In recent years, scientists have developed drugs can help shrink cancerous tumors. Several of these target P13K, an enzyme involved in cellular growth that is known to contribute to causing cancers.
But the anti-cancer drugs that target P13K don’t work as well as scientists had hoped. The problem is that the drugs also cause a spike in insulin, which helps tumors grow. The spike could compromise the effectiveness of the cancer therapies.
One solution is to supplement a pati ...read more
Albert Einstein’s been having quite a few weeks! First his “imaginary elevator� thought experiment was confirmed with unprecedented precision, then his theory of relativity was shown to create gravitational lenses as expected even in other galaxies. And today, we learn that a central tenet of relativity still holds even at gravitational extremes. It’s no annus mirabilis, but it ain’t bad.
Todayâ ...read more
Dead gharials began washing up on the banks of India’s Chambal River in December 2007. Over the following weeks, the body count grew. By mid-January, the dead reptiles—some the length of two tall men, lined up end to end—numbered in the dozens. By March, more than 110 of the skinny-snouted creatures had been found dead, most along a 30-kilometer (18-mile) stretch of river.
At the time, there were thought to be just 200 to 250 breeding-ag ...read more
Coconut crabs (Birgus latro) are gigantic land-dwelling crabs found on islands throughout the Indo-Pacific. They can live for decades, and can grow to be more than 3 feet wide (legs outstretched) and weigh in at more than 6 pounds. So that name isn't because they're the size of a coconut—it's because they can actually tear open coconuts to eat their tender meat.
"If a coconut falls out of a tree, they'll clamp onto&A ...read more
Fellas, has that Armani suit been calling your name lately? Maybe it’s because you’ve got some extra testosterone coursing through your system. A new study in the journal Nature Communications found that higher levels of the hormone impact men’s preference for high-end products.
An international team of scientists worked with a group of over 240 men; half of them got an injection of testosterone gel while the other half got a placebo ge ...read more
A paper in Psychological Science was taking a beating on Twitter last month.
https://twitter.com/lakens/status/1004119102485614592
In this post, I'm not going to talk about the paper itself but rather, about how it came to be published and how preregistration - a concept I have long advocated - may be being misused.
The paper reports on five studies which all address the same general question. Of these, Study #3 was preregistered and the authors write that it was performed after ...read more
When Igor Ashurbeyli walked onstage to be inaugurated Asgardia’s head of state, it was a few small steps for the Russian scientist and businessman, and one dubious leap for the world’s first “space nation.�
The national anthem that preceded him fills the mind with scenes of an epic, pioneering future, and that’s just what Ashurbeyli envisions. Our descendents take up residence in â€&oelig ...read more
"No man is an island," noted English poet John Donne, but now a new study of nearly a half-million people find there may be genetic roots to loneliness.
These findings also show that some genetic variations are linked to social activities like going to the pub. The results were published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications.
Previous research has already shown that loneliness is more than just a state of mind. It's strongly linked with an increase in all causes of death, on a l ...read more
So, we're made it through the 2018 Geology World Cup Group Stage. Now it's time to vote for the countries that will make it through to the quarterfinals. To make it easier, I've created a single poll for your votes, so cast your ballot now!
The Matches:
Left bracket:
A1. Russia vs B2. Portugal: In soccer, this might lean strongly in Portugal's direction but in geology, Russia is the behemoth. I mean, Russia is big enough that it has been the site of not one but two maj ...read more
Telling people how we really feel can be... well, tricky. Even when it comes to writing a simple thank you note: "What if it's too much? Will they think I'm weird? Is it going to be awkward?" If only there were a surefire way to know how it was going to turn out! Well, this study is getting as close as we are likely to get. Here, scientists tracked how senders and receivers felt about thank you letters, and the results suggest that you should get your pen out: "Expressers significantly under ...read more
