Knowledge Update

London, Dec 22 (IANS) British researchers have developed a breakthrough technique that uses sound rather than light to see inside live cells, a finding that has potential application in stem-cell transplants and cancer diagnosis.

The new sub-optical phonon (sound) imaging technique uses shorter-than-optical wavelengths of sound and could even rival the optical super-resolution techniques. 

It provides invaluable information about the structure, mechanical properties and behaviour of individual living cells at a scale not achieved before.

"Like ultrasound on the body, ultrasound in the cells causes no damage and requires no toxic chemicals to work. Because of this, we can see inside cells that one day might be put back into the body, for instance as stem-cell transplants," said Matt Clark, Professor at the University of Nottingham in Britain.

In optical microscopy, which uses light (photons), the size of the smallest object you can see or the resolution is limited by the wavelength.

For biological specimens, the wavelength cannot go smaller than that of blue light because the energy carried on photons of light in the ultraviolet and shorter wavelengths is so high it can destroy the bonds that hold biological molecules together damaging the cells.

Also, the fluorescent dyes used in optical super-resolution imaging are often toxic and it requires huge amounts of light and time to observe and reconstruct an image which is damaging to cells.

However, sound does not have a high-energy payload. This uses smaller wavelengths and enables to see smaller things and get higher resolution images without damaging the cell biology, the researchers noted.

The study is published in the journal Scientific Reports.

New York, Dec 22 (IANS) A distinctive neural signature found in the brains of people with dyslexia may explain why they have difficulty in learning to read and adapting to sensory inputs, according to a new study.

The brain typically adapts rapidly to sensory input, such as the sound of a person's voice or images of faces and objects, as a way to make processing more efficient. 

But, the study found that for individuals with dyslexia, the adaptation was on average nearly half.

In dyslexic people, the brain has a diminished ability to acclimate to a repeated input -- a trait known as neural adaptation. 

For example, when dyslexic students see the same word repeatedly, brain regions involved in reading do not show the same adaptation seen in typical readers.

This suggests that the brain's plasticity, which underpins its ability to learn new things, is reduced, said John Gabrieli, professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US.

"It's a difference in the brain that's not about reading per se, but it's a difference in perceptual learning that's pretty broad," Gabrieli added.

For the study, the team used MRI technique where the brains of young adults with and without reading difficulties were scanned as they listened to a series of words read by either four different speakers or a single speaker.

The results revealed that the dyslexic participants showed much less adaptation to hearing words said by a single speaker.

Further, for dyslexics the brain activity remained high while listening to a consistent voice and not to multiple voices, suggesting that they did not adapt as much. 

Again, when researchers looked at adaptation to visual stimuli, they saw much less adaptation in participants with dyslexia.

"This suggests that adaptation deficits in dyslexia are general, across the whole brain," noted Tyler Perrachione, assistant professor at Boston University in Massachusetts, US. 

The study appears in the journal Neuron.

​Washington, Dec 22 (IANS) A NASA satellite instrument orbiting Earth that can see through fog, clouds and darkness has given scientists their first continuous look at the boom-and-bust, or peak and decline, cycles of phytoplankton - foundation of the ocean's food web vital for life to exist on earth.

The results showed that small, environmental changes in polar food webs significantly influence the boom-and-bust cycles of phytoplankton. 

The researchers believe that the findings - published in the journal Nature Geoscience - will supply important data for ecosystem management, commercial fisheries and our understanding of the interactions between Earth's climate and key ocean ecosystems.

"It's really important for us to understand what controls these boom-and-bust cycles, and how they might change in the future so we can better evaluate the implications on all other parts of the food web," said Michael Behrenfeld, a marine plankton expert at Oregon State University in Corvallis, US.

Coastal economies and wildlife depend on what happens to tiny green plants, or phytoplankton, at the base of the ocean food chain. Commercial fisheries, marine mammals and birds all depend on phytoplankton blooms.

Phytoplankton also influence Earth's carbon cycle. Through photosynthesis, they absorb a great deal of the carbon dioxide dissolved in the upper ocean and produce oxygen, which is vital for life on Earth. This reduces the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

NASA's Cloud-Aerosol LIdar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP), an instrument aboard the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation (CALIPSO) satellite launched in 2006, uses a laser to take measurements. 

Scientists used the instrument to continuously monitor plankton in polar regions from 2006 to 2015.

"CALIOP was a game-changer in our thinking about ocean remote sensing from space," said Chris Hostetler, a research scientist at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

"We were able to study the workings of the high-latitude ocean ecosystem during times of year when we were previously completely blind," Hostetler noted.

​New Delhi, Dec 20 (IANS) Flock, a team messenger for businesses, on Tuesday launched world's first chat operating system "FlockOS" which allows developers to build customised apps, bots and integrations on Flock.

​Mumbai, Dec 20 (IANS) Volatility in the equity markets notwithstanding, the mutual funds industry is confident of attracting new investors and hopes to benefit from the macro-changes post-demonetisation, said a leading industry player.

​New York, Dec 20 (IANS) If you are not physically with your family this Christmas, Facebook Messenger's latest group chat feature rolled out on Monday can mitigate the distance.

​New York, Dec 20 (IANS) Inspired by Iron Man's artificial assistant (AI) "Jarvis" and his capabilities, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has coded and developed his own "Jarvis" to run his home.

New York, Dec 20 (IANS) Popular world building game Minecraft is now available for purchase on the tvOS App Store with seven pieces of downloadable content which includes the latest Ender update, a media report said. All seven pieces of the downloadable content for the "Apple TV edition" of Minecraft are included in the $19.99 price, including the Holiday 2015, Town Folk, and City Folk skin packs, as well as the Plastic, Natural, Cartoon and Festive 2016 mash-ups, Apple Insider reported. The new Ender Update, which brings a whole bunch of new single-player content to the experience, is also available for free to Minecraft Pocket players on iOS. The new Festive Mash-Up Pack 2016 can be purchased for $3.99. Minecraft is also available for Mac for $26.95 and on iOS for $6.99. Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook first announced Minecraft was coming to Apple TV in MacBook Pro event in October. Minecraft, a sandbox video game originally created by Swedish game designer Markus "Notch" Persson and later developed and published by Mojang, was first released in 2009 and was ultimately purchased by Microsoft in September of 2014. The game allows players to build in a procedurally generated world either in a game-oriented survival mode, or in a free-build mode with no constraints on materials.

New Delhi, Dec 20 (IANS) Adding another product to its mirrorless camera line-up, Sony India on Tuesday launched its new flagship APS-C sensor camera, the alpha6500 with 4D FOCUS system that can focus on a subject in 0.05 seconds. Similar to alpha6300 model, the new camera features 425 phase detection autofocus points -- the world's highest number of AF points on any interchangeable lens camera, the company said in a statement. The alpha6500 features Sony's in-camera five-axis optical image stabilisation, making it the first Sony APS-C sensor camera to offer all of the benefits of advanced in-body stabilisation, including a shutter speed advantage of approximately five steps. The model comes equipped with touch screen functionality, allowing users to lock focus on a subject simply by touching it on the screen. The alpha6500 can shoot images at up to 11 frames per second with continuous autofocus and exposure tracking. The camera also offers internal 4K movie recording, as it can shoot 4K (3840 x 2160p) video in the Super 35mm format on the full width of the image sensor. It supports the XAVC S codec during video shooting, which records at a high bit rate of up to 100 Mbps during 4K recording and 50 Mbps during Full HD shooting. The alpha6500 features an APS-C sized 24.2 MP12 Exmor CMOS sensor that works together with a BIONZ X image processor. It is Wi-Fi, QR and NFC compatible and offers location data acquisition via Bluetooth. The alpha6500 camera is available in all Sony Centres, Alpha flagship stores and major electronic stores across India for Rs 119,990 (body only).

​New York, Dec 20 (IANS) Rumours that Apple was no longer keen on the desktop business because of the emergence of portable market has been discarded by CEO Tim Cook, saying new desktops were on the way. According to a report in TechCrunch on Tuesday that cited a posting by Apple CEO to an employee message board, the tech giant assures that "great desktops" are upcoming. "Some folks in the media have raised the question about whether we are committed to desktops," Cook wrote. "If there is any doubt about that with our teams, let me be very clear -- we have great desktops in our roadmap. Nobody should worry about that," Cook added. Answering to a question, Cook said the Mac desktop was very strategic for Apple. "It is unique compared to the notebook because you can pack a lot more performance in a desktop -- the largest screens, the most memory and storage, a greater variety of I/O, and fastest performance. So there are many different reasons why desktops are really important, and in some cases critical, to people," wrote Cook. Cook said Apple's greatest differentiator was their culture and people who were embedded with "change the world" attitude and boldness that "good is not good enough". "They are the foundation by which everything else comes about. Without great people and a great environment that people can live in, we would not have intellectual property. We would not have the best products. We would not have the inventions or features I mentioned earlier," Cook noted.