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Featured news

15 Jul 2021

The two-thousand-year-old mystery of the havoc-wreaking worm

By Daegan Miller / University of Massachusetts Amherst Office of News and Media Relations Section of a piling attacked by shipworms in Belfast, Maine. Image credit: Barry Goodell / University of Massachusetts Amherst Humans have known for over two thousand years that shipworms, a worm-like mollusk, are responsible for damage to wooden boats, docks, dikes and piers. Yet new research from the University of Massachusetts Amherst published in Frontiers in Microbiology reveals that we still don’t know the most basic thing about them: how they eat. “It’s unbelievable,” says Reuben Shipway, adjunct assistant professor in microbiology at UMass Amherst, research fellow at the Centre for Enzyme Innovation at the University of Portsmouth, UK, and one of the paper’s authors. “The ancient Greeks wrote about them, Christopher Columbus lost his fleet due to what he called ‘the havoc which the worm had wrought,’ and, today, shipworms cause billions of dollars of damage a year.” Read original article. Download original article (pdf) Shipworms also play a key role in mangrove forest ecosystems, found throughout the world’s tropical regions, and are responsible for cycling a huge amount of carbon through the web of life. “Yet,” says Shipway, “we still don’t know how they do what […]

Featured news

24 Jun 2021

Surprising ‘fight or flight’ discovery in sleepwalkers paves way to new understanding of phenomenon

By Colm Gorey, Frontiers science writer Image: New Africa/Shutterstock.com New research published in the open access journal Frontiers investigating the biological mysteries of sleepwalking found the levels of ‘fight or flight’ response in those who wander at night is surprisingly lower than those who sleep soundly. Somnambulism – otherwise known as sleepwalking – is a phenomenon which has fascinated the public and neurologists for decades, but a lot of what causes it remains a mystery. Affecting up to 4% of adults, sleepwalking is a non-rapid-eye movement (NREM) sleep parasomnia that not only gives someone a poor night’s sleep, but also puts them at serious risk of injury and, in some cases, lead to unintended violence against others. The following day can also prove challenging as the sleepwalker will feel unrested and a strong desire to fall asleep (somnolence). Unfortunately for those predisposed to sleepwalking episodes, prolonged sleep deprivation increases both their frequency and complexity, making it harder for them to achieve the deep sleep the body needs to function healthily. Now, in a paper published to Frontiers in Neurology, researchers at the University of Montréal and Montréal Sacred Heart Hospital, Canada aimed to further investigate the hypothesis that sleepwalking is […]

Featured news

24 Jun 2021

A dog’s life: James A Serpell and his investigation into the origin story of mankind’s best friend

By Colm Gorey, Frontiers science writer/Prof James Serpell, University of Pennsylvania Prof James A Serpell, University of Pennsylvania. Image: University of Pennsylvania Two distinctly different stories have been created to explain how fearsome, wild wolves were first domesticated by humans, according to Prof James A Serpell of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wallis Annenberg PetShape Leadership Institute. However, in the open access journal Frontiers, he recently published a paper investigating the truth of these claims. Despite being considered mankind’s best friend, the ancestors of modern dogs were a lot less welcoming to human owners. However, trying to trace the timeline of when early humans first domesticated wild wolves to serve their needs has proven difficult. One of the most prevalent origin stories in scientific literature suggests the ‘commensal scavenger hypothesis’. This posited that wolves essentially domesticated themselves by invading ancient human settlements in search of animal remains and other edible waste discarded by hunter-gatherers. Over time, tolerance by humans gave a selective advantage to the bolder, less fearful wolves, which then diverged from the ancestral population as they adapted to the new scavenging niche. An alternative hypothesis – sometimes referred to as the pet keeping or cross-species adoption hypothesis […]

Featured news

22 Jun 2021

Twin study is first to reveal common genetic risk factors for PTSD and migraine

By Conn Hastings, science writer Image credit: LanaG/Shutterstock.com While scientists have known that PTSD and migraine often co-occur, no one had studied this link before now. A new study by the open access publisher Frontiers on identical twins investigates the genetic basis for both migraine and PTSD. It reveals epigenetic changes that are shared by PTSD and migraine, suggesting that similar environmental risk factors are at play in both conditions. The findings could help researchers to develop new treatments. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and migraine often co-occur, but researchers knew relatively little about how or why this happens. A new study in Frontiers in Neuroscience is the first to investigate if the conditions have a common genetic basis. By studying identical twins, where one twin in each pair lives with PTSD or migraines and the other twin does not, the researchers found common genes that may play a role in both conditions. These genes may help to explain why the conditions co-occur, and could reveal new treatment targets for both. PTSD is a psychiatric disorder that typically occurs after a traumatic experience, such as a life-threatening event. Most people will experience a traumatic event at some point in their lives, […]

Featured news

18 Jun 2021

Surprising spider hair discovery may inspire stronger adhesives

By K.E.D. Coan, science writer Cupiennius salei wandering spider. Image credit: Kevin Wells Photography / Shutterstock.com A recent study by the open access publisher Frontiers shows the first evidence that the individual hair-like structures that form spiders’ adhesive feet are far more diverse than expected. By looking at a sample set of these hairs, researchers have found that they have varied shapes as well as attachment properties. Understanding how spiders climb a wide range of surfaces may help scientists design new and better adhesives. Just how do spiders walk straight up — and even upside-down across — so many different types of surfaces? Answering this question could open up new opportunities for creating powerful, yet reversible, bioinspired adhesives. Scientists have been working to better understand spider feet for the past several decades. Now, a new study in Frontiers in Mechanical Engineering is the first to show that the characteristics of the hair-like structures that form the adhesive feet of one species — the wandering spider Cupiennius salei — are more variable than previously thought. “When we started the experiments, we expected to find a specific angle of best adhesion and similar adhesive properties for all of the individual attachment hairs,” […]