Leahgates

U. WASHINGTON (US) — Seeds gobbled by birds and dispersed across the landscape have a better chance of surviving, and new research may explain why.

Scientists have long known that those seeds that are carried in birds’ bellies tend to fare better than those that fall near parent plants where seed-hungry predators and pathogens are more concentrated.

COLUMBIA (US) — Having a large workspace or a big driver’s seat in a car can make people feel more powerful, which can lead to dishonest behaviors.

“In everyday working and living environments, our body postures are incidentally expanded and contracted by our surroundings—by the seats in our cars, the furniture in and around workspaces, even the hallways in our offices—and these environments directly influence the propensity of dishonest behavior in our everyday lives,” says Andy Yap, who conducted the research as a PhD student at Columbia University.

Building on previous research that expansive postures can lead to a state of power, and power can lead to dishonest behavior, the study found that expanded, nonverbal postures forced upon individuals by their environments could influence decisions and behaviors in ways that render people less honest, Yap says.

BROWN (US) — Using computer models, researchers have discovered it’s a sticky type of red blood cell that starts the blockage that leads to a “sickle cell crisis.”

The models show that the rigid, crescent-shaped red blood cells that are the hallmark of sickle cell disease don’t cause these blockages on their own. Instead, softer, deformable red blood cells known as SS2 cells start the process by sticking to capillary walls. The rigid sickle-shaped cells then stack up behind the SS2s, like traffic behind a car wreck.

The findings, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could provide a way to evaluate drug treatments aimed at easing or preventing sickle cell crisis, also known as vaso-occlusion.

MICHIGAN STATE (US) — Training young children in spatial reasoning can improve their math performance, according to a new study.

The researchers trained 6- to 8-year-olds in mental rotation, a spatial ability, and found their scores on addition and subtraction problems improved significantly. The mental rotation training involved imagining how two halves of an object would come together to make a whole, when the halves have been turned at an angle.

Past research has found a link between spatial reasoning and math, but the new study is the first to provide direct evidence of a causal connection—that when children are trained in one ability, improvement is seen in the other. The findings are published in the Journal of Cognition and Development.

USC (US) — Researchers say they may have found a new and surprising way to treat an aggressive blood cancer that can be fatal for people infected with HIV.

The class of drugs—called BET bromodomain inhibitors—effectively targets primary effusion lymphoma (PEL), a type of cancer for which those drugs were not expected to be effective.

U. ROCHESTER (US) — Emergency room patients may be less likely to receive opioid pain meds if they are black, Hispanic, poor, or have less education.

Racial and ethnic disparities are already well documented in the scientific literature, but a new study could be the first to investigate whether aspects of socioeconomic status—poverty, income, and education levels—also influence the prescription of opioid pain medications, researchers say.

NYU (US) — A new type of streaming technology that fuses streaming and downloading kicks up video quality and dodges screen freezes in mobile devices.

It’s the bane of streaming media—the endlessly spinning cursor on a dark screen, or the final minutes of a favorite show freezing to a halt when the wireless signal weakens. The new technology, called streamloading, could make spotty streaming and data-hogging downloads a thing of the past.

U. WARWICK (UK) — Children are at the top of the list when it comes to daily social contacts, making them most at risk for catching—and spreading—infections.

Researchers mapped the daily contact networks of thousands of individuals to shed light on which groups may be at highest risk of contracting and spreading respiratory diseases.

The scientists used an anonymous web and postal survey of 5,027 UK residents to collect information on the types of social contact likely to lead to the transmission of respiratory infections.

U. QUEENSLAND (AUS) — New treatments for stroke and high blood pressure may come from an unlikely source: vampire bat venom.

Researchers have discovered that vampire bat venom contains molecules capable of evading the victim’s immune system.

BOSTON U. (US) — A new fiber optic technology has the potential to dramatically boost bandwidth for Internet users and providers.

Described in the journal Science, the technology centers on donut-shaped laser light beams called optical vortices, in which the light twists like a tornado as it moves along the beam path, rather than in a straight line.

Widely studied in molecular biology, atomic physics, and quantum optics, optical vortices (also known as orbital angular momentum, or OAM, beams) were thought to be unstable in fiber, until Siddharth Ramachandran, an engineering professor at Boston University, recently designed an optical fiber that can propagate them.

U. TEXAS-AUSTIN (US) — Chemists are hopeful their new energy-efficient method to desalinate water can be scaled up for personal or even municipal uses.

The method, which creates a small electrical field that removes salts from seawater, consumes less energy and is dramatically simpler than conventional techniques.

notoriousrbg:

She does.

how can it be cute

BUT IT IS

clambistro:

The complete set of SB5 Filibuster Heroes!!

omfg

franklindbulldog:

I just got caught licking a taco on the table. I’m pretending I don’t know what anyone is talking about.

I’m sorry, are you saying you put a taco on the table that was NOT for FDB?

gwendolynthecorgi:

I AM HUGGING YOU BECAUSE I LOVE YOU

ALSO SOMEONE ATE ONE OF YOUR SHOES BUT THIS IS NOT ABOUT THAT

Awww!

“I’d like to send a huge THANK YOU from everyone here at the Sloth Sanctuary for promoting our Save Our Sloths campaign last month. With your help, we’ve raised a whopping $46,000 to allow us to develop a release program & return orphaned baby sloths back to the wild! A huge amount of these donations came from Cute Overload visitors, so THANK YOU! We’re now in the last 8 days of our campaign!”- Cuteporter Becky C.

Maymo decides to take Penny The Puppeh to the park, so they can both enjoy a bit of a romp.

Get mo Maymo here.