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mindblowingscience

Clusters of gold atoms produce tiny bubbles that kill cancer cells on command

Clusters of gold atoms can detect and kill cancer cells commonly left behind after tumor-removal surgery, according to a study of a new nanotechnology technique. For now, the approach has only been tried in a handful of mice. But the researchers are designing a clinical trial that could begin testing the therapy in humans in the next 2 years. If the technique proves successful in people, it could dramatically improve the odds for cancer patients, particularly in cases where surgically removing an entire tumor is impossible.

mindblowingscience

Russian scientists say design work has already begun on missiles designed to destroy incoming asteroids.

In a shocking announcement, Russian scientists say they want to test improved ballistic missiles on the asteroid Apophis, which is expected to come dangerously close to Earth in 2036. If this doesn’t send chills down your spine, you haven’t read enough science fiction.

In a February 11th article in the Russian state-owned news agency TASS, Sabit Saitgarayev, the lead researcher at the Makeyev Rocket Design Bureau, says Russian scientists are developing a program to upgradeInter-Continental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) to destroy near-Earth meteors from 20-50 metres in size. Apophis’ approach in 2036 would be a test for this program.

mindblowingscience

This could help prevent psychosis in heavy pot smokers.

The links between cannabis use and psychosis has long been of interest to scientists, with studies in recent times indicating that a gene called AKT1 affects the likelihood of cannabis users developing a psychotic disorder.

Now, for the first time, researchers in the UK have shown that this gene also mediates the acute response to cannabis in healthy individuals. This means AKT1 can be used to predict how susceptible people are to the mind-altering effects of the drug, and the gene pathway might be a target for the prevention and treatment of cannabis psychosis.

“These findings are the first to demonstrate that people with this AKT1 genotype are far more likely to experience strong effects from smoking cannabis, even if they are otherwise healthy,” said psychopharmacologist Celia Morgan from the University of Exeter. “To find that having this gene variant means that you are more prone to [the] mind-altering affects of cannabis when you don’t have psychosis gives us a clue as to how it increases risk in healthy people.”

According to the researchers, about 1 percent of cannabis users end up developing psychosis, with those who smoke the drug daily doubling their risk of experiencing a psychotic disorder. While previous research has found a high prevalence of a particular variant of the AKT1 genotype in cannabis users with psychosis, it wasn’t known how the gene and the effects of smoking cannabis tied together.

mindblowingscience

Hold your breath.

For the first time, astronomers have detected the atmospheric makeup of a ’super-Earth’ – the most common type of planet in our galaxy. Found in other solar systems, these exoplanets have a mass larger than Earth’s, but are significantly smaller than the gas giants found in our Solar System, such as Jupiter and Saturn.

The super-Earth in question is called 55 Cancri e, which orbits the star 55 Cancri, located some 40 light-years away from Earth. 55 Cancri e qualifies as a super-Earth with a mass of about 8 Earth-masses, and thanks to a new study, we now know that its atmosphere contains hydrogen and helium, but no water vapour.

In itself, those elements might not sound like a huge discovery, but when you consider that astronomers have been able to gauge the atmospheric composition of a planet that’s a staggering 40 light-years away, it’s pretty breath-taking. To put it in perspective, 1 light-year is more than 9 trillion kilometres (or about 6 trillion miles), so we’re talking very, very far away.

mindblowingscience

The Indian government has granted initial approval for the construction of LIGO-India, a gravitational wave detector that will work with the two in the US

Einstein’s handiwork is making waves across the globe. The Indian government has given initial approval for the construction of LIGO-India, a detector that will complement the two US instruments that last week announced the historic first sighting of gravitational waves.

“Cabinet has granted ‘in-principle’ approval to the LIGO-India mega science proposal for research on gravitational waves,” tweeted the office of Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, who previously indicated his support in 2014. “The project will motivate Indian students and scientists to explore newer frontiers of knowledge and will add impetus to scientific research.”

Gravitational waves are ripples in space-time caused by events like the merger of two black holes. The two US detectors, one in Washington and the other in Louisiana, saw the signal of a merger just a few milliseconds apart, but with just two detectors it cannot pin the source down in the sky. A third LIGO detector will allow researchers to triangulate gravitational wave sources and train other telescopes on the same part of the sky to learn more.

The site for LIGO-India’s two 4-kilometre laser interferometer arms is still to be decided, but there are a number of suitable locations. If full funding is secured, the observatory could be up and running by 2023.

“We’re absolutely delighted to see that the funding for LIGO-India looks like it might come about,” says Shelia Rowan of the University of Glasgow, UK, who is a member of the international LIGO team. Two smaller detectors in Germany and Italy are expected to come online later this year, as well.

“Scientifically we look forward to having a network of detectors around the world. That’s the way we get directional information about where gravitational wave signals are coming from. Having a detector in India would be fantastic.”

mindblowingscience

*Takes another helping of spinach*

For the first time, scientists have figured out how an unusual type of sugar found in green, leafy vegetables feeds the ‘good’ bacteria living in our guts to aid digestion, while blocking off the 'bad’ bacteria that can make us sick.

Known as sulfoquinovose (SQ for short), it’s the the only known sugar molecule to contain sulphur, and that’s important - sulphur is the third most abundant mineral in the body, and is one of the vital amino acids used to create proteins for cells and tissues, plus many crucial hormones, enzymes, and antibodies.

“Sulphur is critical for building proteins, the essential components of all living organisms,” said one of the researchers, Spencer Williams from the University of Melbourne in Australia. “SQ is the only sugar molecule which contains sulphur, and 'digestion’ of the molecule by bacteria releases sulphur into the environment, where it re-enters the global ‘sulphur cycle’ to be reused by other organisms.”

SQ is produced by all green plants to facilitate photosynthesis, and the greener the plant, the more it contains. According to Rae Johnston over at Gizmodo, each year, leafy green vegetables around the world produce the sugar on a scale comparable to the world’s total annual iron ore production.

The only problem? Humans can’t digest it. “No one had any idea where it went or what happened to it when the plant died,” lead researcher, Ethan Goddard-Borger from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute in Melbourne, told The Sydney Morning Herald. “But it is actually being used by bugs that live in the gut to promote their growth, which is a good thing for you.”

mindblowingscience

"There is no known reason why we cannot do this."

Despite how far we’ve come in space exploration, one thing still holding us back from interstellar travel is our slow spacecraft. While we’re able to propel particles to close to the speed of light in the lab, we’re struggling to even accelerate spacecraft to beyond 3 percent of that. With our current technology, it’s estimated it’ll take humans around five months to reach Mars.

But NASA scientist Philip Lubin is working on a system where lasers propel spacecraft with giant sails to the Red Planet in as little as three days. Much like Bill Nye’s much-hyped solar sail, this ‘photonic propulsion’ system relies on the momentum of photons - particles of light - to move forward. But instead of photons from the Sun’s rays, Lubin’s design would be given a push by giant Earth-based lasers.

It sounds pretty far-fetched, but in a video for NASA 360, Lubin explains that the technology is very much readily available, and that the system could easily be scaled up.

“There are recent advances that take this from science fiction to science reality,”Lubin explains. “There is no known reason why we can not do this.”

mindblowingscience

This could change everything.

In a medical first, doctors in Texas are planning to use a groundbreaking neuroscience technique to attempt to restore the sight of blind people, MIT Technology Review reports.

The Ann Arbor, Michigan-based startup RetroSense Therapeutics aims to use a technique known as optogenetics, which involves modifying neurons so they can be turned ‘on’ or 'off’ using light. The technique has been demonstrated in miceand monkeys, but this would be the first time it’s been used in humans.

According to Tech Review, the trial is being carried out by the Retina Foundation of the Southwest, and will involve 15 patients with retinitis pigmentosa, a condition where the light-sensitive cells of the eye (the retina) degenerate, causing patients to lose peripheral and night vision and eventually go blind.

mindblowingscience

Real-life space cadets.

If your astronomical curiosity was piqued when NASA put out the call for astronauts to join its illustrious ranks, it seems like you weren’t the only one.

The space agency announced this week that it’s received a record number of applications from the US public for its upcoming 2017 astronaut class, with more than 18,300 would-be space cadets signing up for a chance to walk among the stars – almost three times the number it handled for its last intake back in 2012.

“We have our work cut out for us with this many applications,” said Brian Kelly, director of Flight Operations at NASA’s Johnson Space Centre in Houston. “But it’s heartening to know so many people recognise what a great opportunity this is to be part of NASA’s exciting mission. I look forward to meeting the men and women talented enough to rise to the top of what is always a pool of incredible applicants.”

Applications opened in December and closed last week, but the real challenge for all those NASA candidates is only just beginning. The next 18 months will see more than 18,000 hopefuls whittled down to a final 8–14 individuals who will be given the opportunity to become astronauts. Astronauts, people!

mindblowingscience

Deficit in antiparticle output exceeds theoretical expectations

In tunnels deep inside a granite mountain at Daya Bay, a nuclear reactor facility some 55 kilometers from Hong Kong, sensitive detectors are hinting at the existence of a new form of neutrino, one of nature’s most ghostly and abundant elementary particles.

Neutrinos, electrically neutral particles that sense only gravity and the weak nuclear force, interact so feebly with matter that 100 trillion zip unimpeded through your body every second. They come in three known types: electron, muon and tau. The Daya Bay results suggest the possibility that a fourth, even more ghostly type of neutrino exists — one more than physicists’ standard theory allows.

Dubbed the sterile neutrino, this phantom particle would carry no charge of any kind and would be impervious to all forces other than gravity. Only when shedding its invisibility cloak by transforming into an electron, muon or tau neutrino could the sterile neutrino be detected. Definitive evidence “would open up a whole new avenue of research,” says particle physicist Stephen Parke of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Ill.

mindblowingscience

There are no borders in space.

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has invited representatives from space organisations around the world, including the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), to a meeting in Washington next month, where they’ll discuss how they can work together on the journey to Mars, according to reports.

ISRO has already proved that it has the ability to get to the Red Planetary efficiently - the space agency spent only US$74 million (less than the budget of the film Gravity) on their Mars Orbiter Mission, which put spacecraft Mangalyaan into the Red Planet’s orbit on its first attempt. And now it appears NASA might want to capitalise on some of that knowledge in order to help humans get to the red planet sooner.

“Reaching the Mars orbit in first attempt was an amazing achievement and that too at such low cost,” Charles Elachi, director of JPL, told the Press Trust of India(India’s answer to the Associated Press). “Now American scientists through its MAVEN mission and India through its Mars Orbiter Mission are sharing data.”

Official details of the collaborative discussions are thin on the ground, but according to the Press Trust of India, NASA isn’t only reaching out to ISRO for future collaboration, but also a range of other European countries, with the overall goal of getting humans to Mars faster.

scinote

Seeking SciNote, Biology: Sleep Deprivation and Learning

Question: What effect does sleep deprivation have on learning, such as memorizing facts for a test? asked by anonymous Answer: The amount of sleep you get actually has a tremendous effect on your learning abilities. Sleep deprivation causes an inability to concentrate or pay attention, which prevents a lot of learning activities. Disorientation is another side effect, which can hinder performance of learned skills. Sleep helps regulate neuroplasticity, or neural changes, especially in the hippocampus, and is necessary to “recharge” neurons and clear unnecessary temporary pathways in the brain. Someone who doesn’t sleep enough will start to feel a mental impairment often referred to as “brain fog.” You’ve probably experienced it. This is a common symptom of those with sleep or fatigue disorders, and can hinder all kinds of activity. Some doctors have compared the impairment from 24 hours without sleep to having a blood-alcohol level of 0.1% (which is significant intoxication). The effects on your body are very different, but the mental experience is similar. Just as it would be pretty difficult to learn anything while constantly drunk, insufficient or disrupted sleep can impede any kind of learning. Similarly, sleep deprivation can even inhibit the formation of new memories, so it would have an especially pronounced effect on fact memorization. Sleep is how your body processes memories: they’re acquired during the day into your short-term memory and then during sleep, they are consolidated as the neural pathways that allow them to be recalled long-term are finalized. Different types of memory are established during the Rapid Eye-Movement (REM) and Slow-Wave Sleep (SWS) stages. Without these processes, new information cannot be retained or integrated with previously existing knowledge. With severe enough sleep deprivation, a person won’t even be able to recall basic facts from the day before.

Stages of sleep cycle (1).

Also, sleep deprivation is associated with differences in mood, which can impact a person’s ability to acquire new information in the first place. Insomnia and fatigue are often symptoms of depression and other mental illnesses, and contribute to the overall negative effects of those conditions. Sleep deprivation functions as a chronic stressor, increasing the hormones that cause anxiety and interfering with allostasis, the body’s ability to achieve stability through adaptation.

Side effects of sleep deprivation on the body (2).

In the brain, sleep deprivation primarily affects the hippocampus (the brain’s memory centre), decreasing its activity significantly, but the connections between the prefrontal cortex (responsible for judgments and decision-making) and the amygdala (responsible for emotions) also begin to degrade. Across your body, it can influence everything from your blood pressure to your hormone levels. Sleep has a tremendously wide variety of functions, many of which are not yet well-understood, and missing out on it can impact a student very negatively. Numerous studies with both humans and rats have demonstrated that sleep deprivation hinders information processing, memory development, and decision-making. Children and adolescents with developing brains need more sleep and are therefore particularly affected, especially due to school systems and parents often forcing them into schedules their bodies can’t accommodate. Asking a student chronically sleeping four hours a night to perform well on a test is like asking a forgetful drunk to build a model airplane. They might be able to do it, but it’s going to be an uphill battle all the way.

References and further reading:

http://www.catalystathletics.com/article/1845/Understanding-Sleep-for-Optimal-Recovery-Productivity/

Häggström, Mikael. “Medical gallery of Mikael Häggström 2014”. Wikiversity Journal of Medicine 1 (2). DOI:10.15347/wjm/2014.008. ISSN 20018762. - All used images are in public domain.. Licensed under CC0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Effects_of_sleep_deprivation.svg#mediaviewer/File:Effects_of_sleep_deprivation.svg

An ASAP Science video on what happens to you more generally when you don’t sleep at all for extended periods.

The Doctor Who Coaches Athletes on Sleep by Danielle Elliot at The Atlantic.

Sleep, Learning, and Memory from Harvard Medical School’s Division of Sleep Medicine.

McEwen, B. S. (2006). Sleep deprivation as a neurobiologic and physiologic stressor: Allostasis and allostatic load. Metabolism, 55, S20-S23. doi:http://0-dx.doi.org.libraries.colorado.edu/10.1016/j.metabol.2006.07.008

Campbell, I. G., Guinan, M. J., & Horowitz, J. M. (2002). Sleep deprivation impairs long-term potentiation in rat hippocampal slices. Journal of Neurophysiology, 88(2), 1073-1076. Retrieved from http://0-search.proquest.com.libraries.colorado.edu/docview/71988710?accountid=14503

Fan, J., Shenghu, W., Chonghuai, Y., Pengjun, Z., Xiaogang, Y., & Xiaoming, S. (2003). The effect of long-term partial sleep deprivation on learning and memory in young mice. Chinese Mental Health Journal, 17(9), 607-631. Retrieved from http://0-search.proquest.com.libraries.colorado.edu/docview/620189621?accountid=14503

Rasch, B., & Born, J. (2013). About sleep’s role in memory. Physiological Reviews, 93(2), 681–766. Retrieved from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3768102/

Answered by Lauren W., Expert Leader.

Edited by James H.

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If you enjoy articles like the one above and are interested in contributing your own work to SciNote’s publication, please apply for a staff position at www.scinote.org/staff-application.html.

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