From Italy and the World

CNN  —  Police in Spain arrested a man on suspicion of sexual assault after he appeared to touch a TV journalist on the bottom as she was reporting live from the streets of Madrid. The man approached Isa Balado, a journalist for the “En boca de todos” program on Spain’s…

Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un attend a meeting at the Vostochny Сosmodrome in the far eastern Amur region, Russia, on September 13. KCNA/Reuters Vladimir Putin has said Russia is considering and discussing some military cooperation with North Korea, following a summit at which that country’s leader Kim Jong Un appeared to endorse Moscow’s war on…

An international team led by City University of Hong Kong (CityU) has announced a groundbreaking step forward that has added significantly to the technical know-how required to clean up the planet. The discovery, published in the journal Nature, centres on developing a highly efficient electrocatalyst that can enhance hydrogen generation…

In a trio of papers appearing in Nature on Sept. 13, 2023, the researchers offer the most comprehensive look yet at how malnutrition affects growth in the first two years of life, underscoring a devastating reality for millions of children in the Global South, particularly Asia. In 2022, more than…

Researchers at Utah State University have successfully demonstrated that hagfish slime proteins can accurately replicate membranes in the human eye. Professor Elizabeth Vargis and her team study a condition called age-related macular degeneration that causes damage to the retina, making it difficult to see. They study in vitro models, or…

Researchers at the University of Washington have developed small robotic devices that can change how they move through the air by “snapping” into a folded position during their descent. When these “microfliers” are dropped from a drone, they use a Miura-ori origami fold to switch from tumbling and dispersing outward…

A new study updates the planetary boundary framework and shows human activities are increasingly impacting the planet and, thereby, increasing the risk of triggering dramatic changes in overall Earth conditions. For over 3 billion years, the interaction between life (represented by the planetary boundary, Biosphere Integrity) and climate have controlled…

Two graduate students from Western University have developed a ground-breaking method for predicting which intensive care unit (ICU) patients will survive a severe brain injury. Matthew Kolisnyk and Karnig Kazazian combined functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) with state-of-the art machine learning techniques to tackle one of the most complex issues…

During a bout of influenza, B cells interact with other immune cells and then take different paths to defend the body. One path is the B cells that differentiate into antibody producing cells. Another path is the B cells that differentiate into lung-resident memory B cells, or lung-BRMs, that are…

If the Chicago region replaced 30% of all on-road combustion-engine vehicles — including motorcycles, passenger cars and trucks, buses, refuse trucks and short- and long-haul trucks — with electric versions, it would annually save more than 1,000 lives and over $10 billion, according to a new Northwestern University study. The…

Researchers at Moorfields Eye Hospital and UCL Institute of Ophthalmology have developed an artificial intelligence (AI) system that has the potential to not only identify sight-threatening eye diseases but also predict general health, including heart attacks, stroke, and Parkinson’s disease. RETFound, one of the first AI foundation models in healthcare,…

Many of the bacteria that ravage crops and threaten our food supply use a common strategy to cause disease: they inject a cocktail of harmful proteins directly into the plant’s cells. For 25 years, biologist Sheng-Yang He and his senior research associate Kinya Nomura have been puzzling over this set…

An LSU Health New Orleans research study led by Siqiong June Liu, PhD, Professor of Cell Biology and Anatomy, has found that cerebellar inhibitory interneurons are essential for fear memory, a type of emotional memory formation. Inhibitory interneurons within the cerebellar circuitry act as gatekeepers and control the output of…

Scientists call long-spined sea urchins “the lawn mowers of the reefs” because they eat algae that could otherwise smother reef ecosystems and kill corals. That’s why researchers affiliated with the University of Florida Tropical Aquaculture Lab (TAL), who work at the Florida Aquarium’s Conservation Campus in Apollo Beach, are trying…

A new study finds that a natural compound found in many plants inhibits the growth of drug-resistant Candida fungi — including its most virulent species, Candida auris, an emerging global health threat. The journal ACS Infectious Diseases published the discovery led by scientists at Emory University. Laboratory-dish experiments showed that…

An international research team led by maritime archaeologist Staffan von Arbin of the University of Gothenburg has studied what might be Europe’s oldest shipboard cannon. The cannon was found in the sea off Marstrand on the Swedish west coast and dates back to the 14th century. The findings from the…

Scientists from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) have created a process that can upcycle most plastics into chemical ingredients useful for energy storage, using light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and a commercially available catalyst, all at room temperature. The new process is very energy-efficient and can be easily powered by renewable…

Scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) identify a new and surprising function of a membrane protein on the surface of cancer cells: It supports and stabilizes an important “co-stimulatory” factor that enhances the activation of T cells, thus improving the immune response against the tumor. The study was…

Improvements in socioeconomic status (education, income, employment status and health insurance) on ideal cardiovascular health may not benefit people from all racial or ethnic groups equally, as white adults were more likely to benefit than Black, Hispanic and Asian adults in the U.S., according to new research published today in…

Reflux disease manifests as acid regurgitation and heartburn and is a known risk factor for oesophageal cancer. However, a new study published in The BMJ by researchers at Karolinska Institutet now reports that the majority of patients do not have a higher risk of cancer. A large-scale study from three…

Protected nature areas are considered fundamental for maintaining biodiversity and countering its loss. But how effectively do established protected areas work and prevent negative trends? Research at the University of Helsinki shows mixed effects of protected areas on various species. Biodiversity is dwindling at a rapid pace across the globe.…

A unique new study led by researchers at University of Limerick in Ireland has found that bacteria that may lead to hospital acquired infection is present in a hospital’s wastewater system. In a partnership with University Hospital Limerick and Queen’s University Belfast, the UL School of Medicine has completed an…

New research led by the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King’s College London has found that depression and the risk of depression are linked to different inflammatory proteins in boys and girls. When inflammation occurs in the body a host of proteins are released into the blood…

Sitting calmly in their webs, many spiders wait for prey to come to them. Arachnids along lakes and rivers eat aquatic insects, such as dragonflies. But, when these insects live in mercury-contaminated waterways, they can pass the metal along to the spiders that feed on them. Now, researchers reporting in…

One of the most interesting and important questions in cosmology is, “How much matter exists in the universe?” An international team, including scientists at Chiba University, has now succeeded in measuring the total amount of matter for the second time. Reporting in The Astrophysical Journal, the team determined that matter…

A new type of analysis suggests that droughts in Ohio were more severe from 2000 to 2019 than standard measurements have suggested. Researchers at The Ohio State University developed impacts-based thresholds for drought in Ohio, looking specifically at how corn yield and streamflow were affected by various drought indicators, such…

New research suggests that owls in Texas have high rates of anticoagulant rodenticides (AR) — blood thinning rat poisons — in their systems. Jennifer Smith, a professor of integrative biology in the UTSA College of Sciences, co-authored a research article published recently in PLOS ONE, the world’s first multidisciplinary open…

Most coastal communities will encounter 100-year floods annually by the end of the century, even under a moderate scenario where carbon dioxide emissions peak by 2040, a new study finds. And as early as 2050, regions worldwide could experience 100-year floods every nine to fifteen years on average. A 100-year…