AMICOR - 3.108 em construção

 3.108 - AMICOR (25) em construção

#Scientific America

 

GENETICS How the Ancient Viral DNA in Our Genome Affects Disease and Development Human endogenous retroviruses make up 8 percent of the human genome. Researchers are studying how active they are

By Aidan Burn,The Conversation US

 

GENETICS Why Elephants Don't Get Cancer Elephants use 20 copies of a key cancer-fighting gene—and humans just have one

By Rachel Nuwer

#Academia SR Medicina

#Nature Microgiology

New hybrid virus evades immune system The flu virus and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) can fuse together to create a virus that can evade the human immune system. Researchers who were keen to understand co-infections — in which both viruses infect someone at the same time — deliberately infected human lung cells with both viruses. They found that the RSV and the flu virus fused together to form a palm-tree-shaped hybrid, which could infect new cells even in the presence of flu antibodies. “This kind of hybrid virus has never been described before,” says virologist Pablo R. Murcia, who worked on the research. “We are talking about viruses from two completely different families combining together with the genomes and the external proteins of both viruses. It is a new type of virus pathogen.” The Guardian | 4 min read Reference: Nature Microbiology paper

#Nature Briefing

Infographic of the week

Progress towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) — a set of commitments that aim both to end poverty and protect the environment — has stalled, in part owing to a failure to adjust institutions of science and governance to meet the SDGs. Since the goals were agreed in 2015, the rate at which research from high-income countries on, or about, the SDGs is being published has mostly either plateaued or is falling. It’s a different story for low- and middle-income countries, where funding and policy systems are clearly more aligned with the goals. Two-thirds of research published in the poorest countries has some connection to the SDGs, compared with around 35% in high-income countries. (Nature | 5 min read) See more of the week’s key infographics, selected by Nature’s news and art teams. (Source: Changing Directions report)

The aye-aye inserts ‘the entire length of its extra-long, skinny and highly mobile middle finger into the nasal passages’. (imageBROKER/Alamy)

Nose-picking primates eat their own snot Researchers have discovered that aye-ayes (Daubentonia madagascariensis) — round-eyed, nocturnal primates found in Madagascar — use their long, skinny middle fingers to pick their noses, and eat the mucus. Biologist Anne-Claire Fabre recalls her surprise when she first saw a captive aye-aye picking and licking, because the creature’s whole middle finger seemed to disappear up its nose. “It is nearly 8 centimetres — it is really long, and I was wondering where this finger is going,” she says. To solve the anatomical puzzle, researchers carried out CT scans to build 3D models of the aye-aye’s head and hand, revealing that the creature’s long digit could extend into its sinus, throat and mouth. The Guardian | 4 min read Reference: Journal of Zoology paper

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GENOMICS | ALL TOPICS   How Genes Can Leap From Snakes to Frogs By VERONIQUE GREENWOOD The discovery of a hot spot for horizontal gene transfer draws attention to the possible roles of parasites and ecology in such changes. Read the article

ASTROPHYSICS   Brightest-Ever Space Explosion Could Help Explain Dark Matter By JONATHAN O'CALLAGHAN A recent gamma-ray burst known as the BOAT appears to have produced a high-energy particle that shouldn’t exist. For some, dark matter provides the explanation. Read the blog Related:  Gamma-Ray Bursts Continue to Surprise By Jonathan O'Callaghan (2021) CRYPTOGRAPHY   New Entanglement Results Hint at Better Quantum Codes By ALLISON PARSHALL A team of physicists has entangled three photons over a considerable distance, which could lead to more powerful quantum cryptography. Read the blog Related:  Stephanie Wehner Is Designing a Quantum Internet By Natalie Wolchover (2019) INSIGHTS PUZZLE   How to Win at Wordle (Without Cheating) By PRADEEP MUTALIK This month's puzzle column attempts to use objective techniques to address some interesting aspects of Wordle. Try your hand at a solution in the comments section for a chance to win a free Quanta T-shirt or book. Solve the puzzle Related: Why Claude Shannon Would Have Been Great at Wordle By Patrick Honner QUANTA SCIENCE PODCAST   Protein Blobs Linked to Alzheimer’s Affect Aging in All Cells Podcast hosted by SUSAN VALOT; Story by VIVIANE CALLIER A first-of-its-kind study offers a fresh perspective on what happens inside cells as they age. Listen to the podcast Read the article Around the Web It’s (Chatty) Turtles All the Way Down Even typically quiet animals like turtles can vocalize. Recent work suggests that all forms of acoustic communications had a common origin 470 million years ago, evolving in concert with lungs, reports Elizabeth Pennisi for Science Magazine. All land vertebrates vocalize, but only some can mimic sounds that they hear. Neuroscientist Erich Jarvis has found that this “vocal learning” uses the same brain pathways as language. Jordana Cepelewicz interviewed Jarvis for Quanta in 2018. Stretchy Protons Stunt the Strong Force Protons are stretchier than expected. Their constituent quarks are pulled apart by an electric field more easily than the Standard Model predicts, reports James Riordon for Science News. Quantum chromodynamics (QCD), the model that describes how quarks interact with one another, is a notoriously complicated theory. In 2020 Charlie Wood wrote for Quanta about the unwieldy calculations needed for QCD. Recently, physicists helped create a series of animations to better understand the physics happening inside a proton. Last week, Quanta published an explainer using visuals from the collaboration.

#NSF

Research News Bird enzyme points toward novel therapies October 26, 2022 Thank the crested ibis for a clue that could someday help human bodies make their own drugs. The rare bird is the only one known to naturally produce…

24 de outubro de 1945 - Fundação da ONU

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#Scientific       

 

GENETICS Why Elephants Don't Get Cancer Elephants use 20 copies of a key cancer-fighting gene—and humans just have one

By Rachel Nuwer

 

21 DE OUTUBRO DE 2022

OBITUÁRIO

Ely Toscano Barbosa

Morreu no domingo, em Brasília, o cardiologista gaúcho Ely Toscano Barbosa, aos 97 anos. A causa da morte não foi divulgada. Segundo o jornal Correio Braziliense, em setembro deste ano o médico sofreu com uma infecção bucal e precisou ser internado. Ele recebeu alta no dia 13 de outubro, mas no último sábado precisou ser entubado. Toscano faleceu durante a transferência para a UTI do Hospital DF Star.

Natural de Porto Alegre, onde conheceu e se casou com a ginecologista e obstetra Jurema Toscano Barbosa, o médico mudou-se para Brasília em 1959. Toscano foi um dos responsáveis pela fundação e estruturação das unidades de cardiologia do Instituto Hospital de Base e do Hospital das Forças Armadas, na capital federal.

Formado pela Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), o cardiologista fez mestrado pelo Instituto Nacional de Cardiologia do México e doutorado pela Clínica Mayo, nos Estados Unidos. Durante o período em que morou no Exterior, tornou-se referência na área ao identificar o padrão eletrocardiográfico do defeito congênito do canal atrioventricular e identificar as alterações do campo elétrico como distúrbio de condução intraventricular.

Toscano teve trabalhos publicados em simpósios e em revistas estrangeiras, como o The American Journal of Cardiology. Ele também foi presidente da Sociedade Brasileira de Cardiologia, nos anos de 1980 e 1981, e ocupava cadeira emérita na Academia de Medicina de Brasília.

Em entrevista ao jornal de Brasília, o sobrinho de Toscano, Luiz Chabalgoity, contou que ele estava aposentado havia anos, mas continuou atuando em uma clínica privada até sofrer um acidente vascular cerebral (AVC), em 2017. Em 2021, o cardiologista também teve covid-19.

Em nota de pesar, divulgada pela Sociedade Brasileira de Cardiologia, Toscano foi apontado como um dos grandes nomes da cardiologia.