Social Sciences Bolivia  BOLIVIA 07/05/2019

Ancient ritual bundle contained multiple psychotropic plants

the co-occurrence of harmine and DMT -which are the primary ingredients of ayahuasca- in the pouch suggests the use of this beverage as one of the drugs in the shaman's kit

A thousand years ago, Native Americans in South America used multiple psychotropic plants -- possibly simultaneously -- to induce hallucinations and altered consciousness, according to an international team of anthropologists.

  
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Environment Panama  PANAMÁ 30/04/2019

Parasitoid wasps may turn spiders into zombies by hacking their internal code

New observations of Costa Rican spiders demonstrate several previously unappreciated patterns that suggest that the wasp larvae use ecdysone

Setting off a startling chain of events, a parasitoid wasp can force a spider to weave a special web to suspend the wasp pupa just before it finishes killing its spider host. William Eberhard, staff scientist emeritus at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and Marcelo Gonzaga at the Universidade Federal de Uberlândia in Brazil have assembled wide-ranging evidence that 'zombification' involves hacking existing web-spinning mechanisms by hijacking the spider's own molting hormone, ecdysone.

  

 

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Social Sciences Spain  MADRID 30/04/2019

A study analyzes the academic repercussions of institutional scientific dissemination

By researchers at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) and the Universidad de Valencia (UV)

Communicating research results to the public generates a range of positive effects on the careers of university professors, according to a study carried out by researchers at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) and the Universidad de Valencia (UV), which analyzed the perception of university researchers who have participated in institutional communication campaigns.

  
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Environment Spain  LEÓN 25/04/2019

New perennial brome-grass from Iberian Peninsula named after Picos de Europa National Park

'Bromus picoeuropeanus' belongs to a rather underrepresented on the Iberian Peninsula perennial group within the grass genus 'Bromus'

Picos de Europa National Park has given its name to a new species of perennial bromegrass, discovered in Spain. Bromus picoeuropeanus belongs to a rather underrepresented on the Iberian Peninsula perennial group within the grass genus Bromus, with the new species being just the fourth of all recognised wild species living in the Iberian territory.

  
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Social Sciences Perú  PERú 25/04/2019

Archaeological discovery at the site of Pachacamac

A project found a cluster of burials in foetal positions, wrapped in numerous layers of plant materials, nets and textiles

A cemetery dating back over 1000 years has recently been discovered at the legendary site of Pachacamac, on the Pacific coast of Peru. The project is exploring a new area of this enormous site, and found a cluster of burials in foetal positions, wrapped in numerous layers of plant materials, nets and textiles.

  
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Health Spain  ESPAÑA 22/04/2019

New liquid biopsy technique assess melanoma progression

This is very important in melanoma, since it is an aggressive tumour type that metastasizes in a large number of patients

When the surgeon surgically removes a melanoma, some patients are said to be 'cancer-free' and they do not get additional treatment. However, should the fluid obtained in the drainage implanted after surgery be tested using the liquid biopsy technique rather than be disposed of as medical waste, the test might predict the high or low risk of cancer recurrence.

  
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Environment Panama  PANAMÁ 22/04/2019

Where science meets music: a banjo player listens for the songs of katydids

What do playing the banjo and recording katydids have in common?

A Google-search on ‘Sharon Martinson’, comes up with a curly-haired woman with a banjo, named Wyoming’s Performer of the Year. Keep scrolling down, and you come to a Dartmouth College visiting scholar, a scientist studying katydids in Panama with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI). Both of these individuals are the same person.

  
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Environment Argentina  SAN JUAN 17/04/2019

Argentinian researchers discover an extraordinary 220 million year old animal cemetery in San Juan

In this "bed of bones", there are skulls and dismembered parts of, at least, seven or eight individuals

Argentinian researchers discover an extraordinary 220 million year old animal cemetery in San Juan. It is a surprising accumulation of fossils that would belong to dinosaurs, giant crocodiles and mammalian ancestors. In this "bed of bones", there are skulls and dismembered parts of, at least, seven or eight individuals, although there could be many more.

  
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Health Portugal  PORTUGAL 16/04/2019

Mechanism to form influenza A virus discovered

The study of the team of Maria João Amorim reveals that the selection of the genetic material is made in viral-induced compartments called viral inclusions

The influenza A virus is known to form new strains every year. These strains are the result of small variations occurring at the level of the genome, which cause the virus to become different and no longer recognized by the immune system. A new study by Maria João Amorim's team, from the Gulbenkian Institute of Science, now reveals where the genomes of the influenza A virus are assembled inside infected cells. The results will be published this week in the journal Nature Communications* and may contribute to therapies that prevent or combate new strains of influenza viruses.

  
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Technology Brazil  SãO PAULO 12/04/2019

Clothing with nanotechnology controls heat and odor and repels insects

Brazilian firm has developed nanoparticles that eliminate body odor, reflect solar radiation, and release insect repellent and insecticide in fabric

Functional fabrics that are due to be marketed next summer retain less heat, control body odor, protect against sunlight, and repel mosquitoes such as Aedes aegypti, which transmit pathogens that cause dengue, yellow fever, chikungunya and Zika.

  
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Space Chile  CHILE 10/04/2019

Astronomers capture first image of a black hole

The EHT is the result of years of international collaboration, and offers scientists a new way to study the most extreme objects in the Universe

The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT), a planet-scale array of eight ground-based radio telescopes forged through international collaboration, was designed to capture images of a black hole. Today, in coordinated press conferences across the globe, EHT researchers reveal that they have succeeded, unveiling the first direct visual evidence of a supermassive black hole and its shadow.

  
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Environment Panama  PANAMÁ 10/04/2019

Microbes may fight the epidemic driving some frog species to extinction

A compound produced by Panamanian frog skin bacteria could help resist fungal infections in amphibians and humans worldwide

In the past few decades, a lethal disease caused by the chytrid fungus has decimated amphibian populations worldwide, driving some species to extinction. This is in part due to the types of habitats amphibians often thrive in: humid places, favoring the growth of microorganisms. The chytrid fungus in particular also enjoys cool temperatures, so most amphibian species vulnerable to the epidemic inhabit cloud forests.

  
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Social Sciences Perú  PERú 05/04/2019

Ancient, four-legged whale with otter-like features found along the coast of Peru

The presence of small hooves at the tip of the whale's fingers and toes and its hip and limbs morphology all suggest that this whale could walk on land

Cetaceans, the group including whales and dolphins, originated in south Asia more than 50 million years ago from a small, four-legged, hoofed ancestor. Now, researchers reporting the discovery of an ancient four-legged whale--found in 42.6-million-year-old marine sediments along the coast of Peru--have new insight into whales' evolution and their dispersal to other parts of the world. The findings are reported in the journal Current Biology.

  
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Social Sciences Panama  PANAMÁ 05/04/2019

When in their evolutionary past did the whales begin to migrate?

Fossil whale barnacles may have the answers

Many whales take long journeys each year, spending summers feeding in cold waters and moving to warm tropical waters to breed. One theory suggests that these long-distance migrations originated around 5 million years ago, when ocean productivity became increasingly patchy. But patterns of ancient whale migrations have, until recently, been shrouded in mystery. Scientists from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) and the University of California, Berkeley approached this question with an ingenious technique: barnacles.

  
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Social Sciences Bolivia  BOLIVIA 03/04/2019

Rise of religion pre-dates Incas at Lake Titicaca

Subtítulo de la noticia

An ancient group of people made ritual offerings to supernatural deities near the Island of the Sun in Lake Titicaca, Bolivia, about 500 years earlier than the Incas, according to an international team of researchers. The team's findings suggest that organized religion emerged much earlier in the region than previously thought.

  
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Environment Panama  PANAMÁ 27/03/2019

Innovation by ice cream bean relatives explains biodiversity

The back and forth relationship between insects and their food plants may drive tropical biodiversity evolution according to work on Barro Colorado Island’s 50 hectare plot

Constant pressure from hungry insects forces plants to innovate: producing new chemicals to protect themselves. This is the newest and best explanation for tropical diversity according to results from a study at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute’s Barro Colorado Island Research Station in Panama published in Science magazine.

  
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Technology Spain  MADRID 27/03/2019

The UC3M is coordinating a European project for research and training in 5G mobile networks

18 organisations, research institutes and companies from seven countries are participating, with the aim of analysing the major challenges faced by 5G communications networks

The Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M) is coordinating a European research project, called TeamUp5G, in which 18 organisations, research institutes and companies from seven countries are participating, with the aim of analysing the major challenges faced by 5G communications networks as well as training future European leaders in these technologies.

  
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Health Bolivia  BOLIVIA 21/03/2019

Shorter treatment for Chagas disease could be just as effective, and significantly safer

The results could help remove one of the barriers to treatment scale up and bring new hope for people with Chagas disease

A two-week treatment course for adult patients with chronic Chagas disease showed, when compared to placebo, similar efficacy and significantly fewer side effects than the standard treatment duration of eight weeks, according to the results of a clinical trial in Bolivia led by the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative (DNDi). .

  
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Environment Panama  PANAMÁ 20/03/2019

How new species arise in the sea

Study sheds new light on fundamental question in evolutionary biology

How can a new species form if animals live together and can interbreed? A team from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama and the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research in Kiel, Germany, studied Caribbean reef fishes to find out. Their discovery that natural selection couples the evolution of genes for vision and color pattern is published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution.

  
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Nutrition Chile  CHILE 15/03/2019

Dramatic rainfall changes for key crops expected even with reduced greenhouse gas emissions

Even if humans radically reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the short term, important crop-growing regions of the world can expect changes to rainfall patterns

By 2040, rainfall on wheat, soybean, rice and maize will have changed, even if Paris Agreement emissions targets are met. Projections show parts of Europe, Africa, the Americas and Australia will be drier, while the tropics and north will be wetter.

  
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