science

A Science News report about Dr. Eliezer Masliah (who held a highly important role at the National Institute of Aging), a 300-page dossier composed of misconducts at his lab, as well as followups... Featuring everyone's favorite research integrity sleuths (Elizabeth Bik, Mu Yang, "Cheshire", ...) and more.

Post URL points to archive.org due to soft paywall on Science News. Here's the original link

Semiconductors have already had a very profound effect on society, accelerating scientific research and driving greater connectivity. Future semiconductor hardware will open up new possibilities in quantum computing, artificial intelligence and edge computing, for applications such as cybersecurity and personalized healthcare. By nature of its ethos, open hardware provides opportunities for even greater collaboration and innovations across education, academic research and industry. Here we present Flex-RV, a 32-bit microprocessor based on an open RISC-V instruction set fabricated with indium gallium zinc oxide thin-film transistors on a flexible polyimide substrate, enabling an ultralow-cost bendable microprocessor. Flex-RV also integrates a programmable machine learning (ML) hardware accelerator inside the microprocessor and demonstrates new instructions to extend the RISC-V instruction set to run ML workloads. It is implemented, fabricated and demonstrated to operate at 60 kHz consuming less than 6 mW power. Its functionality when assembled onto a flexible printed circuit board is validated while executing programs under flat and tight bending conditions, achieving no worse than 4.3% performance variation on average. Flex-RV pioneers an era of sub-dollar open standard non-silicon 32-bit microprocessors and will democratize access to computing and unlock emerging applications in wearables, healthcare devices and smart packaging.

theres a hint there about spsce travel

We finally have an answer: The beginning and the end of the sliding motion that produces static electricity experience different forces – resulting in a charge differential between the front and the back that results in the crackle of static electricity.

YouTube description: 58 of you watching this video right now will not be alive next week. And it’s not because of some freak accident or rare disease. It’s because of everyday actions you probably think are harmless. Let’s save your life today by looking at what is most likely to kill you next week – so you can avoid it.

"Octopuses normally hunt alone, but footage captured by divers has revealed that they can collaborate with fish to find their next meal. The videos, described today in Nature Ecology & Evolution (citation 1), show that the different species even adopt specific roles to maximize the success of joint hunting expeditions."

Associated research article (open access): Sampaio E et al. Multidimensional social influence drives leadership and composition-dependent success in octopus–fish hunting groups. Nature Ecology & Evolution (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-024-02525-2

Same news that was independently reported by Science News (might need membership): https://www.science.org/content/article/some-octopuses-treat-fish-hunting-buddies

many interesting pictures

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/13574268

A really innovative study that went beyond statistical association and actually planted trees in low-tree neighborhoods and measured the impacts.

After the plantings, the research team reassessed residents' health. They found that those living in the greened area had 13-20% lower levels of a biomarker of general inflammation, a measure called high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP) than those living in the areas that did not receive any new trees or shrubs. Higher levels of hsCRP are strongly associated with a risk of cardiovascular disease and are an even stronger indicator of heart attack than cholesterol levels. Higher CRP levels also indicate a higher risk of diabetes and certain cancers.

A reduction of hsCRP by this percentage corresponds to nearly 10-15% reduction in the risk of heart attacks, cancer or dying from any disease.

Although several previous studies have found an association between living in areas of high surrounding greenness and health, this is the first study to show that a deliberate increase in greenness in the neighborhood can improve health.

The research team, led by NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) scientists in South Gloucestershire and supported by the University of Bristol, found a blood group called MAL.

They identified the genetic background of the previously known AnWj blood group antigen, which was discovered in 1972 but unknown until now after this world-first test was developed.

‘Soft cells’ — shapes with rounded corners and pointed tips that fit together on a plane — feature in onions, molluscs and more.

barely passed general chemistry. poor memory for arbitrary compound names. invested a lot of cpu cycles in folding@home brute force compound modeling screensaver app. until I realised how much electricity it used.