Phagocytes feed by forming food vacuoles. In this article the authors investigate the extent that exposure of non-nutritional food, such as India Ink, to Tetrahymena pyriformis affects the number of vacuole formation. These studies provide insight to how organisms budget their energy and metabolic processes during an energy shortage.
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Behavioral Longevity: The Impact of Smoking, Alcohol Consumption, and Obesity on Life Expectancy
In this article, the authors look into what is already known about the factor affecting longevity and determine the importance of behavioral factors including alcohol consumption, smoking, and obesity on longevity. The authors quantify data from over 150 countries and, interestingly, find that the impact each factor has on longevity is at least in part dependent on the country's economic development status. Overall, they conclude that an average person’s life expectancy can increase by more than 3 years if smoking and alcohol consumption is reduced by a half and weight is decreased by 10%.
Read More...Monitoring Local Soil Toxicity by Daphnia magna Viability
In this study a student uses Daphnia magna, or water fleas, to assay the purity of local soil samples. Daphnia magna are a helpful organism to detect potentially harmful levels of toxins in water.
Read More...The Clinical Accuracy of Non-Invasive Glucose Monitoring for ex vivo Artificial Pancreas
Diabetes is a serious worldwide epidemic that affects a growing portion of the population. While the most common method for testing blood glucose levels involves finger pricking, it is painful and inconvenient for patients. The authors test a non-invasive method to measure glucose levels from diabetic patients, and investigate whether the method is clinically accurate and universally applicable.
Read More...What Can You See in the Dark? The Effects of Contrast, Light, and Age on Contrast Sensitivity in Low Light
Many of us take our vision for granted, but rarely do we measure how well we can see. In this study, the authors investigate the ability of people of different ages to read progressively fainter letters in dark light. They find that the ability to see in dim light drops drastically after age 30. The ability to read fainter letters worsens after age 30 as well. These findings should help inform lighting decisions everywhere from restaurants to road signs.
Read More...Understanding the battleground of identity fraud
The authors looked at variables associated with identity fraud in the US. They found that national unemployment rate and online banking usage are among significant variables that explain identity fraud.
Read More...Investigating the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the cognitive dissonance of adolescents
The authors survey adolescents about aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic to explore perspectives that may give rise to cognitive dissonance.
Read More...The effects of age on quality of mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic
The impact of age on mental health is a crucial yet understudied aspect of public health. While mental health is gaining recognition as a vital component of overall well-being, its correlation with age remains largely unexplored. In Canada, where the median age has risen significantly over the past half-century, understanding this relationship becomes increasingly pertinent. Researchers hypothesized that older adults would exhibit lower rates of mental health disorders and report better perceived mental health due to increased emotional stability and maturity.
Read More...Groundwater prediction using artificial intelligence: Case study for Texas aquifers
Here, in an effort to develop a model to predict future groundwater levels, the authors tested a tree-based automated artificial intelligence (AI) model against other methods. Through their analysis they found that groundwater levels in Texas aquifers are down significantly, and found that tree-based AI models most accurately predicted future levels.
Read More...Impact of carbon number and atom number on cc-pVTZ Hartree-Fock Energy and program runtime of alkanes
It's time-consuming to complete the calculations that are used to study nuclear reactions and energy. To uncover which computational chemistry tools are useful for this challenge, Pan, Vaiyakarnam, Li, and McMahan investigated whether the Python-based Simulations of Chemistry Framework’s Hartree-Fock (PySCF) method is an efficient and accurate way to assess alkane molecules.
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