYSTEM THROUGH GENOMICS…
Reading Time: < 1 minuteThreespine stickleback, which occupy lakes across the northern latitudes, are a tiny fish with an outsize impact on evolutionary research. These sticklebacks thrive in both marine and freshwater habitats and exist in most of the inland waters that dot the northern coasts of North America, Europe, and Asia. Significant to scientists, the species has a […]
Asthma monitoring gets easier
Reading Time: 2 minutesNew local innovation is world’s first with potential for assessing other respiratory functions. BANGI: A locally innovated asthma monitoring device is all set to create a new revolution in respiratory medicine, especially for the examination of asthmatic attacks in real time. Developed by Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) and Penang Hospital, the gadget called Spironic is […]
Why are some snakes deadlier than others?
Reading Time: 2 minutesAN international collaboration led by scientists from the National University of Ireland, Galway, The University of St Andrews, Trinity College Dublin and the Zoological Society of London has uncovered why the venom of some snakes makes them so much deadlier than others. Snakes are infamous for possessing potent venoms, a fact that makes them deadly predators and also strikes fear into humans and other animals alike. However, […]
Scientists engineer shortcut for photosynthetic glitch
Reading Time: < 1 minutePLANTS convert sunlight into energy through photosynthesis; however, most crops on the planet are plagued by a photosynthetic glitch, and to deal with it, evolved an energy-expensive process called photorespiration that drastically suppresses their yield potential. Researchers from the University of Illinois and US Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service report in the journal Science that crops engineered with a photorespiratory shortcut are 40 per cent more productive […]
Artificial fly brain can tell who’s who
Reading Time: 2 minutesDESPITE the simplicity of their visual system, fruit flies are able to reliably distinguish between individuals based on sight alone. This is a task that even humans who spend their whole lives studying Drosophila melanogaster struggle with. Researchers have now built a neural network that mimics the fruit fly’s visual system and can distinguish and […]
Researchers develop self-contained planters that grow in space
Reading Time: 2 minutesFRESH food is so attractive to astronauts that they toasted with salad when they were able to cultivate a few lettuce heads on the International Space Station three years ago. In 2021, beans are on the menu to be grown in space, planted in high-tech planters developed at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology […]
Animals that never develop CANCER
Reading Time: < 1 minuteSOME animals don’t get cancer easily, or never at all. Something in their genetic makeup is hardwired to fight cancer. Understanding why, could help scientists treat and prevent it. Research shows that the elephant genome turned out to contain a lot of copies of a cancer-fighting gene. Known as p53, it is a tumour suppressor. Most mammals have it, including humans, […]
A lung-inspired design turns water into fuel
Reading Time: 2 minutesSCIENTISTS at Stanford University have designed an electrocatalytic mechanism that works like a mammalian lung to convert water into fuel. Their research, published December 20 in the journal Joule, could help existing clean energy technologies run more efficiently. The act of inhaling and exhaling is so automatic for most organisms that it could be mistaken […]
Why cows are getting a bad rap in lab-grown meat debate
Reading Time: 5 minutesBY ALISON VAN EENENNAAM A BATTLE ROYAL is brewing over what to call animal cells grown in cell culture for food. Should it be in-vitro meat, cellular meat, cultured meat or fermented meat? What about animal-free meat, slaughter-free meat, artificial meat, synthetic meat, zombie meat, lab-grown meat, non-meat or artificial muscle proteins? Then there is […]
Biodiesel from wet biological waste
Reading Time: < 1 minuteIN a step toward producing renewable engine fuels that are compatible with existing diesel fuel infrastructure, researchers report they can convert wet biowaste, such as swine manure and food scraps, into a fuel that can be blended with diesel and that shares diesel’s combustion efficiency and emissions profile. The researchers report the findings in the […]