science newsletter: Science News SciGuru.com

Κυριακή 12 Φεβρουαρίου 2012

Science News SciGuru.com

Study Produces New Findings on Autism and GI Dysfunction
Advanced power-grid model finds low-cost, low-carbon future in West
Hovering Not Hard if You’re Top-Heavy, NYU Researchers Find
Transforming Galaxies: Markarian 779 has distorted appearance from recent galaxy merger
Excess copies of DYRK1A gene located on chromosome 21 are present in Down's syndrome sufferers

Study Produces New Findings on Autism and GI Dysfunction

Posted: 12 Feb 2012 06:21 AM PST

A researcher at the Keck School of Medicine of USC has published a study highlighting the importance of physicians listening to parental reports of gastrointestinal (GI) problems in their autistic children and screening these children for gastrointestinal dysfunction (GID).

Pat Levitt, director of the Zilkha Neurogenetic Institute at the Keck School, served as principal investigator of the study, which was published on Jan. 9 on the website of Autism Research.

Advanced power-grid model finds low-cost, low-carbon future in West

Posted: 12 Feb 2012 05:31 AM PST

The least expensive way for the Western U.S. to reduce greenhouse gas emissions enough to help prevent the worst consequences of global warming is to replace coal with renewable and other sources of energy that may include nuclear power, according to a new study by University of California, Berkeley, researchers.

The experts reached this conclusion using SWITCH, a highly detailed computer model of the electric power grid for the states west of the Kansas/Colorado border that will be an important tool for utilities and government planners.

Hovering Not Hard if You’re Top-Heavy, NYU Researchers Find

Posted: 12 Feb 2012 05:01 AM PST

Top-heavy structures are more likely to maintain their balance while hovering in the air than are those that bear a lower center of gravity, researchers at New York University’s Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences and Department of Physics have found. Their findings, which appear in the journal Physical Review of Letters, are counter to common perceptions that flight stability can be achieved only through a relatively even distribution of weight—and may offer new design principles for hovering aircraft.

Transforming Galaxies: Markarian 779 has distorted appearance from recent galaxy merger

Posted: 12 Feb 2012 04:49 AM PST

Many of the Universe's galaxies are like our own, displaying beautiful spiral arms wrapping around a bright nucleus. Examples in this stunning image, taken with the Wide Field Camera 3 on the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, include the tilted galaxy at the bottom of the frame, shining behind a Milky Way star, and the small spiral at the top center.

Excess copies of DYRK1A gene located on chromosome 21 are present in Down's syndrome sufferers

Posted: 11 Feb 2012 01:13 PM PST

The neural dendritic spine structures make connections between neurones possible (the neuronal synapses). In the case of patients with Down’s syndrome, the morphology of the neuronal information-receiving system, the dendritic tree, is altered. The dendrites are shorter and the trees are less complex, reducing and altering the flow of information via the neurone endings. It is possibly this that inhibits the development of certain normal cognitive skills, one of the characteristics of people with Down’s syndrome.