Crowdsourced Geospatial Data Will Mean A 'Seismic Shift' Astronomy has long been dominated by expert amateurs but with geospatial data everywhere, thanks to widely available internet and smartphones, it is not just that directions that were once only available in a paper map are now updated on your phone in real time to account for traffic. It is changing the relationships of science also. Crowdsourced scientific data will go from obscure folding protein folding of 15 years ago to relevance everywhere. That evolution will continue to be driven by how the data is gathered. Credit: X ..read more

Red Light Myopia Therapy Can Injure Your Retina Over the last few years, low-level red light (LLRL) therapy has become popular to control myopia, or nearsightedness, especially in children. In LLRL therapy, children are instructed to look into a red light-emitting instrument for three minutes, twice a day, five days a week, for the duration of the treatment period, which could last years.    Studies reported the treatment as effective and responsible for significant reduction in myopia progression and it is already being used to address myopia in over 100,000 pediatric patients ..read more

No, COVID-19 Vaccines Do Not Cause Infertility - Not Getting It Might Despite claims of anti-vaccine activists no different than groups that used to claim vaccines cause autism, COVID-19 vaccines do not impact fecundability—the probability of conception per menstrual cycle—in female or male partners who received the Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, or Johnson & Johnson vaccines. The prospective study instead indicates that COVID-19 infection among males may temporarily reduce fertility— an outcome that could be avoidable through vaccination. Lead author Dr. Amelia Wesselink, epidemiologist ..read more

Liangzhu, Venice of the Stone Age, Collapsed Due To Climate Change In the Yangtze Delta, about 160 kilometres southwest of Shanghai, the archeological ruins of Liangzhu City are located. There, a highly advanced culture blossomed about 5,300 years ago, thanks to the engineering of large hydraulic structures. The walled city had a complex system of navigable canals, dams and water reservoirs. This system made it possible to cultivate very large agricultural areas throughout the year. In the history of human civilization, it is one of the first examples of highly developed communities base ..read more

Genetically Rescued Organism: Toward A Solution For Sudden Oak Death Sudden oak death, caused by the pathogen Phythophthora ramorum, is one of the most ecologically devastating forest diseases in North America, responsible for the deaths of millions of oaks and tanoaks along the coast. Science to the rescue? After the success of genetically modified organisms in things like insulin and food, a recent trend is Genetically Rescued Organisms. These GROs would use science to create natural resistance, like a vaccine for plants, and reduce the impact of altered species composition ..read more

Doomscrolling COVID-19 News Takes an Emotional Toll - Here is How to Prevent That Picture this: it’s April 2020, you’re between Zoom meetings, and scrolling through your social media newsfeed. Headlines like “Death toll continues to rise”, “COVID-19 may cause long-term health implications” and “Health-care systems overwhelmed” flash across your screen. Your mood takes a dive, but you can’t stop scrolling. If this scenario rings true for you, you’re not alone. Research shows people have a tendency to seek out information during uncertain times – it’s a natural coping mechanism. But is persiste ..read more

Appreciating van Leeuwenhoek: The Cloth Merchant Who Discovered Microbes Imagine trying to cope with a pandemic like COVID-19 in a world where microscopic life was unknown. Prior to the 17th century, people were limited by what they could see with their own two eyes. But then a Dutch cloth merchant changed everything. His name was Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, and he lived from 1632 to 1723. Although untrained in science, Leeuwenhoek became the greatest lens-maker of his day, discovered microscopic life forms and is known today as the “father of microbiology.” Visualizing ‘animalcules’ with a ‘sma ..read more

The Increase in Infant Milk Formulas and Why It Matters Breastfeeding can play an especially important role in early-life nutrition. It can benefit children’s future school performance and economic prospects in later life, as well as the mother’s health. Health authorities across the world endorse the World Health Organization’s (WHO) recommendation that newborns should where possible exclusively breastfeed from the first hour of life until six months of age, and thereafter receive safe and nutritious foods with continued breastfeeding up to two years of age or beyond. Despite this, our recen ..read more

Greenland Could Lose Ice Faster Than Any Century Since The Last Ice Age Ended A new estimate using sheet modeling finds that Greenland's rate of ice loss this century could outpace that of any century over the past 12,000 years, when the last Ice Age ended. Scientists used reconstructions of ancient climate to drive the model, and validated the model against real-world measurements of the ice sheet's contemporary and ancient size. The study brought together climate modelers, ice core scientists, remote sensing experts and paleoclimate researchers. The team used an ice sheet mod ..read more

Fork-Tailed Flycatchers Make Sounds With Their Feathers in Different Accents (Inside Science) -- The fork-tailed flycatcher whistles with its wings in two different accents, potentially more evidence this bird is splitting into two species, a new study finds. Birds are known for the songs they can sing, but dozens of species also use their feathers to generate sounds. For instance, peacocks can rattle their quills together, and the crested pigeon's wings whistle when they fly. In the new study, researchers investigated fork-tailed flycatchers -- 1-ounce birds found throughout the Americas tha ..read more