ريتشارد دوكنز's Blog, page 663
October 16, 2015
Alcohol And Love Have Very Similar Effects On The Brain
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Lily Monster/Flickr. (CC BY-NC 2.0)
A recent study, published in Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, has found that alcohol and the "love hormone" oxytocin have a nearly identical effect on behaviour.
Lead exposure in mothers can affect future generations
© tatyana_k / Fotolia
By Wayne State University – Office of the Vice President for Research
A team of researchers at Wayne State University have discovered that mothers with high levels of lead in their blood not only affect the fetal cells of their unborn children, but also their grandchildren. Their study, Multigenerational epigenetic inheritance in humans: DNA methylation changes associated with maternal exposure to lead can be transmitted to the grandchildren, was published online this week in Scientific Reports.
It’s a known fact that babies in the womb can be affected by low levels of lead exposure. If a pregnant woman is exposed to lead, the lead passes through the placenta into the baby’s developing bones and other organs. Pregnant women with a past exposure to lead can also affect the unborn child’s brain, causing developmental problems later in life. Previous research studies have suggested that exposure to heavy metal toxicants can influence a person’s global DNA methylation profile.
In the recent Wayne State study led by Douglas Ruden, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology and the Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, director of epigenomics, and program leader in the Center for Urban Responses to Environmental Stressors, he and his research team revealed that lead exposure can cause specific changes in DNA methylation, which can be detected in dried blood spots beyond one generation. The neonatal blood spots from both the mothers and children in this study were obtained from the Michigan Neonatal Biobank, a unique resource that has most of the neonatal dried blood spots from children born in Michigan since 1984.
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Exercise in a bottle could become a reality
© arthurhidden / Fotolia
By University of Sydney
Research finds around 1000 molecular reactions to exercise, opening the door for drug treatments to mirror the health benefits of exercise.
Drugs that mimic the benefits of exercise could soon become a reality thanks to breakthrough research from the University of Sydney’s Charles Perkins Centre.
Published in Cell Metabolism, the research exposed a thousand molecular changes that occur in our muscles when we exercise, providing the world’s first comprehensive exercise blueprint.
“Exercise is the most powerful therapy for many human diseases, including type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and neurological disorders,” said Professor David James, Leonard P. Ullmann Chair of Metabolic Systems at the Charles Perkins Centre and the head of the research group that undertook the study.
“However, for many people, exercise isn’t a viable treatment option. This means it is essential we find ways of developing drugs that mimic the benefits of exercise.”
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First Love Child of Human, Neanderthal Found
Neanderthal Museum (Mettmann, Germany)
By Jennifer Viegas
The skeletal remains of an individual living in northern Italy 40,000-30,000 years ago are believed to be that of a human/Neanderthal hybrid, according to a paper in PLoS ONE.
If further analysis proves the theory correct, the remains belonged to the first known such hybrid, providing direct evidence that humans and Neanderthals interbred. Prior genetic research determined the DNA of people with European and Asian ancestry is 1 to 4 percent Neanderthal.
The present study focuses on the individual’s jaw, which was unearthed at a rock-shelter called Riparo di Mezzena in the Monti Lessini region of Italy. Both Neanderthals and modern humans inhabited Europe at the time.
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October 15, 2015
Researchers develop deep-learning method to predict daily activities
Robot Economics
By Georgia Institute of Technology
Researchers from the School of Interactive Computing and the Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines developed a new method that teaches computers to “see” and understand what humans do in a typical day.
The technique gathered more than 40,000 pictures taken every 30 to 60 seconds, over a 6 month period, by a wearable camera and predicted with 83 percent accuracy what activity that person was doing. Researchers taught the computer to categorize images across 19 activity classes. The test subject wearing the camera could review and annotate the photos at the end of each day (deleting any necessary for privacy) to ensure that they were correctly categorized.
“It was surprising how the method’s ability to correctly classify images could be generalized to another person after just two more days of annotation,” said Steven Hickson, a Ph.D. candidate in Computer Science and a lead researcher on the project.
“This work is about developing a better way to understand people’s activities, and build systems that can recognize people’s activities at a finely-grained level of detail,” said Edison Thomaz, co-author and graduate research assistant in the School of Interactive Computing. “Activity tracking devices like the Fitbit can tell how many steps you take per day, but imagine being able to track all of your activities – not just physical activities like walking and running. This work is moving toward full activity intelligence. At a technical level, we are showing that it’s becoming possible for computer vision techniques alone to be used for this.”
The group believes they have gathered the largest annotated dataset of first-person images to demonstrate that deep-learning can understand human behavior and the habits of a specific person.
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First Scientific Paper Published From New Horizons Mission
Photo credit:
High-resolution image of Pluto in enhanced color to bring out differences in surface composition by NASA/New Horizons, via Wikimedia Commons
New Horizons' images of Pluto have been the astronomical highlight of the summer. The complexity that became apparent from the pictures of the dwarf planet is discussed in detail in the first paper published by the research team. Pluto’s geology, colors and atmosphere, Charon’s surface and the first data on Nix and Hydra – all moons of Pluto – are all discussed in the study, published in Science.
One Giant Step for Alabama Students on Evolution … Now What?
In September 2015, something amazing happened. It isn’t what we traditionally think of as ground-breaking or life-changing, but to millions of young people in one southern state, this will be the first step toward a new lens on science. What was it? That Alabama adopted a new set of science standards in which evolution is described as “substantiated with much direct and indirect evidence.”
Alabama, and the southeastern US in general, has a long history of controversy when it comes to the teaching of evolution. This isn’t to say that there are not teachers who do an amazing job of teaching it, but traditionally discussing evolution has been “taboo” likely to draw challenge, rebuke, and/or isolation. Due to underpinning cultures in the Southeast, prevalence of literalist religious fundamentalism, and focus on states rights vs. federal, we have been in the negative spotlight for our refusal to teach or mention evolution, even going so far as to post disclaimers in student textbooks that explain how evolution is “just a theory” and one interpretation of evidence. (You can check out Ken Miller’s dissection of the disclaimer here.)
State standards in the Southeast have historically refused to mention the "E word" while dancing around the concept of evolution. In the best cases, the standards addressed some concepts but with weak enough language as to allow teachers to conduct a classroom “hit and run”, where they introduce the concept, discuss their discomfort and/or counter with alternative ideas. In light of the negative perceptions many have of our state's conflict with evolution, it is nice to see Alabama doing something that will help students in generations to come.
It may not seem like much of a step forward, but considering the jump being made just in the language of the standards, it is huge. Comparing the language and coverage of evolution in the life sciences from the old standards to the new standards is comparing apples to oranges in terms of clarity, strength of content, and depth of expectations. In the old standards, there were some concepts of evolution mentioned before high school, but they avoided the word “evolution” and had little depth or application. Compare this to the level of detail and focus in the new standards, where evolution is treated as a unifying theory, and it is represented from early elementary all the way up to high school with increasing complexity.
It is important, however, to recognize that this is hardly the end of the battle over evolution in Alabama. Having standards is a great start, but the presence of the standards is not equivalent to the presence of a magical switch that suddenly makes evolution less controversial, nor does it automatically ensure that all teachers who have avoided teaching evolution, or who teach it alongside other non-scientific alternative concepts such as creationism, will now change their minds and teach the science accurately.
Research by myself and others in Alabama show that teachers struggle with teaching evolution due to their own worldview and beliefs. Even those who teach evolution often go through a transformation of sorts, becoming more anxious, aloof, and discombobulated when addressing the topic than when they are teaching other, non-controversial topics. Having standards gives a scaffold upon which to build instruction, but it does not change the atmosphere of controversy and conflict that prevents many teachers from teaching evolution.
Now that there is a strong framework for teaching evolution securely in place for K–12 education in Alabama, it is time for science supporters to come together to find ways to prepare teachers and support them in the classroom. I'll be there to help; will you?
Amanda Glaze has been a classroom teacher, researcher, and university professor for nine years in various settings around the Southeastern United States. Her area of focus is evolutionary biology but her passion is the intersections of science and society where there is conflict, namely the evolution conflict in the Heart of Dixie and nationwide in the United States. She resides in Alabama with her husband, Greg, and their two youngest children, Jaymon and Maddox, as well as a menagerie of flora and fauna her boys have collected from their adventures. You can read her previous Science League of America post on teaching evolution here.
Our Fossil Find Suggests Humans Spread To Asia Way Before They Got To Europe
Photo credit:
New discovery has put some teeth into our understanding of human evolution. Credit: S. Xing and X-J. Wu
It’s hard not to feel slightly superior when you belong to the only human species on the planet. Behind us there is a long track of extinct relatives that did not make it to our days. The Neanderthals in Europe went extinct some 40,000 years ago, just as we got there – leading us to believe we forced them out by being so much more advanced.
MH17 Crash Report Establishes The Cause, But Only Criminal Investigation Can Find Those Responsible
Photo credit:
Tjibbe Joustra announces the Dutch Safety Board’s findings. Robin van Longhuijsen/EPA
The Dutch Safety Board’s report into the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines MH17 and the death of all 298 people on board presents compelling evidence that the aircraft was destroyed by a missile launched from a 320 square kilometre area in Eastern Ukraine. While the investigation chose not to include it – another Dutch-led criminal investigation is also underway – there is substantial other information that supports these claims.
The Missile
Men And Women Biased About Studies Of STEM Gender Bias – In Opposite Directions
Photo credit:
How you assess the strength of gender bias research depends on your viewpoint. Glasses image via www.shutterstock.com
In 2012, an experiment on gender bias shook the scientific community by showing that science faculty favor male college graduates over equally qualified women applying for lab manager positions. Though the study was rigorous, many didn’t believe it.
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