DIRS.INFO The most relevant business & tech news

☆ U.S. Tightens Rules on Risky Virus Research
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-07 | by ( Carl Zimmer | Benjamin Mueller | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The White House has unveiled tighter rules for research on potentially dangerous microbes and toxins, in an effort to stave off laboratory accidents that could unleash a pandemic. The new policy, published Monday evening, arrives after years of deliberations by an expert panel and a charged public debate over whether Covid arose from an animal market or a laboratory in China. But others warned against creating restrictive rules that would stifle valuable research without making people safer. The debate grew sharper during the pandemic, as politicians raised questions about the origin of Covid. Those who suggested it came from a lab raised concerns about studies that tweaked pathogens to make them more dangerous — sometimes known as “gain of function” research.

Locations: China

☆ What Makes a Society More Resilient? Frequent Hardship.
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-01 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Traditionally, historians have studied these downturns qualitatively, by diving into the twists and turns of individual societies. In a study published Wednesday, these methods allowed Dr. Riris and his colleagues to answer a profound question: Why are some societies more resilient than others? The study, published in the journal Nature, compared 16 societies scattered across the world, in places like the Yukon and the Australian outback. The more often a society went through them, the more resilient it eventually became. “Over time, you will suffer less, essentially,” said Dr. Riris, an archaeologist at Bournemouth University in England.

Persons: Philip Riris, Riris, ” Organizations: Bournemouth University Locations: Yukon, England

☆ Cicadas Are Emerging Now. How Do They Know When to Come Out?
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-24 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Trillions of noisy, red-eyed insects called cicadas are emerging from the earth after more than a decade of feeding on tree roots. This spring, Brood XIX, known as the Great Southern Brood, and Brood XIII, or the Northern Illinois Brood, are emerging simultaneously. The Great Southern Brood, which emerges across the South and the Midwest every 13 years, has been seen at sites scattered from North Carolina to Georgia. The Northern Illinois Brood, which appears every 17 years in the Midwest, is expected to appear in the next month, as temperatures there warm. “There’s surprisingly little information about cicadas that you’d like to know,” said Raymond Goldstein, a physicist at the University of Cambridge.

Persons: “ There’s, ”, Raymond Goldstein Organizations: Southern, Northern Illinois, Midwest, The Northern Illinois Brood, University of Cambridge Locations: United States, North Carolina, Georgia, The, Midwest

☆ A.I. Is Learning What It Means to Be Alive
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-10 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Dr. Viault’s red blood cells, which ferry oxygen, had surged 42 percent. It’s called the Norn cell, named after the Norse deities who were believed to control human fate. It took humans 134 years to discover Norn cells. The discovery came about when researchers at Stanford programmed the computers to teach themselves biology. But the Stanford researchers trained their computers on raw data about millions of real cells and their chemical and genetic makeup.

Persons: Francois, Gilbert Viault, It’s Organizations: Stanford Locations: Israel, California

☆ On the Trail of the Denisovans
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-02 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

March 2, 2024Neanderthals may have vanished 40,000 years ago, but they are no strangers to us today. But there’s no such familiarity with the Denisovans, a group of humans that split from the Neanderthal line and survived for hundreds of thousands of years before going extinct. In a new review paper, anthropologists tally all of the fossils that have been clearly identified as Denisovan since the first discovery in 2010. Nevertheless, many scientists are growing increasingly fascinated by Denisovans. “I find Denisovans way more interesting,” said Emilia Huerta-Sánchez, a geneticist at Brown University.

Persons: Kevin Bacon, ”, Janet Kelso, Max Planck, Denisovans, Emilia Huerta, Sánchez Organizations: Max, Max Planck Institute, Brown University Locations: Africa, Leipzig, Germany

☆ Researchers Dispute Claim That Ancient Whale Was Heaviest Animal Ever
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-29 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Last August, a team of paleontologists announced that they had discovered the fossilized bones of a gigantic ancient whale. Perucetus, as they named it, might have weighed over 200 tons, which would make it the heaviest animal that has ever lived. But in a study published Thursday, a pair of scientists have challenged that bold claim. The bones had many hallmarks of whales’ bones. Dr. Urbina and his colleagues reconstructed the full skeleton of Perucetus by studying the much smaller whales that lived at the same time.

Persons: ”, Nicholas Pyenson, Pyenson, Ryosuke, Perucetus, Mario Urbina, Urbina Organizations: Smithsonian National Museum of, University of California, Museum, National University of San Locations: Davis, National University of San Marcos, Lima , Peru, Peru

☆ Scientists Find Genetic Signature of Down Syndrome in Ancient Bones
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-20 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Scientists have diagnosed Down syndrome from DNA in the ancient bones of seven infants, one as old as 5,500 years. Their method, published in the journal Nature Communications, may help researchers learn more about how prehistoric societies treated people with Down syndrome and other rare conditions. Down syndrome, which occurs in 1 in 700 babies today, is caused by an extra copy of chromosome 21. The extra chromosome makes extra proteins, which can cause a host of changes, including heart defects and learning disabilities. But Down syndrome — also known as trisomy 21 — is a remarkably variable disease.

Persons: — Organizations: Nature Communications

☆ Brain Implants Helped 5 People Toward Recovery After Traumatic Injuries
▼ + stars: | 2023-12-04 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Gina Arata, one of the volunteers who received the implant, was 22 when a car crash left her with fatigue, memory problems and uncontrollable emotions. She abandoned her plans for law school and lived with her parents in Modesto, Calif., unable to keep down a job. “It’s kind of amazing how I’ve seen myself improve.”Dr. Schiff and his colleagues designed the trial based on years of research on the structure of the brain. Those studies suggested that our ability to focus on tasks depends on a network of brain regions that are linked to each other by long branches of neurons. Dr. Schiff and his colleagues pinpointed a structure deep inside the brain as a crucial hub in the network.

Persons: Gina Arata, Arata, “, ”, Dr, Schiff, . Schiff Locations: Modesto , Calif

☆ Penguins Take Thousands of Naps Every Day
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-30 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

Penguins are champion power nappers. Over the course of a single day, they fall asleep thousands of times, each bout a few seconds long, a new study has found. Although animals have a wide range of sleeping styles, penguins easily take the record for fragmented sleeping. “It’s really unusual,” said Paul-Antoine Libourel, a neuroscientist at the Neuroscience Research Center of Lyon in France who helped make the discovery. The science of sleep got its start in the early 1900s when researchers used scalp electrodes to discover that people produce slow brain waves when dozing.

Persons: “, ”, Paul, Antoine Libourel Organizations: Penguins, Neuroscience Research, of Lyon Locations: France

☆ Omicron, Now 2 Years Old, Is Not Done With Us Yet
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-21 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

By November 2021, nearly two years after the coronavirus emerged in Wuhan and spread across the world, the surprises seemed to be over. Researchers in Botswana and South Africa alerted the world that a highly mutated version of the virus had emerged and was spreading fast. Omicron, as the World Health Organization called the variant, swiftly overtook other forms of the virus. In the two years since its emergence, Omicron has proved to be not only staggeringly infectious, but an evolutionary marvel, challenging many assumptions virologists had before the pandemic. “It was almost like there was another pandemic,” said Adam Lauring, a virologist at the University of Michigan.

Persons: virologists, ”, Adam Lauring Organizations: Alpha, World Health Organization, University of Michigan Locations: Wuhan, Botswana, South Africa

☆ Chimpanzees Go Through Menopause, Too
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-26 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

For biologists, menopause is baffling. If natural selection favors genes that produce more descendants, why don’t women remain fertile their entire lives? The mystery has only deepened as scientists have looked for menopause in mammals in the wild and found clear evidence of it only in a few species of whales. That rarity has led some researchers to argue that menopause played a crucial part in the evolution of humans. After decades of observations in a rainforest in Uganda, they discovered that some chimpanzees go through menopause, too.

Persons: ”, Kevin Langergraber, Langergraber Organizations: Arizona State University Locations: Uganda

☆ Mammals’ Time on Earth Is Half Over, Scientists Predict
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-25 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

It’s been about 250 million years since reptile-like animals evolved into mammals. Now a team of scientists is predicting that mammals may have only another 250 million years left. The researchers built a virtual simulation of our future world, similar to the models that have projected human-caused global warming over the next century. Using data on the movement of the continents across the planet, as well as fluctuations in the chemical makeup of atmosphere, the new study projected much further into the future. Alexander Farnsworth, a paleoclimate scientist at the University of Bristol who led the team, said that the planet might become too hot for any mammals — ourselves included — to survive on land.

Persons: It’s, Alexander Farnsworth, —, Dr, Farnsworth Organizations: University of Bristol, Nature

☆ Ancient Logs Offer Earliest Example of Human Woodworking
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-20 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Nearly half a million years ago, humans in Africa were assembling wood into large structures, according to a study published Thursday that describes notched and tapered logs buried under sand in Zambia. The discovery drastically pushes back the historical record of structural woodworking. Before, the oldest known examples of this craft were 9,000-year-old platforms on the edge of a British lake. It’s not clear what early humans were building in Africa. Dr. Milks said that the new discovery suggested that they used wood not just for spears or digging sticks, but also for far more ambitious creations such as platforms or walkways.

Persons: Annemieke Milks, It’s, Milks Organizations: University of Reading Locations: Africa, Zambia, British

☆ Humanity’s Ancestors Nearly Died Out, Genetic Study Suggests
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-31 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

“About 98.7 percent of human ancestors were lost at the beginning of the bottleneck, thus threatening our ancestors with extinction,” the scientists wrote. But outside experts said they were skeptical of the novel statistical methods that the researchers used for the study. The studies all take advantage of the same basic facts of our biology: every baby is born with dozens of new genetic mutations, and some of those mutations can be handed down over thousands or even millions of years. By comparing genetic variations in DNA, scientists can trace people’s ancestry to ancient populations that lived in different parts of the world, moved around and interbred. They can even infer the size of those populations at different times in history.

Persons: ”, Stephan Schiffels Organizations: Max Planck Institute Locations: Leipzig, Germany

☆ Enslaved African Americans in Maryland Linked to 42,000 Living Relatives
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-03 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

A construction team working on a highway expansion in Maryland in 1979 discovered human remains on the grounds of an 18th-century ironworks. Eventually, archaeologists uncovered 35 graves in a cemetery where enslaved people had been buried. In the first effort of its kind, researchers now have linked DNA from 27 African Americans buried in the cemetery to nearly 42,000 living relatives. Henry Louis Gates Jr., a historian at Harvard University and an author of the study, published on Thursday in the journal Science, said that the project marked the first time that historical DNA had been used to connect enslaved African Americans to living people. “The history of Black people was intended to be a dark, unlit cave,” Dr. Gates said.

Persons: Henry Louis Gates Jr, Gates Organizations: Harvard University Locations: Maryland

☆ This Ancient Whale May Have Been the Heaviest Animal Ever
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-02 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Paleontologists on Wednesday unveiled the fossilized bones of one of the strangest whales in history. The 39-million-year-old leviathan, called Perucetus, may have weighed about 200 tons, as much as a blue whale — by far the heaviest animal known, until now. While blue whales are sleek, fast-swimming divers, Perucetus was a very different beast. Some experts cautioned that more bones would have to be discovered before a firm estimate of Perucetus’s weight could be made. “It’s clear from this discovery that there are so many other ways of being a whale that we have not yet discovered.”

Persons: Perucetus, ”, Nicholas Pyenson Organizations: Wednesday, Smithsonian National Museum of

☆ A Theory of Childbirth’s Evolution May Not Be What You’re Expecting
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-30 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

What’s more, the scientist said, the idea sends a pernicious message to women that pregnancy is inherently dangerous. “It perpetuates a narrative of bodily incompetence,” Dr. Warrener said. In graduate school, Dr. Warrener did not see any reason to doubt the obstetrical dilemma. But in 2015, after studying volunteers walking on treadmills, Dr. Warrener found that having a wider pelvis did not create a bigger demand for oxygen. Holly Dunsworth, a biological anthropologist now at the University of Rhode Island, also became disenchanted with the obstetrical dilemma when she took a close look at the evidence.

Persons: Anna Warrener, ”, Warrener, Holly Dunsworth, “ Organizations: University of Colorado, University of Rhode Locations: University of Colorado Denver, University of Rhode Island

☆ Blood of Young Mice Extends Life in the Old
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-27 | by ( Carl Zimmer | More About Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In the 1950s, Clive McCay of Cornell University and his colleagues used parabiosis to explore aging. They joined young and old rats, stitching together their flanks so that the capillaries in their skin merged. Later, Dr. McCay and his colleagues examined the cartilage in the old rats and concluded it looked younger. They found the muscles and brains of old mice were rejuvenated, while younger mice showed signs of accelerated aging. The researchers not only found that the old mice lived longer, but also that the course of their aging appeared to change.

Persons: Clive McCay, McCay, parabiosis, . White Organizations: Cornell University, Drug Administration

☆ 2 Leading Theories of Consciousness Square Off
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-01 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

On a muggy June night in Greenwich Village, more than 800 neuroscientists, philosophers and curious members of the public packed into an auditorium. They came for the first results of an ambitious investigation into a profound question: What is consciousness? In June 1998, they had gone to a conference in Bremen, Germany, and ended up talking late one night at a local bar about the nature of consciousness. Dr. Chalmers liked the concept, but he was skeptical that they could find such a neural marker any time soon. Scientists still had too much to learn about consciousness and the brain, he figured, before they could have a reasonable hope of finding it.

Persons: — David Chalmers, Christof Koch, —, Koch, Francis Crick, ”, Chalmers Locations: Greenwich Village, Bremen, Germany

The vaccine, the company said, may not have gone through advanced enough testing to qualify for the new pot of U.S. funding. Federal officials, some of whom have become concerned about the leadership of the next-generation vaccine program, acknowledged that key questions remain about how the program will operate and how quickly it can deliver. Although some Biden administration officials hope to roll out new vaccine technology by fall 2024, many scientists believe doses are at least several years away. “There’s not the money, there’s not the infrastructure, there’s not the support,” John Moore, a virologist at Weill Cornell Medicine, said of the push for improved vaccines. “So I’m not expecting any next-generation major things in the near future.”

Persons: “ There’s, there’s, ” John Moore, I’m, ” Organizations: Biden, Weill Cornell Medicine Locations: Pennsylvania, India

☆ Scientists Debut Lab Models of Human Embryos
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-24 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In its first week, a fertilized human egg develops into a hollow ball of 200 cells and then implants itself on the wall of the uterus. Over the next three weeks, it divides into the distinct tissues of a human body. And those crucial few weeks remain, for the most part, a black box. Dr. Hanna and a number of other biologists are trying to uncover those details by creating models of human embryos in the lab. They are coaxing stem cells to organize themselves into clumps that take on some of the crucial hallmarks of real embryos.

Persons: ”, Jacob Hanna, Hanna, Hanna’s Organizations: Weizmann Institute of Science Locations: Israel, Britain, United States, China

☆ Ancient Human Relatives Buried Their Dead in Caves, New Theory Claims
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-05 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In 2015, scientists reported an astonishing discovery from deep inside a South African cave: more than 1,500 fossils of an ancient hominin species that had never been seen before. The creatures, named Homo naledi, were short, with long arms, curved fingers and a brain about one-third the size of a modern human’s. Now, after years of analyzing the surfaces and sediments of the elaborate underground cave, the same team of scientists is making another splashy announcement: Homo naledi — despite their tiny brains — buried their dead in graves. They lit fires to illuminate their way down the cave, and they marked the graves with engravings on the walls. It suggests that big brains are not essential for sophisticated kinds of thinking, he said, such as making symbols, cooperating on dangerous expeditions or even recognizing death.

Persons: Homo naledi, —, Lee Berger, hominin Organizations: University of Witwatersrand Locations: Africa, Johannesburg

☆ How Did Birds First Take Off?
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-03 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In 1993, “Jurassic Park” helped inspire 9-year-old Stephen Brusatte to become a paleontologist. So Dr. Brusatte was thrilled to advise the producers of last year’s “Jurassic World: Dominion” on what scientists had learned about dinosaurs since he was a child. He was especially happy to see one of the most important discoveries make it to the screen: dinosaurs that sported feathers. “A lot of people thought it was made up,” said Dr. Brusatte, a professor at the University of Edinburgh. Now Dr. Brusatte and other paleontologists are trying to determine exactly how feathered dinosaurs achieved powered flight and became the birds that fly overhead today — an evolutionary mystery that stretches more than 150 million years.

Persons: ”, Stephen Brusatte, Brusatte, “ Organizations: Dominion, University of Edinburgh Locations: China

☆ Bizarre Sea Creatures Illuminate the Dawn of the Animal Kingdom
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-17 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Scientists have long wondered what the first animals were like, including questions about their anatomy and how they found food. In a study published on Wednesday, scientists found tantalizing answers in a little-known group of gelatinous creatures called comb jellies. While the first animals remain a mystery, scientists found that comb jellies belong to the deepest branch on the animal family tree. The oldest definitive animal fossils date back about 580 million years, although some researchers have claimed to find even older ones. Sponges would make sense as the oldest animal.

☆ Study Offers New Twist in How the First Humans Evolved
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-17 | by ( Carl Zimmer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Scientists have revealed a surprisingly complex origin of our species, rejecting the long-held argument that modern humans arose from one place in Africa during one period in time. By analyzing the genomes of 290 living people, researchers concluded that modern humans descended from at least two populations that coexisted in Africa for a million years before merging in several independent events across the continent. “It really puts a nail in the coffin of that idea.”Paleoanthropologists and geneticists have found evidence pointing to Africa as the origin of our species. The oldest fossils that may belong to modern humans, dating back as far as 300,000 years, have been unearthed there. So were the oldest stone tools used by our ancestors.

Search resuls for: "Carl Zimmer"

25 mentions found