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giovedì 13 settembre 2018

# zen: "walking doesn't get the respect it deserves"

<< Walking is one of the things that distinguishes us from all other animals and, according to a Harvard Medical School Review, "walking doesn't get the respect it deserves". >>

<< Our genome has been evolving over millennia and we still have the same genomes as our hunter-gather ancestors who were active and not obese. >> Anthony Hannan.

Jill Margo. Science shows how walking keeps the brain developing deep into old age.

https://www.afr.com/lifestyle/health/science-shows-how-walking-keeps-the-brain-developing-deep-into-old-age-20180820-h147re

Also

Kinhin

https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinhin

sabato 8 settembre 2018

# gst: even repulsive interactions generate solitons

<< Solitons are nonspreading wave packets that exist in a wide range of real-world systems, including water waves, sound, DNA, optics, and so on. >>

<< Two or more solitons can bind together to form a soliton molecule with dynamics similar to matter molecules, such as vibration, synthesis, and dissociation. >>

<< Formation processes for three types of soliton molecules were studied: ground-, excited-state, and a new one termed an intermittent-vibration soliton molecule. While it is generally believed that attractive interactions of solitons are responsible for the formation of soliton molecules, the authors found that soliton interactions are not limited to attractive interactions. Counterintuitively, even repulsive interactions can lead to the formation of soliton molecules, >>

John Wallace. Investigation with a femtosecond fiber laser finds new type of soliton ‘molecule’. Aug 01, 2018.

https://www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/print/volume-54/issue-08/newsbreaks/investigation-with-a-femtosecond-fiber-laser-finds-new-type-of-soliton-molecule.html

<< For closely‐separated bound solitons, soliton interactions display wide diversities in repeated measurements, including soliton attraction, repelling, collision, vibration, and annihilation. For well‐separated bound solitons, repulsive interactions dominate the soliton interactions. >>

Junsong Peng, Heping Zeng. Build‐Up of Dissipative Optical Soliton Molecules via Diverse Soliton Interactions. Laser & Photonics Reviews 2018, 12, 1800009.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/lpor.201800009 

Also "soliton" in:

https://flashontrack.blogspot.com/search?q=soliton

https://inkpi.blogspot.com/search?q=solitons

lunedì 3 settembre 2018

# gst: a chaos-inducing approach against superbugs evolution

<< The CHAOS [Controlled Hindrance of Adaptation of OrganismS] method takes advantage of this effect, pulling multiple genetic levers in order to build up stress on the bacterial cell and eventually trigger a cascading failure, leaving the bug more vulnerable to current treatments. The technique does not alter the bug's DNA itself, only the expression of individual genes, similar to the way a coded message is rendered useless without the proper decryption. >>

<< We now have a way to cut off the evolutionary pathways of some of the nastiest bugs and potentially prevent future bugs from emerging at all, >> Peter Otoupal

Chaos-inducing genetic approach stymies antibiotic-resistant superbugs. University of Colorado at Boulder. Sept 3, 2018.

https://m.phys.org/news/2018-09-chaos-inducing-genetic-approach-stymies-antibiotic-resistant.html 

<< While individual perturbations improved fitness during antibiotic exposure, multiplexed perturbations caused large fitness loss in a significant epistatic fashion. >>

Peter B. Otoupal, William T. Cordell, et al. Multiplexed deactivated CRISPR-Cas9 gene expression perturbations deter bacterial adaptation by inducing negative epistasis. Comm  Biol 1 (129) Sept 3, 2018

https://www.nature.com/articles/s42003-018-0135-2

giovedì 30 agosto 2018

# evol-ethno: the fuzzy dispersal and interaction dynamics of ancient (early) nomads (2)

AA << present the genome of 'Denisova 11', a bone fragment from Denisova Cave (Russia)3 and show that it comes from an individual who had a Neanderthal mother and a Denisovan father. >>

<< The finding of a first-generation Neanderthal–Denisovan offspring among the small number of archaic specimens sequenced to date suggests that mixing between Late Pleistocene hominin groups was common when they met. >>

Viviane Slon, Fabrizio Mafessoni, et al. The genome of the offspring of a Neanderthal mother and a Denisovan father. Nature. Aug 22, 2018. doi: 10.1038/s41586-018-0455-x

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0455-x

Marlowe Hood. Neandertal mother, Denisovan father-Newly-sequenced genome sheds light on interactions between ancient hominins. Aug 22, 2018.

https://m.phys.org/news/2018-08-neandertal-mother-denisovan-fathernewly-sequenced-genome.html

Also

the fuzzy dispersal and interaction dynamics of ancient (early) nomads. Dec 11, 2017.

https://flashontrack.blogspot.com/2017/12/evol-ethno-fuzzy-dispersals-and.html

mercoledì 29 agosto 2018

# astro: when an unlucky star ventures close enough to a black hole, it spaghettifies ...

<< To be disrupted, an unlucky star must venture close enough to a black hole that gravitational tides exceed the internal gravity that binds the star together. In other words, the difference in the black hole's gravitational pull on the near and far sides of the star, along with the inertial pull as the star swings around the black hole, stretches the star out into a stream. "Basically it spaghettifies," >> James Guillochon

Joshua Sokol. Star-Swallowing Black Holes Reveal Secrets in Exotic Light Shows. August 8, 2018.

https://www.quantamagazine.org/star-swallowing-black-holes-reveal-secrets-in-exotic-light-shows-20180808/

martedì 28 agosto 2018

# behav: strange "sunk cost" behaviors: to repeat the wrong choice

<< In a temporal context, a sensitivity to sunk costs arises when an individual resists ending an activity, even if it seems unproductive, because of the time already invested. In two parallel foraging tasks [AA] found that mice, rats, and humans show similar sensitivities to sunk costs in their decision-making. >>

Brian M. Sweis, Samantha V. Abram, et al. Sensitivity to "sunk costs" in mice, rats, and humans. Science  Jul 13, 2018; 361 (6398): 178-81 doi: 10.1126/science.aar8644

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/361/6398/178

Krystle Barbour. Sticking with the wrong choice. University of Minnesota Medical School. July 13, 2018.

https://m.phys.org/news/2018-07-wrong-choice.html