Science news of the day thread.

Post Reply
User avatar
Brian Peacock
Tipping cows since 1946
Posts: 37953
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2009 11:44 am
About me: Ablate me:
Location: Location: Location:
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by Brian Peacock » Wed Apr 23, 2014 9:41 pm

That's a lot of paper. ;)
Rationalia relies on voluntary donations. There is no obligation of course, but if you value this place and want to see it continue please consider making a small donation towards the forum's running costs.
Details on how to do that can be found here.

.

"It isn't necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice.
There are two other possibilities: one is paperwork, and the other is nostalgia."

Frank Zappa

"This is how humanity ends; bickering over the irrelevant."
Clinton Huxley » 21 Jun 2012 » 14:10:36 GMT
.

User avatar
Brian Peacock
Tipping cows since 1946
Posts: 37953
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2009 11:44 am
About me: Ablate me:
Location: Location: Location:
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by Brian Peacock » Wed Apr 23, 2014 9:42 pm

FBM wrote:rEv just reminded me that the Lyrid meteor shower is peaking tonight. Thought someone else might be interested.
I've peaked already thanks.
Rationalia relies on voluntary donations. There is no obligation of course, but if you value this place and want to see it continue please consider making a small donation towards the forum's running costs.
Details on how to do that can be found here.

.

"It isn't necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice.
There are two other possibilities: one is paperwork, and the other is nostalgia."

Frank Zappa

"This is how humanity ends; bickering over the irrelevant."
Clinton Huxley » 21 Jun 2012 » 14:10:36 GMT
.

User avatar
Calilasseia
Butterfly
Butterfly
Posts: 5272
Joined: Mon Jul 27, 2009 8:31 pm
About me: Destroyer of canards, and merciless shredder of bad ideas. :twisted:
Location: 40,000 feet above you, dropping JDAMs
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by Calilasseia » Wed Apr 23, 2014 9:44 pm

Brian Peacock wrote:That's a lot of paper. ;)
That's only a tiny fraction of the literature available on Drosophila wing development. :)

User avatar
Brian Peacock
Tipping cows since 1946
Posts: 37953
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2009 11:44 am
About me: Ablate me:
Location: Location: Location:
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by Brian Peacock » Wed Apr 23, 2014 9:47 pm

I don't know where you find the time.

Time flies like an arrow, but fruit flies like a banana.
Rationalia relies on voluntary donations. There is no obligation of course, but if you value this place and want to see it continue please consider making a small donation towards the forum's running costs.
Details on how to do that can be found here.

.

"It isn't necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice.
There are two other possibilities: one is paperwork, and the other is nostalgia."

Frank Zappa

"This is how humanity ends; bickering over the irrelevant."
Clinton Huxley » 21 Jun 2012 » 14:10:36 GMT
.

User avatar
Calilasseia
Butterfly
Butterfly
Posts: 5272
Joined: Mon Jul 27, 2009 8:31 pm
About me: Destroyer of canards, and merciless shredder of bad ideas. :twisted:
Location: 40,000 feet above you, dropping JDAMs
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by Calilasseia » Wed Apr 23, 2014 10:26 pm

Meanwhile, here's another paper on insects mimicking their predators in order to sow confusion in the ranks:

Predator Mimicry: Metalmark Moths Mimic Their Jumping Spider Predators by Jadranka Rota & David L. Wagner, PLoS One, 1: e45 (20th December 2006) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0000045 [Full paper downloadable from here]
Rota & Wagner, 2006 wrote:Abstract

Cases of mimicry provide many of the nature's most convincing examples of natural selection. Here we report evidence for a case of predator mimicry in which metalmark moths in the genus Brenthia mimic jumping spiders, one of their predators. In controlled trials, Brenthia had higher survival rates than other similarly sized moths in the presence of jumping spiders and jumping spiders responded to Brenthia with territorial displays, indicating that Brenthia were sometimes mistaken for jumping spiders, and not recognized as prey. Our experimental results and a review of wing patterns of other insects indicate that jumping spider mimicry is more widespread than heretofore appreciated, and that jumping spiders are probably an important selective pressure shaping the evolution of diurnal insects that perch on vegetation.

User avatar
FBM
Ratz' first Gritizen.
Posts: 45327
Joined: Fri Mar 27, 2009 12:43 pm
About me: Skeptic. "Because it does not contend
It is therefore beyond reproach"
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by FBM » Wed Apr 23, 2014 11:35 pm

Good images of that here: http://bugs.adrianthysse.com/tag/salticidae/

Edited to correct the link.
"A philosopher is a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat that isn't there. A theologian is the man who finds it." ~ H. L. Mencken

"We ain't a sharp species. We kill each other over arguments about what happens when you die, then fail to see the fucking irony in that."

"It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism while the wolf remains of a different opinion."

User avatar
Calilasseia
Butterfly
Butterfly
Posts: 5272
Joined: Mon Jul 27, 2009 8:31 pm
About me: Destroyer of canards, and merciless shredder of bad ideas. :twisted:
Location: 40,000 feet above you, dropping JDAMs
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by Calilasseia » Wed Apr 23, 2014 11:52 pm

Your link takes me to a video clip of a two year old girl doing a pratfall on ice.

User avatar
FBM
Ratz' first Gritizen.
Posts: 45327
Joined: Fri Mar 27, 2009 12:43 pm
About me: Skeptic. "Because it does not contend
It is therefore beyond reproach"
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by FBM » Wed Apr 23, 2014 11:56 pm

Derp. That was meant for elsewhere. :pardon: Hang on while I edit...
"A philosopher is a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat that isn't there. A theologian is the man who finds it." ~ H. L. Mencken

"We ain't a sharp species. We kill each other over arguments about what happens when you die, then fail to see the fucking irony in that."

"It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism while the wolf remains of a different opinion."

User avatar
Calilasseia
Butterfly
Butterfly
Posts: 5272
Joined: Mon Jul 27, 2009 8:31 pm
About me: Destroyer of canards, and merciless shredder of bad ideas. :twisted:
Location: 40,000 feet above you, dropping JDAMs
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by Calilasseia » Thu Apr 24, 2014 12:14 am

I downloaded the video clips from PLoS One. There's four in total: one showing the manner in which the moths display themselves, a comparison video showing territorial responses of male Salticid spiders, a video showing what happens when non-mimetic moths are offered up to the Salticids (invariably, they end up as lunch), and the final video shows the Brenthia mimetic moths placed alongside the same Salticids (the spiders react with a territorial display as if encountering another Salticid, as in the second video).

They're pretty impressive. You can download them from the PLoS One main page covering the paper.

User avatar
FBM
Ratz' first Gritizen.
Posts: 45327
Joined: Fri Mar 27, 2009 12:43 pm
About me: Skeptic. "Because it does not contend
It is therefore beyond reproach"
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by FBM » Thu Apr 24, 2014 12:51 am

I gave them a look. Fascinating. The spider wanted to fight the metalmark(s), but ate the others. Very cool.
"A philosopher is a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat that isn't there. A theologian is the man who finds it." ~ H. L. Mencken

"We ain't a sharp species. We kill each other over arguments about what happens when you die, then fail to see the fucking irony in that."

"It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism while the wolf remains of a different opinion."

User avatar
JacksSmirkingRevenge
Grand Wazoo
Posts: 13511
Joined: Thu Feb 26, 2009 6:56 pm
About me: Half man - half yak.
Location: Perfidious Albion
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by JacksSmirkingRevenge » Sun Jun 08, 2014 6:53 pm

Computer passes Turing test:-
http://home.bt.com/techgadgets/technews ... 3909495174
A "super computer" has duped humans into thinking it was a 13-year-old boy to become the first machine to pass the "iconic" Turing Test, experts have said.

Five machines were tested at the Royal Society in central London to see if they could fool people into thinking they were humans during text-based conversations.

The test was devised in 1950 by computer science pioneer and Second World War codebreaker Alan Turing, who said that if a machine was indistinguishable from a human, then it was "thinking".

No computer had ever previously passed the Turing Test, which requires 30% of human interrogators to be duped during a series of five-minute keyboard conversations, organisers from the University of Reading said.
Sent from my Interositor using Twatatalk.

User avatar
cronus
Black Market Analyst
Posts: 18122
Joined: Thu Oct 11, 2012 7:09 pm
About me: Illis quos amo deserviam
Location: United Kingdom
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by cronus » Sun Jun 08, 2014 8:04 pm

So they couldn't tell the difference between a 13 year old brat and a piece of computer code? Not exactly passing the Turing Test.... :read:

What will the world be like after its ruler is removed?

User avatar
Brian Peacock
Tipping cows since 1946
Posts: 37953
Joined: Thu Mar 05, 2009 11:44 am
About me: Ablate me:
Location: Location: Location:
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by Brian Peacock » Tue Aug 25, 2015 12:42 am

The Guardian wrote: Universal flu vaccine a step closer as scientists create experimental jabs

Annual vaccinations could be a thing of the past as scientists have successfully tested vaccines on animals infected with different strains of influenza



A universal flu vaccine that protects against multiple strains of the virus is a step closer after scientists created experimental jabs that work in animals.

The vaccines prevented deaths or reduced symptoms in mice, ferrets and monkeys infected with different types of flu, raising hopes for a reliable alternative to the seasonal vaccine.

Doctors hope that a universal flu vaccine would do away with the need for people at risk to have flu jabs every year, and even protect the public from dangerous, potentially pandemic, strains that jump from birds or pigs into humans.

Conventional flu vaccines target the “head” of a molecule called haemagglutinin (HA) that sits on the surface of flu viruses. But because the head of the HA mutates so rapidly, seasonal flu vaccines must be continually re-formulated to ensure they are effective.

During the last flu season, mutations in the HA molecule on one of the most common circulating strains, H3N2, meant that the seasonal flu vaccine offered little protection. Public Health England said in February that the less effective vaccine was likely to have been behind a steep rise in flu deaths.

In two studies reported on Monday, separate research teams describe how they created novel flu vaccines that target the “stem” of the HA molecule instead of the head. The stem of the HA molecule is similar across different flu strains and mutates far less often.

One of the teams, led by Barney Graham at the National Institutes of Health in Maryland, created their vaccine by attaching part of a flu virus’s HA stem to tiny balls of protein. These protein nanoparticles kept the stem intact and made it easy for the immune system to spot once it was injected.

In lab tests, one version of the vaccine completely protected mice and partially protected ferrets from injections of H5N1 bird flu virus, which was fatal in unvaccinated animals. The H5N1 flu strain has killed more than 400 people since 2003, most of whom caught the virus from infected poultry.

“This is very much a test of concept,” Graham told the Guardian. The team, whose study appears in the journal Nature Medicine, now hopes to develop another vaccine that protects against a different group of flu viruses. The first human trials are at least three years away, Graham added.

A second team, led by Antonietta Impagliazzo at the Crucell Vaccine Institute in Leiden, created their own experimental flu vaccine by removing the head of the HA molecule, and tweaking the stem to make it bind to antibodies more effectively.

Writing in the journal Science, the team describes how injections of one formulation of the vaccine protected mice from H5N1 bird flu and the H1N1 swine flu that emerged in 2009. The vaccine was less effective in macaques, but the animals had less severe flu symptoms after receiving the jabs.

“Influenza remains one of the most serious public health challenges, and new therapeutic and preventative solutions are needed,” said Hanneke Schuitemaker, head of viral vaccines discovery at Janssen Infectious Diseases and Vaccines, a company that worked on the vaccine.

“The results highlighted today shows there is potential in the development of a single universal vaccine to protect against all seasonal and pandemic influenza strains,” she added.

Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at Oxford University, said: “This is an exciting development, but the new vaccines now need to be tested in clinical trials to see how well they work in humans. This will be the next stage of research, which will take several years. So we are still some way from having better flu vaccines for humans.”

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015 ... ental-jabs
Good news for the old and infirm, eh Jim? :whistle:
Rationalia relies on voluntary donations. There is no obligation of course, but if you value this place and want to see it continue please consider making a small donation towards the forum's running costs.
Details on how to do that can be found here.

.

"It isn't necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice.
There are two other possibilities: one is paperwork, and the other is nostalgia."

Frank Zappa

"This is how humanity ends; bickering over the irrelevant."
Clinton Huxley » 21 Jun 2012 » 14:10:36 GMT
.

User avatar
rainbow
Posts: 13528
Joined: Fri Jun 08, 2012 8:10 am
About me: Egal wie dicht du bist, Goethe war Dichter
Location: Africa
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by rainbow » Wed Sep 07, 2016 12:51 pm

I call bullshit - Alfred E Einstein
BArF−4

User avatar
pErvinalia
On the good stuff
Posts: 59295
Joined: Tue Feb 23, 2010 11:08 pm
About me: Spelling 'were' 'where'
Location: dystopia
Contact:

Re: Science news of the day thread.

Post by pErvinalia » Wed Sep 07, 2016 1:04 pm

I'm pretty sure the guy who lives next door is an older fossil than that..
Sent from my penis using wankertalk.
"The Western world is fucking awesome because of mostly white men" - DaveDodo007.
"Socialized medicine is just exactly as morally defensible as gassing and cooking Jews" - Seth. Yes, he really did say that..
"Seth you are a boon to this community" - Cunt.
"I am seriously thinking of going on a spree killing" - Svartalf.

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 6 guests