Under embargo until 27 January 2017 19:00 GMTPlease contact Erik Björn, associate professor, for further details on the publication or Anna Lawrence, international press officer, regarding multimedia or copyright issues. Photos and the video may be used and shared. Please give credit to the photographer. However, no multimedia included may be used outside of the context of this publication without permission.

Global warming is expected to increase runoff and input of organic matter to aquatic ecosystems in large regions of the Northern hemisphere including the Baltic Sea. Research performed at Umeå University and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences is now indicating a sevenfold increase in poisonous methylmercury in zooplankton as a consequence. This increase is due to an altered structure of the aquatic food web. The study has been published in the journal Science Advances. “The study has revealed a phenomenon that has not been described before. The results are critical in the prediction of how global climate changes can affect the exposure of methylmercury to ecosystems, and humans,” says Erik Björn, associate professor at Umeå University and leader of the research project.

La camera in luce visibile a bordo di Juno ha raccolto dati nel corso del terzo flyby. Le informazioni collezionate sono state elaborate in un'immagine che mostra il pianeta che sorge dal buio, con le sue tempeste ovali e la Grande Macchia Rossa

Il gigante gassoso Giove simile a una luna che emerge dal buio cosmico sfoggiando il suo primo quarto. È ancora lui il soggetto in primo piano delle cartoline dallo spazio firmate JunoCam, la camera operante nella luce visibile a bordo della missione NASA Juno.
Il nuovo scatto è stato realizzato dallo scienziato in erba Roman Tkachenko sulla base dei dati raccolti dalla sonda americana durante un sorvolo ravvicinato. A rendere riconoscibile il profilo del quinto pianeta del Sistema Solare, la Grande Macchia Rossa – il longevo anticiclone che spazza la superficie aliena da 300 anni almeno - e un 'filo di perle ovali', le spaventose tempeste che si abbattono nell’emisfero meridionale ruotando in senso antiorario.

The regulatory system to control redox balance involves sugar-dependent gene regulation and protein phosphorylation. Without dynamic control of redox balance animals lose their ability to survive on sugar-rich food. Animal diet has a tremendous natural variation, ranging from meat-eating carnivores to sugar-loving nectarivores. Omnivores, like humans, can adopt different types of diets and still remain healthy. However, if the diet is highly unbalanced and calorie rich, it will eventually lead to metabolic problems and disease. The genetic factors of the individual define how easily and quickly such problems develop.

The gigantic telescope is set to extract a range of the sun's secrets by picking up radio waves. Stay tuned!

High up in the Chilean highlands, surrounded by guanaco herds and cacti, a huddle of 66 antennas much like satellite dishes is now facing the sun. Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, more commonly known as the ALMA telescope, is able to register radiowaves of about one milliteter length. Radiowaves of this range will illumate details of the solar atmosphere that can not be seen with regular telescopes, and will give researchers a completely new view of the sun's physical processes.

Studiare la 'forma' del nostro cervello può fornirci sorprendenti indizi sulla nostra personalità. La scoperta, pubblicata su Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, è di un gruppo di ricerca internazionale che coinvolge l’Ibfm-Cnr, l’Università di Tor Vergata e l’Università Magna Graecia

In uno studio pubblicato sulla rivista scientifica 'Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience', un team internazionale di ricercatori provenienti da Italia, Regno Unito e Usa (Luca Passamonti - Università di Cambridge e Istituto di bioimmagini e fisiologia molecolare del Consiglio nazionale delle ricerche Ibfm-Cnr; Nicola Toschi - Università Tor Vergata di Roma; Roberta Riccelli - Università Magna Græcia di Catanzaro; Antonio Terracciano - Università della Florida) ha analizzato più di 500 risonanze magnetiche cerebrali ottenute nell’ambito di 'Human Connectome Project', un’iniziativa statunitense di grandi dimensioni che ha l’obiettivo di mappare il funzionamento e la struttura del cervello umano. Nello specifico, i ricercatori hanno studiato le differenze anatomiche della corteccia cerebrale in più di 500 individui sani attraverso l’uso di tre indici: lo spessore, l’area ed il grado di girificazione o 'ripiegamento' corticale (in altre parole da quante 'fessure' e 'rigonfiamenti' è caratterizzata la superficie cerebrale). Il principale scopo dello studio era valutare come ognuna di queste misure, che caratterizzano la struttura delle diverse aree cerebrali, fosse collegata ai cinque principali tratti di personalità.

Researchers uncover mechanism by which hypothalamic neural signaling drives hunger responses to survive starvation.

The human body responds to starving conditions, such as famine, to promote the chance of survival. It reduces energy expenditure by stopping heat production and promotes feeding behavior. These “hunger responses” are activated by the feeling of hunger in the stomach and are controlled by neuropeptide Y (NPY) signals released by neurons in the hypothalamus.

However, how NPY signaling in the hypothalamus elicits the hunger responses has remained unknown. Sympathetic motor neurons in the medulla oblongata are responsible for heat production by brown adipose tissue (BAT). Researchers centered at Nagoya University have now tested whether the heat-producing neurons respond to the same hypothalamic NPY signals that control hunger responses. They injected NPY into the hypothalamus of rats and tested the effect on heat production. Under normal conditions, blocking inhibitory GABAergic receptors or stimulating excitatory glutamatergic receptors in the sympathetic motor neurons induced heat production in BAT. After NPY injection, stimulating glutamatergic receptors did not produce heat, but inhibiting GABAergic receptors did. The study was recently reported in Cell Metabolism.

Mitochondrial dysfunction is the root cause of many diseases that are bewildering in their variety and complexity. They include rare genetic disorders in children, some forms of heart disease, and most likely many cases of Parkinson’s disease.

Research on mitochondria started already in the late 19th century, but there are still many unsolved issues concerning their composition, their function and their relevance to health and disease. Director Howy Jacobs and his research group at the Institute of Biotechnology are amongst many scientists worldwide who seek to answer the open questions, in their daily work. Their main aim is to understand how mitochondria interact with other cellular components to maintain physiological homeostasis, and how mitochondrial defects lead to pathological states.

The genomes of the two least common species of human malaria parasites are revealed today in Nature by a team of scientists from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and their international collaborators. These sequences will enable improved surveillance and diagnosis of these rarer parasites that still cause more than 10 million malaria cases every year. The research has important implications for malaria eradication worldwide, and casts light on a malaria vaccine target.

Saturday, January 28, 2017 -

10:00am to 5:00pm

Sunday, January 29, 2017 -

10:00am to 5:00pm

The Natural History Museum of Utah | Rio Tinto Center | 301 Wakara Way, Salt Lake City

A researcher at the UPV/EHU-University of the Basque Country proposes analysing characteristics such as the location and visibility of Palaeolithic works to try to deduce their purpose Blanca Ochoa, a researcher in the UPV/EHU’s department of Geography, Prehistory and Archaeology, proposes analysing the spaces in which the artistic figures of the Palaeolithic are represented to try and deduce the purpose of these expressions. In her study she observed chronological differences in the location of the drawings and engravings, which could indicate that the function and meaning of cave art gradually changed throughout the Upper Palaeolithic.