Lab Notes

People diagnosed with a vaginal yeast infection are usually prescribed an azole-based antifungal medication. But many know that’s often the beginning of a roller coaster of recurrent vaginal infections. This is likely because azole antifungals ransack the “good” bacterial populations of the vagina even as they kill the yeast. 

A recent study published in Scientific Reports sought to leverage the idea that probiotics might be as effective as antifungals for yeast infections, while preventing the recurrences that so often follow the use of azoles. 

The research team behind the study knew that sizeable populations of Lactobacillus bacteria inhabit the vagina throughout the course of a yeast infection. They reasoned that certain Lactobacillus strains are great at producing lactic acid, and could inhibit yeast growth. They carefully selected the strains of Lactobacillus that seemed to work best in laboratory studies and developed a probiotic gel that could be used to treat yeast infections.

Past studies of probiotics administered vaginally during a yeast infection were always combined with the antifungal treatment standard. But this time, the 20 study participants were given only the probiotic gel, with an emergency course of the antifungal as back-up. The gel alone worked for 45% of the participants, those whose infections were relatively minor and not recurrent. With further tweaking and a lot more testing, azole antifungal treatments may be a thing of the past.

Frontline maternity healthcare workers provide ongoing care to many people throughout their pregnancies, in addition to caring for those admitted to hospitals for delivery. Maternity healthcare workers have continued meeting the needs of pregnant people throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. And although COVID-19 may seem like a milder illness in some pregnant patients, we are just beginning to get an idea of the risk of transmission between maternity healthcare staff and patients.

A recent investigation into the number of undiagnosed SARS-CoV-2 infections among maternity healthcare workers was carried out in London, UK. Instead of relying on the nasal swab-based PCR assay with which we’ve all become so familiar, blood tests were used to look for antibodies against the virus, which would indicate previous infection. Out of 200 healthcare workers practicing in maternity wards, 14.5 percent (29 of 200 total) had antibodies against the virus, despite never having been diagnosed with COVID-19. 

This is in contrast to other types of healthcare professionals working in London who are more likely to be in direct contact with symptomatic COVID-19 patients, such as those working in the emergency department. Antibody testing in 200 such frontline healthcare staff revealed 45.3 percent had been infected with SARS-CoV-2.

Though the on-the-job risk of infection may be lower for those on the maternity frontlines than in other departments, the potential transmission risk posed to their colleagues, as well as to pregnant patients and their babies, is concerning. Out of the 29 maternity healthcare professionals with SARS-CoV-2 antibodies, 17 self-reported that they had continued working throughout the pandemic, either because they had been asymptomatic entirely or, if they did have symptoms, their symptoms did not qualify them for self-isolation at the time. 

The human virome is collection of viruses inhabiting humans. This virome is important to study because these viruses can have important impacts on human health and disease. Next-generation sequencing, or NGS, analysis can reveal important differences between viromes. 

A team led by Zihao Yuan used NGS to detect virome differences between brain samples from healthy people and and from brain tumors of people diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme, or GBM. Glioblastoma is the most aggressive type of primary brain tumor — most patients die within 18 months of diagnosis, even with advanced and invasive treatment. 

According to the new findings, unique characteristics of viromes in samples from GBM tumors point the way to potential new treatments. For instance, the researchers propose that a new virus found in GBM tumors could engineered to become oncolytic — capable of killing cancer cells. Other viral sequences contained structures that might be recognized by antibodies, which can also be used to kill cancer cells. 

We are often taught about the relationships between organisms as a one-lane, one-way street: the grass is eaten by the rabbit, which is eaten by the snake, which is eaten by the hawk. In reality, this food chain model drastically oversimplifies the complex web of interactions between species. Healthy ecosystems contain numerous species that can fill the same role. Instead of the rabbits only being eaten by a snake, for example, they might be eaten by a snake or a fox or a hawk. This built-in redundancy in ecological roles makes ecosystems more resilient to change. 

New research published in Science suggests that marine ecosystems may not have enough redundancy in their food webs to combat the cocktail of changes they could see in the near future.  

Researchers set up large-scale ecological experiments called “mesocosms” to test how ecosystems responded to ocean acidification, ocean warming, and a combination of both acidification and warming. While ocean acidification alone had little effect on the overall ecosystem health, scenarios testing ocean warming and the combined effects of acidification and warming both altered the food web, negatively impacting the ecosystem’s ability to function normally.

In addition to climate change-induced shifts in ocean environments, like ocean acidification and ocean warming, marine ecosystems face stressors like overfishing, habitat destruction, and pollution. While some species will tolerate changes and replace less resilient species, a shift in the fundamental balance of ecosystem functions could throw off the delicate balance of the ecosystem. Much like Skittles will not adequately replace apples in a nutritious diet, some species do not make suitable substitutions for others in an ecosystem. Without a healthy level of diversity, marine ecosystems may be ill-equipped to handle the inevitable changes to their environment. 

Most of us give little thought to the ingredients inside the brightly colored pills that we rely on to keep our bodies functioning. We refer to them as an aspirin or antihistamine without realizing that for most drugs, the major component by mass is not the drug of interest itself, but compounds classified as “inactive” called excipients. 

While called inactive, excipients such as dyes, stabilizers, and antioxidants that increase shelf life have not been systematically tested to determine whether they interact with molecular targets in the body. Scientists recently analyzed a wide range of these compounds to determine potential unknown side effects. 

The authors first found interaction candidates by predicting how much an excipient looks to the native compounds that act on certain molecular targets, and then tested the hits experimentally. In another approach, the scientists tested widely used excipients against 28 targets that are known to be related to toxicity. Using these two approaches, the authors found 134 side-effect activities. Of these leads, some were further analyzed for their abilities to be toxic to the body and to enter the bloodstream. 

One finding was for an antiseptic commonly found in mouthwash. Predicted to interact with a number of biological targets, this compound was shown to be toxic to the body at low levels, and was able to enter the bloodstream at concentrations high enough to interact with at least one biological target. Overall, 134 side-effect activities for 38 excipients were found. 

This study highlights how compounds in our drugs not normally considered active can alter our bodies. The authors additionally note the widespread use of some excipients in food and cosmetics that are found at even higher doses than drugs, and the issue of populations that juggle more than one medication and therefore have a higher exposure. While a preliminary piece of work, it highlights the importance of paying close attention to what we add to substances that sustain us. 

We frequently use baby talk in our best efforts to communicate with newborns, smothering them with strings of "goo goo" and "ga ga" until they smile or cry in return. But oversimplifying our language may not be necessary — scientists from Paris recently studied a group of newborns and found that their speech perception skills were more astute than previously thought. 

To perceive speech, our auditory system must be developed enough to differentiate the spectral (frequency-based features for pitch, rhythm) and temporal information (time-based features to interpret) that make up our speech. Studying how our brain processes information might help us deduce whether or not the foundations of language learning and speech comprehension are present from birth. If infants interpret these cues differently than adults do, they may also be absorbing different linguistic information, like envelope cues that aid in consonant identification. 

The basilar membrane in the inner ear receives speech by dividing the temporal modulations of the speech signal into different frequency bands. The researchers found that six-month-olds were able to differentiate consonants similarly to adults. Once this was established, they looked at how newborns interpreted different types of consonants. To discriminate plosive consonants (produced by stopping airflow using the lips/teeth and then a sudden release of air, such as in "t," "k," and "p" sounds), newborns required fast cues, as opposed to adults and six-month-olds, for whom slow cues were sufficient. 

This study showed the physically immature newborn brain is capable of processing the acoustic components of speech, which is the foundation of language learning. As opposed to adults, who can rely only on slow cues, newborns need fast envelope cues to perceive consonants. The specialization to different temporal cues reflects infants’ great speech perception skills despite limited language experience and an immature auditory system. 

The idea of mixing brains with machines is nothing new. First proposed in the 1970s, brain-machine interfaces (BMIs) have already achieved a lot over the decades. Initial versions let people move virtual cursors, and more recent ones allow for full control of mechanical arms. As of today, the only FDA approved BMI is the Utah Array, a 1mm implant with 100 electrodes that can capture and stimulate brain cells. This array is currently on clinical trials as a treatment for several different diseases.

First announced in 2016, Neuralink entered this field with the stated goal of: “Solving important brain and spine problems with a seamlessly implanted device.” The implant, now in its version v0.9, is 23 x 8 mm and has 10 times more electrodes than the Utah Array. With functions like measuring temperature, pressure, and movement, a fast wireless connection and induction battery charging, the comparison to wearable devices is not hard to make. But it does still require brain surgery. This surgery, promised to take less than an hour, is almost completely done by an automated robot, also designed by Neuralink — at an estimated initial cost of $10-20 million.

Other concrete take home messages from yesterday's press conference was that Neuralink has been approved as an FDA Breakthrough Device, which speeds up the primary approval process with the agency. We also know that they are able to have multiple implants per animal, and they can interpret the neural data, as shown in a video that could predict the animal movement, likely through some form of machine learning algorithm. And...that was about it.

Despite claims about its potential, ranging from curing blindness to summoning your car and figuring out the secret to consciousness, the reality is that, so far, Neuralink has showed little more than a flashy new design for a BMI with more electrodes. The FDA approval might be the most exciting aspect. Given recent reports that the company culture is chaotic and clashes with a normal pace of science, regulatory oversight will be crucial to making sure that this product does not endanger people. Not to discredit the progress made by the company, but neuroscientists should not rush to stop the presses. 

An estimated 50,300 people in the United States are newly diagnosed with Hepatitis C each year. With approximately 2.4 million people in the US already living with the virus, this presents a large healthcare burden to the global medical economy. Within this group, there is a proportion of people so often forgotten in the shuffle: injection drug users. 

Researchers, doctors, and scientists have been working to eradicate Hepatitis C for decades, but one of the biggest barriers faced is injection drug use. Sharing of needles and other supplies frequently transfers bodily fluids between people, which is how Hepatitis C virus is transmitted. And, just 7.7% of people who inject drugs are tested for Hepatitis C. This, among other challenges, such as the fact that people who inject drugs may face stigma and judgement when they seek out health care, makes tracking Hepatitis C difficult.   

A recent study examined the feasibility of using a method called next-generation sequencing to determine similarity of Hepatitis C virus strains between individuals. They found this is a feasible option that could provide epidemiologists with information such as how different strains in populations of people are related and where one newly infected person's strain of the virus may have originated. 

While this doesn't completely solve the problem of track-treat-eradicate, it does help with the tracking portion, which has been severely lacking. Testing for the disease tends to take a few days at minimum, and may require follow-up testing. Each step brings us closer to being able to treat and eradicate the disease, eliminating Hepatitis C virus from the globe, preventing the 8,000-10,000 deaths each year that it causes. 

The human brain is made up of billions of neurons that are interconnected to form the circuits enabling life. However, the brain is not static and neuronal connections can change, a phenomenon termed neuronal plasticity. Often this occurs by making new neurons, but this process is highly controlled as it poses risks for altering existing critical connections. As such, how those brain regions maintain plasticity has been a focus in research efforts. 

One of these brain regions of the brain thought to be relatively stable is the cerebral cortex, which is largely responsible for human cognitive capacity. However, a recent study published in eLife and led by scientists from the University of Turin demonstrate the cerebral cortices of 12 mammal species with a range of brain sizes — including the large-brained chimpanzees — achieve neuronal plasticity by maintaining a reserve population of immature neurons.

The researchers noted that larger cortices contained more immature neurons. However, one striking feature of these neurons is their characteristics are very similar across all 12 species. This suggests that these cells are very important in mammalian brains, as they have remained largely unchanged through years of evolution. 

It seems the cerebral cortex is more adaptable than once thought and that flexibility has been maintained through evolution. This work also highlights the need to continue studying these populations of immature neurons. The researchers call for similar investigations into immature neuron populations' potential role in maintaining proper connections in the brain. As we learn about these immature neurons, it may be possible to use this information to better predict cortex neurodegeneration, which often leads to conditions like Alzheimer’s Disease.

Maggots don’t have fingers, but they do produce chemical “fingerprints” — a blend of chemicals unique to their species. Different maggot species feed on corpses at particular stages of decay. Forensics teams actually use this information to estimate a person's time of death. The problem is that maggots, which are  immature flies, are tricky to identify and rearing them to flyhood is time-consuming and expensive. 

University of Albany researchers developed a machine learning technique to rapidly distinguish maggot species by their chemical fingerprints.

Because maggots collected at a crime scene are usually an assortment of many species, the team trained their computer program with mixtures of various combinations of six fly species. The researchers deciphered the chemical signatures of each maggot melange with a technique called mass spectrometry, which identifies chemicals on the basis of size and charge. 

After teaching the program to recognize the chemical makeup of each training mixture, the researchers assessed whether it could identify “test” maggot blends. The program accurately identified most of the test samples, suggesting that this technique could help forensic detectives establish time of death, a critical clue for solving crimes. The results are published in a recent issue of Analytical Chemistry.

On April 15, 2019, the Notre-Dame Cathedral caught fire and burned for nine hours. But long after the fire was extinguished, environmental effects lingered.

That’s because the cathedral contained 460 tons of lead, some of which was expelled into the air by the fire. Researchers from Columbia University wanted to investigate potential lead contamination in the area surrounding the fire, as even very small environmental exposures to lead can have devastating effects on children’s cognitive development.

In this recently published study, the scientists collected and analyzed soil samples in a one-kilometer radius surrounding the cathedral. They estimated that the cathedral fire had resulted in 1000 kilograms (one metric ton) of lead being deposited in the kilometer surrounding the fire. This amount was much greater than the 150 kilograms of lead that an early government report estimated were deposited 1 to 50 km from the fire. 

The good news is that — even with the caveat that more extensive testing should have been performed in the days after the event — the authors of the study conclude that human exposures were still likely fairly limited and probably much less problematic than exposures from leaded gasoline use in previous decades.

The biodiversity of islands around the globe has fascinated and inspired scientists for hundreds of years. Islands are frequently home to unique species and are hotspots of biodiversity. But not all islands are equally rich — larger and less isolated islands harbor more species. 

In the 1960s two researchers, Robert MacArthur and E.O. Wilson, developed the theory of island biogeography, predicting that the number of species on an island depends on a balance between colonization, evolution of novel species in the islands, and extinction, and that these processes are determined by the size and isolation of the island. 

Since then numerous studies have found the same pattern, but a test of their predictions at a global scale had not been performed until now.  Earlier this year, an international team of ornithologists, evolutionary biologists and mathematical modellers, led by Luís Valente from Museum fur Naturkunde and Naturalis Diversity Center, published a new model to explain species richness in the islands. 

The researchers compiled a new dataset with DNA sequences from 596 species of terrestrial birds from 41 archipelagos (island chains) around the world. Their dataset combined data from samples from their own field trips, research collections, and field samples from colleagues with sequences from GeneBank. This dataset was then used to develop and to apply to their new analysis methods, a dynamic model that was able to predict global relationships that govern variation in biodiversity. In doing so, they confirmed two key aspects of the original island biogeography theory proposed by MacArthur and Wilson.

Understanding island biodiversity is important for island conservation, but has implications beyond it — it can allow us to better evaluate the effect of human actions when imposing barriers to species dispersal, and at a large scale it can contribute to the understanding of biodiversity around the planet.

A blood test is one of the most powerful tools in a healthcare provider’s arsenal. A non-invasive, swiss-army knife that requires little fuss from the patient and the phlebotomist, yet provides crucial hints about what’s going on under the hood. In this way, modern medicine can easily monitor the hormones in your blood and function of your organs, but could they detect something like cancer?

The latest effort from a group of scientists lands one step closer to making routine cancer blood tests a reality. The study reports a method which analyzes circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) shed by tumors directly into the blood. This method looks for signs of chemical modifications to ctDNA called methylation. This methylation decorates ctDNA in patterned, predictable ways, the signatures of which were identified by this study, allowing the scientists to detect cancer across patient samples.

The scientists were able to detect five different types of cancer — including stomach, esophageal, colon, lung and liver— up to four years earlier than normal methods would. This suggests that people with cancers would test positive while asymptomatic, before developing more visible, serious cases years later.

Not without caveats, the study emphasizes that the method is not appropriate for prognostic use in telling currently cancer-free patients that they will develop it in the future. Rather it is successful in predicting patients who already have cancer that is yet undetectable by modern methods, which is still a landmark achievement. Though more follow-up needs to be done, this study cements the utility of DNA methylation in diagnostic testing for cancer, and the feasibility of routine cancer testing in the clinic.

On July 16, snake lovers and snake biologists around the globe celebrated World Snake Day and used the occasion to draw attention to pressing global threats to snake conservation. Some activists even spent the entire month of July honoring one particularly maligned and misunderstood group of reptiles: the rattlesnakes.

Rattlesnakes have long been feared and hated by many people who live near them. While it is healthy to stay alert around venomous snakes, many people use their fear as justification to indiscriminately kill any snakes they encounter. The extreme version of this behavior is on full display at annual “rattlesnake roundups”, where snakes are often slaughtered by the hundreds or even thousands. Conservation organizations such as the Rattlesnake Conservancy have been working with communities to replace roundups with wildlife appreciation festivals, but this can be slow and difficult work.

Recently, photography has been used as a medium through which to raise awareness about rattlesnake conservation and welfare issues as well as to promote a greater appreciation of these unique animals. Jo-Anne McArthur’s photograph “The Wall of Shame”, highly commended by the Natural History Museum of London’s 2019 photography competition, unflinchingly depicts the gruesome reality of a major Texas roundup. 

And to show off the prettier side of this story, Emily Taylor and other snake biologists dedicated July 2020 to a #RattlesnakeBeautyPageant, in which they posted gorgeous photographs of rattlesnakes on Twitter. Some of these pictures even made it into a calendar that supports the non-profit Advocates for Snake Preservation (ASP), which educates people about local snake species and reduces killings by relocating animals that have made their way into backyards.

Whether or not you already love rattlesnakes, these pictures can make you reflect on your relationship with wildlife, and hopefully, inspire you to appreciate the underappreciated organisms living all around us.

A previous version of this article incorrectly reported the beneficiary of the rattlesnake calendar. --BGB (Editor)

Hermit crabs are the renters of the crustacean world, making their homes in discarded shells of other sea creatures. But with high demand for shell real estate, hermit crabs often forcibly evict other crabs to seize a better-fitting shell. 

During these battles, attackers repeatedly “rap” their shells against defenders, and those who rap most vigorously are more likely to win. But, just as the outcome of a boxing match depends not only on how many punches a boxer lands, but also on the skillful placement of these blows — researchers wondered if skill helps crabs win shell skirmishes.

 To prompt conflicts between crab pairs, scientists from the University of Plymouth gave one crab (the attacker) an ill-fitting shell, whereas the other (the defender) received a perfect fitting one. They found that attackers who rapped on a particular area of the defender’s shell — the “sweet spot” — were more likely to win fights than those who rapped elsewhere. 

To be evicted from their homes, losing crabs first have to release muscles that grasp onto their shells. The sweet spot suggests that attackers must accurately strike a specific anchor point to dislodge their opponent’s grasp, and victorious crabs may skillfully target this spot. 

High-volume attacker rapping may also lead defenders to flee their shells. The team found that the number of raps was linked with proportion of raps to the sweet spot. This could mean that rapping in the sweet spot allows attackers to perform more raps (perhaps due to a better grasp of their opponent) or that accurate crabs also rap the most vigorously.

In the animal kingdom, winners of battles over mates, food, and territory are often the biggest, strongest, and most heavily armed. But as champion boxers — and hermit crabs — show us, there’s more to winning fights than brute strength. Skill is important because it allows fighters to strike with greater accuracy and conserve energy. Spatial skills may give hermit crabs a competitive edge in shell real estate wars, and similar abilities could help other animals win conflicts too.

Porcupines have long been captured and sold in the wildlife trade. Some people eat them, and their quills and hairs are used in clothing and other decorative items. Porcupines also produce stone-like collections of undigested plants in their guts called bezoars. Bezoars from several species, including cows, goats, oxen, and porcupines are used in traditional and folk medicine, particularly in East and Southeast Asian countries. 

One of the dark sides of social media and other internet sites is that they have become virtual wildlife markets, where hunters can easily sell their wares to buyers around the world. In a new study published in Global Ecology and Conservation, scientists from Australia's University of Adelaide and the UK's Oxford Brookes University searched 11 online social media and retail sites in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore — including popular platforms like Instagram, Alibaba, and Lazada — for porcupine bezoars for sale. Over a three-month study period, they found 121 listings marketing nearly 450 porcupine bezoars. Over a third of them were posted on Instagram, and the bezoars were selling for an average of $152 USD per gram.

These findings are concerning. Porcupines must be killed to retrieve the bezoars, and relatively few porcupines have them (the actual incidence rate, however, is unknown). This means that, if every listing the researchers found was real, far more than 450 porcupines had been killed for their bezoars over a relatively short amount of time. 

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature, which maintains a list of which species are vulnerable and endangered, currently lists all Asian porcupine species except for the Philippine porcupine as "least concern," meaning that, as far as conservationists know, the animals are still common. But with rapid deforestation and the hunting of these animals for food and the wildlife trade, this may not be true for long. Stronger international and domestic trade laws in Southeast Asian countries would be a good first step toward protecting porcupines, along with all of the animals that share their habitats. 

Tardigrades, also known as water bears or moss piglets, are eight-legged microscopic animals known for their indestructible nature. Using cryptobiotic abilities they are able to dry themselves to crisp husks to survive extreme temperatures, pressure, and radiation, then come back to life when rehydrated.

So far 60 tardigrade species have been recorded in the harsh nature of the Antarctic. A new species has recently been discovered that lays eggs riddled with small spikes, which — strangely — vary in number, shape, and size. 

Scientists on King George Island, off the coast of Antarctica, cataloged the new species of tardigrade by sequencing its DNA and measuring and describing its features, including its eggs. The new species is called Dactylobiotus ovimutans. 

They wondered how and why D. ovimutans was able to alter the shape of its eggs. So they bred the tardigrades in lab, controlling temperature, light, and food. Other species of tardigrade occasionally lay differently-shaped eggs, and this has been tied to seasonality and environmental variation. The scientists expected that breeding the tardigrades in the lab might cause D. ovimutans to lay eggs that were similarly shaped.

But they found that the egg’s ornamentation continued to change in appearance. With no easy explanation, the scientists settled on another explanation to describe this phenomenon: epigenetics.

The question remains, why would D. ovimutans use important resources to change its egg’s appearance? What environmental factor is controlling this proposed epigenetic regulation? Many mysteries of the tardigrade and how it thrives in such harsh conditions still remain, including the discovery of these morphing, ornamental eggs.

Physics students tend to learn about collisions early in their education. They study billiard balls flying away from each other or lumps of clay sticking and moving together after colliding. Scientists can study collisions of objects that are much smaller and much colder as well. 

In a recent experiment, physicists observed two calcium fluoride, or CaF, molecules colliding at a shocking low temperature — only a few millionths of a degree above absolute zero. Molecular collision measurements are important. Scientists can use them to better design future experiments involving ultracold CaF molecules. Since each collision helps molecules lose some energy and therefore become colder, understanding collisions is important for reaching very low temperatures. 

Making molecules ultracold is hard because they can find any of a bunch of different ways to warm up collecting energy, such as by rotating or vibrating. However, researchers learned how to use lasers and magnets to cool molecules and are learning how to control them with incredible precision. 

In this experiment, they used highly focused laser beams, called optical tweezers, to hold two CaF molecules apart and then bring them into an optical trap. Here, it is crucial that light and matter interact. If a laser beam doesn’t have constant intensity, then its electric field would yank the molecules in undesirable ways with electrical force. By manipulating light very precisely, optical tweezers use these forces to pluck each molecule and move it around. 

In optical traps, electric forces due to light-matter interactions keep molecules stuck in place. By holding two CaF molecules with two separate tweezers then bringing them together, physicists were able to study their collisions in detail. 

The optical tweezer method these researchers developed is now another tool in the toolbox of scientists studying ultracold systems. Other scientists could use this tool in the future to investigate collisions of more complicated molecules or to engineer collisions, and therefore reactions, between other ultracold particles.

When it comes to adhesives — materials applied between two surfaces to hold them together — water’s presence is detrimental. This disruption is primarily caused by the polar nature of water molecules. As water comes into contact with adhesives, it creates a thin layer that coats the sticky surface. Therefore, adhesives often lose their binding ability under wet conditions. Because water is highly abundant in biological systems, maintaining stickiness in the face of water would immediately benefit research in tissue repair, drug delivery, and biomedical devices.

But of course, nature has already figured out the solution to this problem. In the ocean, mussels have perfected their own adhesive recipe to firmly attach to wet rocks. They mediate attachment through their byssus, or foot, which secretes proteins with high adhesive power. The repetitive pattern of two amino acids, lysine (K) and DOPA (Y), in these proteins have been shown to play a crucial role in binding. Prior studies have centered on DOPA, and questions remain regarding the impact of lysine.

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley have studied the combination of both amino acids, K and Y. They measured the detaching force of several mussel protein analogs by sticking them to a rock mimic made of titanium dioxide. Results showed that the analog composed of three KY amino acid pairs was the strongest, and that further pair addition did not increase strength.

With these results, the researchers also created a knock-off copy of the most abundant mussel foot protein (mfp-5). They did this by using three KY pairs separated by non-amino acid linkers, then they measured the detaching force again. Results indicated that this material was "stickier" than three KY repeats without the linker addition.

With the development of a full-length model of mfp-5, researchers think this work could serve as a solid foundation for further wet adhesive design and preparation.

In 2020 alone, Puerto Rico has faced the COVID-19 pandemic, earthquakes, and major storms. There's an important radar astronomy system in Arecibo, on the northern side of the island, that has weathered it all. 

The Arecibo Observatory hosts a giant telescope that observes radio waves, rather than the visible light tracked by optical telescopes. The reflector dish is 1000 feet wide, making it one of the largest radio telescopes in the world. It's also the most powerful and most sensitive planetary radar system. According to the University of Central Florida, the observatory has collected more than 12 petabytes of data in its 50-year history — that's 1.2 x 10¹⁰ megabytes, over 10 billion megabytes.

(Personally, as a geologist, I'm a huge fan of the observatory because the reflector dish was built into a karst depression, also called a sinkhole.) 

In late July, the facility shut down for Hurricane Isaias, which brought torrential rain and flooding to Puerto Rico, but didn't damage the telescope. They got all the systems back online just in time to observe Asteroid 2020 NK1, a Potentially Hazardous Object discovered in June. Arecibo found that the asteroid is not an immediate threat to Earth, as it is expected to stay more than 9 times further away than the moon at its closest approach in 2043.

But just a few days later, on August 10th, a 3-inch thick support cable broke, tearing a 100-foot-long (30-meter) gash in the telescope's reflector dish. No one was hurt, but observatory staff are still working on assessing the damage and what repairs will be required.

Drone footage from the Observatory captured the dramatic scale of the dish, the large, white cable hanging down from the upper structure, and the marred reflector panels: 

Video Credit: Arecibo Observatory, University of Central Florida

The gash is even visible on high-resolution satellite imagery (the dark area on the center-left side of the dish), captured by Planet Labs on the day of the break: 

Of course, all this is occurring during the annual hurricane season, which is predicted to be very active this year. The whole astronomy community will be hoping for a quick return to operations. 

If you followed the news during the Ebola Virus outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, you might remember reading that the funeral practices in the region were not compatible with outbreak control measures. Traditional funeral practices in Africa include washing and touching the body extensively after someone dies to prepare them for burial. This poses a problem because many viruses, including Ebola, are passed through bodily fluids such as sweat and blood and remain contagious after the infected person has died. 

Maintaining the boundaries of dignified burials, respecting cultural practices, and reducing transmission from deceased individuals to their surviving family and friends is a significant challenge facing frontline healthcare professionals during many disease outbreaks, including COVID-19.

Recently, scientists have turned to Nipah virus (an infectious respiratory illness) transmission in Bangladesh to understand disease transmission dynamics. Contact patterns, or contact tracing, is used to track how viruses spread from one person to another. Whether, like COVID-19, the virus is spread by respiratory droplets, or like Nipah or Ebola by bodily fluids, contact patterns show how the virus spread by examining the chain of infection. This aids epidemiologists in tracking how viruses move through populations, and can improve future outbreak preparedness. 

They found that, similar to Ebola, the number of personal contacts between a sick person and their friends and family increases rapidly as they person approach death. This is because family and friends want to visit the person, fearing it is their last chance to see them, and people begin to arrive for funeral preparations. The sickest (and likely most contagious) people had more contacts, leading the researchers to conclude that end-of-life preparations spread the virus rapidly. 

This suggests that disease control efforts should focus on funeral practices, an approach we have also seen during the current pandemic, with friends and family mourning their loved ones over Zoom. However, this is an instance where scientific best practices intersect with important human rights and ethics considerations — for example, in 2014 the WHO released a "safe and dignified burial" protocol to ensure that deceased Ebola patients, their families, and their cultural practices are treated respectfully.

The prehistoric monument of Stonehenge is shrouded in unanswered questions, including where the site's stones came from. There are two types of stones that make up the iconic monument, smaller bluestones and larger sarsen sandstones. The main architecture is comprised of these sarsens, each weighing around 20 metric tons (the same weight as about 10 cars).

Recent research published in Science Advances traces the origins of the sarsens by using portable X-ray fluorescence spectrometry to chemically "fingerprint" each of these large boulders. Bombarding a spot on the sarsen with X-rays makes an invisible glow radiate back. By measuring this glow, scientists can figure out exactly what elements are in the stone. 

Sarsens are mostly silica (the stuff in sand and computer chips), but trace amounts of elements such as aluminum, phosphorus, and calcium are clues to their origin. Scientists were able to match the chemical fingerprints of 50 out of 52 sarsens to stones from West Woods, Wiltshire, about 25 km north of Stonehenge. Now two questions remain: where did those other two stones come from, and why were they sourced from a different place?

Gastrointestinal distress is now a known symptom of COVID-19. This indicates that the gut may be an additional place where the virus can thrive, and a site where it can be treated. By observing whether there are changes in the gut microbial communities of hospitalized patients during the course of a COVID-19 infection, researchers hope to learn the role of gut bacteria in infection and how to fight it.

To explore this question, researchers at The Chinese University of Hong Kong conducted a small pilot study of 36 individuals: 15 with COVID-19, 6 with pneumonia, and 15 healthy participants. Those with COVID-19 not only had significantly different gut microbial makeups compared to the healthy participants and those with pneumonia, they also found that a person with COVID-19 who had been on antibiotics tended to move even further from a “healthy” gut microbe profile than those patients with the virus but who hadn’t been on antibiotics.

The researchers also identified types of bacteria that were notably more and less abundant in patients with severe COVID compared to those with a milder form of the disease, indicating that some bacteria may play a protective role against the development of COVID-19, while others may allow the virus to make us sicker.

Learning more about how the human gut microbiome interacts with respiratory diseases might open up new ways to predict who is at risk for severe COVID-19 infection, and may even indicate how to treat it.

It's a question that haunts cat owners and has its roots in ancient civilizations: Do cats love us, or just our food?

Archaeologists believe that cats and humans have had a relationship for thousands of years, starting when crop cultivation became the norm. As agriculture spread in the Fertile Crescent (between the modern Mediterranean Sea and Persian Gulf), the concentration of grains would have attracted rodents like mice and voles. Rotund little rodents nestled in a field would have been easy targets for the wild cats who lived in the area, so rather than roughing it in the desert, cats moved in with people by around 7,500 BCE... sort of.

The exact relationship between early, semi-domesticated cats and humans isn't clear cut. While there's some evidence that people had personal connections to cats, with one potential pet burial site in Cyprus as old as 9,500 years old, it's just as likely that cats tolerated the presence of humans for the convenience of plentiful mouse populations.

So when humans began heading north to Europe, farming along the way, proto-Fluffy apparently tagged along. New research found human and cat bones dating back to 4,200 to 2,300 BCE in a cave in Poland, coinciding with a period of rapid settlement in the Late Neolithic period. To examine the relationship between the humans and cats, the scientists wanted to know what the cats were eating. If it looked like mostly wild mice — rather than diets closer to humans and domesticated dogs — it would confirm that the cats were along for the ride, rather than attached to the humans.

Animals' diets can be recorded in the chemical composition of their bones — specifically, their carbon and nitrogen isotopic values. These values vary due to anything from water sources to nearby plants, so they serve as a diet "fingerprint." By comparing the nitrogen composition of cats' bones to those of the mice, the researchers were able to confirm that the cats were primarily eating mice. 

It seems likely that these semi-domesticated cats were doing what house cats do today — using people as a reliable food source, but not getting too attached.

One of the biggest social challenges in the wake of COVID-19 in American society is figuring out how to safely educate children during the pandemic. And one of the most efficient solutions is so simple: a cloth mask, worn over the nose and mouth, to keep the infection spreading from breathing, coughing, and sneezing. Whenever an individual over the age of two years of age is in public or in close proximity to other individuals not within their household, they should be wearing a mask, according to recommendations by the Centers for Disease Control.  

Two years old is a hard cut off, as kids at that age are less likely to choke or have their breathing impaired by the use of a face mask than younger children. They are also more likely to be socializing in less than six feet from each other (Have you been to a children’s museum? All the hugging, grabbing, touching — yikes!), and are still learning how to act in social settings, let alone the pandemic situation. 

Children need to be wearing masks in public, especially as the demand for school reopenings continues, even though many schools in the United States are continuing to operate through distance learning as the school year begins. As young children learn best through social interaction and play, their need for in-person learning is crucial, and the need for keeping children in school and socializing is a concern of working parents (many of whom are faced with the impossible choice of doing their jobs or staying home with their children at this time), psychologists, and some physicians. If it just requires a simple mask, perhaps it is easier to pretend Halloween has come early.