Knowledge Update

New York, Nov 4 (IANS) Neural activation patterns in the brain remain same when we read different languages like English or Portuguese, finds a study.

"This tells us that, for the most part, the language we happen to learn to speak does not change the organisation of the brain," said Marcel Just, Professor at Carnegie Mellon University, in the US, in the study published in the journal NeuroImage. 

"Semantic information is represented in the same place in the brain and the same pattern of intensities for everyone. Knowing this means that brain-to-brain or brain-to-computer interface can probably be the same for speakers of all languages," Just added.

For the study, 15 native Portuguese speakers -- eight were bilingual in Portuguese and English -- read 60 sentences in Portuguese while in a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner. 

The university developed computational model was able to predict which sentences the participants were reading in Portuguese, based only on activation patterns.

The resulting brain images showed that the activation patterns for the 60 sentences were in the same brain locations and at similar intensity levels for both English and Portuguese sentences.

Additionally, the results revealed the activation patterns could be grouped into four semantic categories, depending on the sentence's focus: people, places, actions and feelings.

"The cross-language prediction model demonstrated a meta-language prediction capability from neural signals across people, languages and bilingual status," said Ying Yang, researcher at the Carnegie Mellon University.

New York, Nov 4 (IANS) Soaking up sun may help you to keep level of emotional distress stable, finds a new study.

"When it comes to your mental and emotional health, the amount of time between sunrise and sunset is the weather variable that matters most. This applies to the clinical population at large, not just those diagnosed with Seasonal Affective Disorder," said Mark Beecher, Professor at the Brigham Young University, US.

The study analysed many meteorological variables such as wind chill, rainfall, solar irradiance, wind speed, temperature and more. The weather data could be analysed down to the minute in the exact area where the clients lived. 

The study focused on a clinical population instead of a general population and used a mental health treatment outcome measure to examine several aspects of psychological distress, rather than relying on suicide attempts or online diaries.

According to the study published in the Journal of Affective Disorders, one thing that was really significant was the amount of time between sunrise and sunset.

"On a rainy day or a more polluted day, people assume that they'd have more distress. But we didn't see that. We looked at solar irradiance, or the amount of sunlight that actually hits the ground. We tried to take into account cloudy days, rainy days, pollution but they washed out," Beecher added.

​London, Nov 4 (IANS) British scientists have identified the reason behind what makes a song so catchy that it gets stuck in our head and goes on playing in an endless loop -- known as experiencing involuntary musical imagery or earworms.

Findings of a study, published in the journal Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity and the Arts, showed that songs that are usually faster and have a fairly generic and easy-to-remember melody but have some unique intervals such as leaps or repetitions that set them apart from the "average pop song" get stuck in our head.

"Our findings show that you can, to some extent, predict which songs are going to get stuck in people's heads based on the song's melodic content," said lead author Kelly Jakubowski from Durham University in Britain.

In addition to a common melodic shape, the other crucial ingredient in the earworm formula is an unusual interval structure in the song such as some unexpected leaps or more repeated notes than you would expect to hear in the "average pop song". 

"The study could help aspiring song-writers or advertisers write a jingle that everyone will remember for days or months afterwards," Jakubowski added.

In the study, the team asked 3,000 people for their most frequent earworm tunes and compared these to tunes which had never been named as earworms in the database but were a match in terms of popularity and how recently they had been in Britain's music charts.

The melodic features of the earworm and non-earworm tunes were then analysed and compared. Songs were limited to popular music genres, such as pop, rock, rap, rhythm and blues.

New York, Nov 4 (IANS) Genetically removing a protein or using drug to target it can help reverse diabetic insulin resistance and glucose intolerance, suggests new research.

By binding to insulin receptors on cells, the protein Galectin-3 (Gal3) prevents insulin from attaching to the receptors, resulting in cellular insulin resistance. 

"This study puts Gal3 on the map for insulin resistance and diabetes in mouse model," said senior author of the study Jerrold Olefsky, Professor at University of California - San Diego School of Medicine.

When people have insulin resistance, glucose builds up in the blood instead of being absorbed by the cells, leading to Type-2 diabetes or prediabetes, according to National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, part of US National Institutes of Health (NIH).

"Our findings suggest that Gal3 inhibition in people could be an effective anti-diabetic approach," Olefsky said.

The team showed that by genetically removing Gal3 or using pharmaceutical inhibitors to target it, insulin sensitivity and glucose tolerance could be returned to normal, even among older mice. 

Olefsky and other researchers have been studying how chronic tissue inflammation leads to insulin resistance in Type-2 diabetes. 

In the current study, published in the journal Cell, researchers explained that inflammation requires macrophages -- specialised cells that destroy targeted cells. 

In obese adipose tissue (fat), for example, 40 per cent of cells are macrophages.

Macrophages in turn secrete Gal3, which then acts as a signaling protein attracting more macrophages, thus resulting in the production of even more Gal3.

Furthermore, investigators identified bone marrow-derived macrophages as the source of Gal3 that leads to insulin resistance. 

​London, Nov 3 (IANS) Larger violation of social norms in public spaces may not lead to stronger reaction from public than smaller violations, finds a new study.

The research team investigated how people respond to large and small violations of social norms in public spaces. 

The study published in the journal Nature Communications refutes the assumption that larger violations tend to be punished more severely than smaller offences. 

The researchers staged small violations (littering a coffee cup) and large violations (littering a coffee cup and bag of trash) at train stations in Germany and recorded how travellers responded in more than 800 trials. 

The implicit assumption was that bystanders would react more strongly if more garbage was littered, hence the norm violation was greater. 

However, the size of the violation did not affect the likelihood that the litterer would be reprimanded -- nor did it affect the intensity of the reprimand.

Travellers have more negative emotions toward the larger violation and felt that it should be reprimanded more severely. 

Despite these emotional responses, however, the surveyed individuals admitted that they would be reluctant to confront or punish such violations in real-life settings.

The scientists explain this reluctance with the perceived risk of retaliation by the norm violator. The greater the norm violation, the greater the retaliation might be. 

Bystanders feared that in cases of a more severe social norm violation, the person's reaction would be stronger when confronted or reprimanded. 

"The study shows that social self-regulation has its limits. Up to a certain point, we reprimand each other for bad behaviour. But in cases of more extreme norm violations, social self-regulation no longer works and we need authorities, police and security personnel," said Bettina Rockenbach, Professor at the University of Cologne, Germany.

​New York, Nov 2 (IANS) Making canola oil part of your diet may help you burn extra abdominal fat in less than four weeks, finds a new study.

"Visceral, or abdominal, fat increases the risk for cardiovascular disease, and is also associated with increased risk for conditions such as metabolic syndrome and diabetes. Monounsaturated fats in canola oil decreases fat that has adverse health effects," said Penny M. Kris-Etherton, Professor at the Pennsylvania State University, US.

For the study, the researchers tested the effect of five different vegetable oil blended in 101 participants' diets through a controlled study. 

The subjects were randomly assigned to follow for four weeks each of the treatment oil diets: conventional canola, high-oleic acid canola, high-oleic acid canola with DHA (a type of omega-3 fatty acid), corn/safflower and flax/safflower. 

After each four-week diet period, participants were given a four-week break before starting the next diet period.

All of the participants had abdominal obesity, or increased waist circumference, and were either at risk for or had metabolic syndrome -- a group of conditions including obesity, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, high blood sugar, low HDL (also known as good cholesterol) and excess body fat around the waist.

When participants consumed conventional canola oil or high-oleic acid canola oil for just four weeks, they lost abdominal fat.

The researchers found that after one month of adhering to diets that included canola oil, participants had 11 kgs, or a quarter pound, less belly fat than they did before the diet. 

They also found that the weight lost from the mid-section did not redistribute elsewhere in the body. 

In order to incorporate canola oil into the diet the researchers suggested using it when sauteing foods, in baking, adding it to a smoothie and in salad dressings.

The researchers presented their study at The Obesity Society's Annual Scientific Meeting.

​New York, Nov 3 (IANS) The constant feeling of being lonely and isolated may be due to the increased amyloid levels in the brain and can be indicative of preclinical Alzheimer's disease, researchers have found.

Loneliness -- characterised by subtle feelings of social detachment -- may be associated with early brain changes in preclinical Alzheimer's disease, prior to mild cognitive impairment.

The findings showed that higher brain amyloid burden was associated with more frequent feelings of isolation, being left out, and lacking companionship, independent of sociodemographic factors, objective measures of social network, depressive and anxiety symptoms.

"The study reports a novel association of loneliness and cortical amyloid burden in cognitively normal adults and present evidence for loneliness as a neuropsychiatric symptom relevant to preclinical Alzheimer's disease," said Nancy J. Donovan, M.D., of Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard in Boston.

Emotional and behavioural symptoms in cognitively normal older people may be direct manifestations of Alzheimer's disease (AD) pathophysiology at the preclinical stage, prior to the onset of mild cognitive impairment, the study stated. 

For the study, the team included 43 women and 36 men with an average age of about 76 years. Out of these, 22 (28 per cent) were carriers of the genetic risk factor apolipoprotein, and 25 (32 per cent) were in the amyloid-positive group based on volume in imaging. 

The participants' average loneliness score was 5.3 on a scale of 3 to 12.

Higher cortical amyloid levels were associated with greater loneliness after controlling for age, sex, genetic risk, socioeconomic status, depression, anxiety and social network. 

The participants in the amyloid-positive group were 7.5 times more likely to be classified as lonely than non-lonely compared with individuals in the amyloid-negative group. 

The association between high amyloid levels and loneliness was also stronger in APOE 4 carriers than in non-carriers.

"The study will inform new research into the neurobiology of loneliness and other socioemotional changes in late life and may enhance early detection and intervention research in Alzheimer's disease," Donovan said in the study appearing online in the journal JAMA Psychiatry.

New York, Nov 3 (IANS) US researchers have identified a possible trigger of chronic inflammation in people with diabetes which could be targeted for preventing complications such as heart attacks, strokes, kidney problems and other related health issues.

"The number of people with diabetes has quadrupled worldwide over the last 20 years," said Clay F. Semenkovich, Professor at the Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, in the US. 

Too much fat in the diet promotes insulin resistance by spurring chronic inflammation. 

But blocking the production of fat inside immune cells may prevent inflammation in people with diabetes and even in other conditions, such as arthritis and cancer, in which chronic inflammation plays a role. 

This could have a profound impact on health, Semenkovich added.

For the study, Semenkovich's team made genetically altered mice that could not make the enzyme for fatty acid synthase (FAS) in immune cells called macrophages. 

Without the enzyme, it was impossible for the mice to synthesise fatty acids, a normal part of cell metabolism.

"We were surprised to find that the mice were protected from diet-induced diabetes. They did not develop the insulin resistance and diabetes that normally would have been induced by a high-fat diet," said Xiaochao Wei from the Washington University. 

Further, through a series of experiments in the animals and in cell cultures, the researchers found that if macrophages could not synthesise fat from within, the external membranes of those cells could not respond to fat from outside the cells. That prevented the cells from contributing to inflammation.

But, eliminating inflammation altogether is not the answer to preventing diabetic complications because inflammation is also vital for clearing infectious pathogens from the body and helps wounds heal, Semenkovich said.

The study is published online in the journal Nature.

​London, Nov 3 (IANS) Consuming foods rich in proteins such as lean meat, fish, legumes and almonds can significantly reduce fat accumulated in the liver within six weeks, researchers say.

The findings showed that liver fat levels dropped by up to 48 per cent after eating high-protein diet regardless of whether it came from a plant or animal source, and also prevented the occurrence of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease -- a very common disorder where excess fat accumulates in the liver -- especially in people with diabetes.

"When left untreated, fatty liver is an important step progress to Type 2 diabetes and can develop into liver cirrhosis, which can have life-threatening effects," said lead author Andreas F.H. Pfeiffer, Endocrinologist at the German Institute of Human Nutrition Potsdam-Rehbruecke (DifE), in Germany. 

Further, the study showed that high-protein diet caused favourable changes in the liver and lipid metabolism, improved insulin sensitivity and led to a significant reduction in the hormone fibroblast growth factor 21 in the blood.

For the study, the researchers investigated the effects of two high-protein diets -- plant- or animal-based -- on the metabolism of 37 female and male subjects between the ages of 49 and 78 years suffering from Type 2 diabetes and, in most cases, from fatty liver. 

The main source for the plant protein group were foods such as noodles or bread that were enriched with pea protein. The animal protein group consumed lean milk products as well as white meat and fish as protein sources.

The results showed that no negative effect was observed on renal function or glucose metabolism and all study participants benefited from the high-protein diet. 

The liver fat content decreased significantly, in half of the study participants by more than 50 per cent. 

The study was published in the journal Gastroenterology.

​Washington, Nov 3 (IANS) US space agency NASA has completed the construction of the world's largest space telescope, after almost two decades.

The James Webb Space Telescope is considered to be the successor to NASA's 26-year-old Hubble Space Telescope, the agency announced on Wednesday.

NASA said an Ariane 5 rocket will launch it from French Guiana in October 2018, Xinhua news agency reported.

"Today, we're celebrating the fact that our telescope is finished and we're about to prove that it works," Nobel laureate and Webb's senior project scientist John Mather said during a news conference posted on Youtube, adding that the new telescope will open up "a whole new territory of astronomy".

"We will see things we have not seen before because this telescope is much more powerful than even the great Hubble telescope," Mather said, adding "To give you some perspective about what we can do with it. If you were a bumblebee at a distance of the moon, we will be able to see you, both by your reflective sunlight and by thermal radiation and heat you emitted."

According to NASA, its engineers and technicians on Wednesday successfully completed the first important optical measurement of Webb's fully assembled primary mirror, known as a Centre of Curvature test, to measure the mirror's shape.

Next, the 6.5-metre primary mirror consisting of 18 hexagonal mirrors will go through a series of rigorous tests that will simulate the violent sound and vibration environments the telescope will experience inside its rocket on its way out into space.

The Centre of Curvature test will be repeated after the launch environment testing and the results compared to find if there are any changes or damages to the optical system.

NASA said the Webb telescope will be used to observe distant objects in the universe, provide images of the first galaxies formed and see unexplored planets around distant stars.

The $8.7 billion project is led by NASA but also supported by the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency.