If you’ve stayed in a bath or pool long enough, you’ve likely noticed your skin, especially your fingers, become wrinkly or pruny. This is caused by your blood vessels contracting. When blood vessels narrow, the skin’s area is reduced, and your skin forms wrinkles. While your pruny fingers may seem off-putting, this evolutionary advantage actually helps you grip things easier underwater, compared to non-pruny hands. However, as your fingers wrinkle underwater, do they always wrinkle in the same pattern? That was the question on one young student’s mind. And their question inspired a new study, published in the Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials. Why Our Skin Gets WrinklyImages of topographical skin wrinkles overlaid on each other from the two different time points, 24 h apart, with opacity levels of0%,50%,100%.Guy German, an associate professor at Binghamton University and a faculty member at the Thomas J. Watson College of Engineering and Applied Science’s Department of Biomedical Engineering had published several studies on human skin, including a 2020 study that focuses on what happens to the skin when it’s exposed to water for long periods of time. In a 2023 article with The Conversation, German answered a young reader's question about why our skin gets wrinkly in water. The answer to that question, however, sparked another. “A student asked, ‘Yeah, but do the wrinkles always form in the same way?’ And I thought: I haven’t the foggiest clue!” said German in a press release. “So it led to this research to find out.”Read More: A Damaging Hand Disease Has Neanderthal RootsSame Wrinkles on Pruny Fingers  Representative wrinkle pairs established and numbered acrossDay 0 and24+ hr later on a subject's ring finger. Black curves denote clearly paired wrinkle morphologies. Red curves denote inconsistent wrinkles between the two time points.To answer the question, German and Rachel Laytin, a biomedical engineering graduate from Binghamton University, submerged research participants' fingers in water for 30 minutes and took photos of the pruny fingers. After 24 hours, they repeated the same process with the same participants. After analyzing the photos, the research team found that the participant has the same wrinkly pattern after each submersion. “Blood vessels don’t change their position much — they move around a bit, but in relation to other blood vessels, they’re pretty static,” German said in a press release. “That means the wrinkles should form in the same manner, and we proved that they do.”During this study, German and Laytin made an additional discovery. “We’ve heard that wrinkles don’t form in people who have median nerve damage in their fingers,” German said in a press release. “One of my students told us, ‘I’ve got median nerve damage in my fingers.’ So we tested him — no wrinkles!”Advancing Forensic ScienceWith this new research, not only does that student have an answer to their question, but there may be a way to use this data to help assist in forensic science. This new advancement could help forensic teams better identify crime scene fingerprints and bodies with prolonged water exposure. German can relate to the possibility of these new methods, as his father is a retired police officer in the U.K. who experienced some of these forensic setbacks. “Biometrics and fingerprints are built into my brain,” he said in a press release. “I always think about this sort of stuff, because it’s fascinating.”German is excited to continue his research and answer more of his students’ questions. “I feel like a kid in a candy store, because there’s so much science here that I don’t know. We thank the people at The Conversation and the wonderful question they asked us, because it does create cool new science,” German concluded in a press release. This article is not offering medical advice and should be used for informational purposes only.Read More: Why Do We Have Fingerprints?Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials. On the repeatability of wrinkling topography patterns in the fingers of water immersed human skinExtreme Mechanics Letters. Mechanical, compositional, and microstructural changes caused by human skin macerationAs the marketing coordinator at Discover Magazine, Stephanie Edwards interacts with readers across Discover's social media channels and writes digital content. Offline, she is a contract lecturer in English & Cultural Studies at Lakehead University, teaching courses on everything from professional communication to Taylor Swift, and received her graduate degrees in the same department from McMaster University. You can find more of her science writing in Lab Manager and her short fiction in anthologies and literary magazine across the horror genre. #your #fingers #wrinkle #same #pattern

Fine soil particles once encased in ice were discovered in a cave about 20,000 years after the frozen sheet melted. This sediment is significant both for what it tells us about the past and what it could forecast for the future, according to an article in the journal Nature Geoscience.The sediment found in an Alaskan cave was likely once part of the Cordilleran Ice Sheet, which melted at the end of the last Ice Age. Most of that ice — along with the sediment contained within it — ended up in the oceans. Finding traces of it on land is extremely rare.“This is the first evidence of land-based meltwater events from this ice-sheet,” Paul Wilcox, a geologist at the University of Innsbruck, Austria, and an author of the paper, said in a press release. “In a way, the cave acted as a kind of time capsule that preserved the sediments for thousands of years.”Preserving Ice Age LifeTwo aspects of the sediment help tell the story of Ice Age life. First, scientists detected plant pollen within the particles. That provides indirect evidence of biological refuges — even during peak ice coverage “in which plants could survive even under extreme climatic conditions,” Daniela Festi, a pollen researcher with GeoSphere Austria and an author of the paper, said in a press release.The sediment also contained quartz — convenient because the presence of that mineral makes determining the particles’ age possible using a method that can detect when it was last exposed to sunlight. But more importantly, it also shows that the sediment must have been transported quite a distance before being deposited, since the cave is in a limestone region, where quartz would generally be scarce or non-existent.Glacial Meltwater and Climate ChangesDating the sediment allows scientists to look to the past to forecast the future. Although the Cordilleran Ice Sheet almost certainly melted due to a change in the Earth’s position relative to the sun, that alone doesn’t account for the ice’s backward retreat from western North America. Other forces must have contributed.Data from the last Ice Age show signs that glacial meltwater repeatedly pulsed into the North Atlantic. That cycle likely further disrupted the region’s heat and contributed to further warming.“This supports the hypothesis that climate changes in the Northeast Pacific were a prerequisite for the shifts observed in the North Atlantic,” Wilcox said in the release.Understanding how these events happened over space and time could inform us about the future. Continued warming could lead to similar increased freshwater flowing into the oceans. That, in turn, could disrupt circulation systems that impact temperature.The researchers plan to investigate additional Alaskan caves and compare the sediment archives to each other. That could provide a more detailed picture of the past ice sheet’s melting dynamics — and perhaps provide a glimpse into how a similar event could affect climate in the future.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Before joining Discover Magazine, Paul Smaglik spent over 20 years as a science journalist, specializing in U.S. life science policy and global scientific career issues. He began his career in newspapers, but switched to scientific magazines. His work has appeared in publications including Science News, Science, Nature, and Scientific American. #sediment #last #ice #age #found

Prostate cancer is one of the primary health scares for aging men, but thankfully, improved testing could soon be on the way. A simple spit test that can be taken at home is among the most promising methods for detecting prostate cancer, which an estimated 1 in 8 men are diagnosed with during their lifetime. In an April 2025 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, researchers demonstrated the success of calculating prostate cancer risk from saliva. The study showed that a spit test can identify prostate cancer more accurately than prostate-specific antigentests, which have come under scrutiny for their tendency to produce unreliable results. Success of the PRS Saliva TestThe study assessed 6,142 European men between the ages of 55 and 69, extracting germline DNA from their saliva. Using the saliva, researchers were able to find a polygenic risk score; this metric denotes someone’s risk of developing a disease — in this case, prostate cancer — based on the genetic variants they contain. Those with a PRS in the 90th percentile or higher were invited for further screening, since a higher score indicates the inheritance of many genetic variations that could raise the risk of developing prostate cancer. A total of 468 participants with exceptionally high PRS underwent MRI scans and prostate biopsies; 187 of these menwere diagnosed with prostate cancer as a result. The Flaws of PSA Blood TestsUnlike the PRS test using saliva, PSA blood tests can fall short in several ways. These tests measure prostate-specific antigen, a protein produced by both normal and malignant cells from the prostate gland. An initial PSA test is often recommended to men around age 50 who have an average risk of developing prostate cancer, or men around age 40 who have a high risk due to family history. The American Cancer Society states that men with a PSA of less than 2.5 ng/mL may only need to be retested every two years, whereas testing should be done every year for those with a higher PSA.Although PSA tests are still commonplace in prostate cancer screenings, they don’t always produce the desired outcome for patients. According to a press statement on the new study, PSA tests falsely indicate “prostate cancer in men three out of four times.” False-positives derived from the tests could lead patients to seek unnecessary medical procedures. A separate 2022 study found that age, alcohol intake, and the presence of urinary tract infections were commonly associated with false positives in PSA tests. Another downfall of PSA tests is that they often detect other cancers that normally grow slowly and would never show symptoms of concern.The new study showed that PRS spit tests, on the other hand, are able to catch a higher proportion of aggressive cancers that are likely to spread. Expanding Knowledge on Prostate CancerResearchers are now working to develop a version of the test that can detect more prostate cancer risk variants in other populations, such as those with Asian and African ancestry. They will also continue with additional trials to compare the success rate of spit tests with MRI scans and PSA tests. "Early detection of cancers significantly increases the chance of a cure. With prostate cancer cases expected to double by 2040, it's crucial to establish a robust way of picking up clinically significant cases of prostate cancer at an earlier stage,” said Kristian Helin, Chief Executive of The Institute of Cancer Research in London. “The current PSA test often leads to unnecessary treatments and, more concerningly, fails to detect some cancers. There is an urgent need for a better screening test. This research represents a promising advancement towards that goal and underscores the life-saving potential of genetic testing."This article is not offering medical advice and should be used for informational purposes only.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:American Cancer Society. American Cancer Society Recommendations for Prostate Cancer Early DetectionNational Cancer Institue. Prostate-Specific AntigenTestNew England Journal of Medicine. Assessment of a Polygenic Risk Score in Screening for Prostate CancerJack Knudson is an assistant editor at Discover with a strong interest in environmental science and history. Before joining Discover in 2023, he studied journalism at the Scripps College of Communication at Ohio University and previously interned at Recycling Today magazine. #simple #spit #test #could #reveal

Australia and South America weren’t always so separate. At one time, many millions of years ago, these two continents were connected, along with others, in the southern supercontinent of Gondwana. Gondwana was a warm, forested place — a perfect home for tree frogs. In fact, the supercontinent fostered the common ancestor of the Australian pelodryadid frogs and the South American phyllomedusid frogs that are still seen, stuck to leaves and branches, today. But when did this common tree frog ancestor appear, and when did it diverge into these two separate frog families?A new study published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology provides some answers. Identifying a new species of Australian tree frog from the Early Eocene around 55 million years ago, the study suggests that the Australian and South American tree frog lineages split apart at around that time, too, or even earlier than that. All in all, the study rethinks the timeline of tree frog evolution and suggests that these lineages are a lot older than traditionally thought.The Australian-South American Frog SeparationTo be sure, the new study isn’t the first to investigate the divergence of the Australian and South American tree frogs. By following the genetic transformations of these two families over time, prior molecular studies have shown, for instance, that the pelodryadids and the phyllomedusids split apart approximately 33 million years ago.The fossil record has supported that timing in the past, with the earliest Australian tree frog fossils previously appearing in Australia after 33 million years ago, in the Late Oligocene and the Early Miocene epochs about 26 and 23 million years ago. But the new species undermines this timeline, suggesting that the separation of Australian and South American tree frogs actually occurred around 55 million years ago at a minimum, or at least around 22 million years earlier than previously thought. The new species, named Litoria tylerantiqua, is now the earliest identified species of Australian tree frog there is. Represented by fossilized pelvic bones from the Murgon fossil site in Queensland, Australia, the pelodryadid species is approximately 55 million years old, or about 30 million years older than any other Australian tree frog found in the fossil record. “While molecular studies are important for understanding the evolutionary relationships of different groups of animals, these studies should be calibrated using knowledge from the fossil record,” said Roy Farman, the lead study author and a lecturer at the University of New South Wales, according to a press release. “In this case, the fossil record provides a more accurate time for separation of the southern world’s tree frogs.”Tree Frogs, Fossilized and PickledThree fossilized iliarepresent a new species of Australian tree frog, Litoria tylerantiqua.To confirm the species’ identification as a pelodryadid, the study authors compared the pelvises of the new species with the pelvises of pickled frogs, including Australian and South American tree frogs, from museums in Australia. “We were able to determine from the shape of the fossil ilia — one of three bones that make up each side of the pelvis — that this new Murgon species of frog is more closely related to the Australian tree frogsthan the South American tree frogs,” Farman said in the release. Though the structure of the pelvic bones from the new species was relatively simple to study, the structure of the bones from the pickled species was not. “We had a real problem at the start of this study,” Farman added in the release, because the bones of the pickled specimens were “invisible,” being obscured by the specimens’ soft tissues. “Museums understandably want to ensure these often unique or rare pickled specimens remain intact for molecular studies because DNA can be obtained from their soft tissues,” Farman said in the release. “This meant that instead ofthese specimens, we needed instead to make CT scans of them, enabling us to create 3D models of their otherwise invisible skeletons.”The new species is named after the Australian herpetologist Michael Tyler, who was famous for studying the fossil record of Australian frogs and toads. “It is only fitting to name Australia’s earliest tree frog inof a man who was a giant in Australian frog research,” Farman said in the release. Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Sam Walters is a journalist covering archaeology, paleontology, ecology, and evolution for Discover, along with an assortment of other topics. Before joining the Discover team as an assistant editor in 2022, Sam studied journalism at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. #fossils #show #that #these #ancient

Monitoring wastewater for traces of infectious diseases is giving this human byproduct a powerful new role in public health. Once used decades ago to detect poliovirus, wastewater-based epidemiology reemerged during COVID-19 and is now proving useful again in tracking measles outbreaks before cases are officially reported.A recent study led by researchers from Baylor College of Medicine, UTHealth Houston, the Houston Health Department, and Rice University showed that measles virus was detected in Houston’s wastewater days before any clinical cases were confirmed. Published in the American Journal of Public Health, the findings come as measles cases rise in Texas and across the U.S.This early detection strategy may offer a new line of defense: spotting outbreaks before they spread.The Measles ComebackMeasles is a highly contagious respiratory virus spread via droplets from coughing or sneezing. Symptoms, such as fever, runny nose, and rash, can resemble other illnesses but can be deadly for young children and immunocompromised individuals.Before the vaccine’s rollout in 1968, the U.S. saw more than 300 cases per 100,000 people annually. By 2000–2009, that number fell below 0.05 per 100,000. But when vaccination rates dip below 95 percent, fresh outbreaks can return, with devastating effects.With lower vaccine uptake and an aging population, experts say stronger surveillance is needed to track this fast-spreading virus.Read More: Scientists Scour Sewage for Coronavirus CluesAnalyzing the WastewaterUsing a sequencing-based approachthe research team scanned wastewater samples for measles.“In 2023, we showed that systematically sequencing the genetic material in wastewater reveals dynamic changes in human viruses circulating in a community,” said study co-author and professor at Baylor Anthony Maresso in a news release. “Importantly, analyzing these viral changes in wastewater can improve our understanding of outbreaks and transmission and inform public health preparedness, just as one uses meteorological data to better understand and predict weather patterns to anticipate potentially dangerous conditions.”In the latest study, measles virus was found in samples from two Houston treatment facilities on January 7, ten days before two travelers in the same area tested positive.“In such cases our next step is always validating the signal with a second method,” said co-first author Sara Javornik Cregeen in the release. “tested for the virus presence in samples from the same date and collection site and confirmed the signal using another technique.”She added, “As a reference, the 821 Houston wastewater samples we sequenced from the same area were negative for measles virus in the previous 31 months.”Maresso noted in the press release, “Because no other cases have been reported and the detections occurred in the same area where the travelers resided, it is reasonable to assume that the measles signal detected in wastewater is from the two infected cases, which underscores the high sensitivity of the method.”Measles Vaccination Still the Best ProtectionThese results suggest measles may be shed at higher rates than previously thought, or that the team’s agnostic hybrid-capture sequencing method is especially sensitive. Likely, it’s both.The researchers are now monitoring measles activity in other Texas cities, especially in West Texas where new cases are emerging. Their results feed into a public-facing, first-of-its-kind health dashboard: tephi.texas.gov/early-detection.“This work underscores the ability of sophisticated wastewater analyses to serve as an early detection system benefiting public health,” said Eric Boerwinkle, dean of UTHealth Houston School of Public Health in the statement. However, he added, “The best protection from contracting the measles virus is the MMR vaccine, which has been shown to be safe and effective.”Beyond measles, this approach can track everything from seasonal viruses like flu and COVID-19 to emerging threats like avian H5N1 influenza. Wastewater, it turns out, may be one of our best tools for staying a step ahead of the next outbreak.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:American Journal of Public Health: Sequencing-Based Detection of Measles in Wastewater: Texas, January 2025Nature Communications: Wastewater sequencing reveals community and variant dynamics of the collective human viromeHaving worked as a biomedical research assistant in labs across three countries, Jenny excels at translating complex scientific concepts – ranging from medical breakthroughs and pharmacological discoveries to the latest in nutrition – into engaging, accessible content. Her interests extend to topics such as human evolution, psychology, and quirky animal stories. When she’s not immersed in a popular science book, you’ll find her catching waves or cruising around Vancouver Island on her longboard. #measles #sewers #wastewater #surveillance #offers

Archaeopteryx lived about 150 million years ago during the Jurassic Period. Although the first Archaeopteryx fossil was discovered more than 160 years ago and the prehistoric bird has been well studied, an excellent specimen has yielded new information about the species, including why it could fly so well, according to a report in the journal Nature. Painstaking preparation made the “Chicago Archaeopteryx”the best-preserved example of the species. That amount of care meant that CT scans and imaging via UV light have yielded the most vivid Archaeopteryx pictures yet. Scientists visualized its smallest bones as well as soft tissue, including some feathers.New Archaeopteryx Flight Details EmergeIllustration showing Archaeopteryx in life, including its tertial feathers that would have helped it fly.Seeing Archaeopteryx in such detail revealed a long set of feathers called tertials on the its upper arm. Those feathers also place the species more accurately on the evolutionary tree among winged dinosaurs as well as a predecessor to contemporary birds, which also have tertials. “Archaeopteryx isn’t the first dinosaur to have feathers, or the first dinosaur to have ‘wings,’" Jingmai O’Connor a curator at the museum and an author of the paper, said in a press release. “But we think it’s the earliest known dinosaur that was able to use its feathers to fly.”Ancient FlightThe scientists now think they know why Archaeopteryx was such a good flier. Archaeopteryx’s upper arm bone is much longer than those of contemporary birds. That length creates a gap between the long primary feathers and others, as well as between the wings and the body. Air passing through that gap generates lift. Contemporary birds don’t need such long arms, because evolution solved their need to create lift another way: a set of tertial feathers between the bird’s body and the rest of its wing.“Our specimen is the first Archaeopteryx that was preserved and prepared in such a way that we can see its long tertial feathers,” O’Connor said in the release. “These feathers are missing in feathered dinosaurs that are closely related to birds but aren’t quite birds. Their wing feathers stop at the elbow. That tells us that these non-avian dinosaurs couldn’t fly, but Archaeopteryx could. This also adds to evidence that suggests dinosaurs evolved flight more than once — which I think is super exciting.”Other Bird Evolutionary FeaturesImaging also revealed some other key evolutionary features. For instance, seeing details of the tiny bones in the roof of its mouth are helping scientists understand how modern birds eventually developed the ability to move their beaks independent of the part of the skull that holds their brain.“That might not sound exciting, but to people who study bird evolution, it’s really important, because it’s been hypothesized that being able to evolve specialized skulls for different ecological niches might have helped birds evolve into more than 11,000 species today,” O’Connor said in the release.Also, because the scientists got a detailed look at some of the Archaeopteryx’s soft tissues they hypothesize that it may have spent a lot of time walking on the ground, and may even have climbed trees.The Chicago Archaeopteryx fossil went on display at the Field Museum in 2024. Its tiny hollow bones are embedded in a slab of limestone. At about the size of a pigeon, it is among the smallest known fossils of the species.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Before joining Discover Magazine, Paul Smaglik spent over 20 years as a science journalist, specializing in U.S. life science policy and global scientific career issues. He began his career in newspapers, but switched to scientific magazines. His work has appeared in publications including Science News, Science, Nature, and Scientific American. #light #helps #understand #why #archaeopteryx

In 2022, archeologists unearthed what appeared to be the oldest intact reed boat. It was found buried in a sediment-filled former channel of the Euphrates River, near the ancient city of Uruk, in the Mesopotamian floodplain of what is now Iraq.“The findings provide valuable insights into the utilization of Uruk's waterways, the evolution of its floodplain, and the broader processes that shaped early urbanization in Mesopotamia,” according to the conference paper.Analyzing the Ancient BoatAlthough the researchers had a rough estimate of the era the boat probably hailed from, they had difficulty giving it a more exact date, because its materials were contaminated by bitumen.So, a group of scientists from the German Archaeological Institute turned to different technique, they explained when they announced the boat’s age at a European Geosciences Union meeting. They tapped into multiple materials surrounding it, rather than dating the reeds themselves.“The excavation revealed that the boat was embedded in sand layers, surrounded by fine-grained floodplain sediments that are rich in artifacts and faunal remains,” according to the paper.Understanding the Boat's AgeThat collection of clues meant they could use multiple methods to home in on the boat’s age. On the sediment, they applied a technique to determine when it was last exposed to sunlight. On the bone fragments, they turned to the radiocarbon dating that they had originally intended to perform on the boat itself. And on the ceramic fragments, they used several pieces of archeological evidence to see where they fit on the timeline.Taken together, these pieces of evidence put the boat’s age at about 3,600 hundred years — give or take a few hundred years in either direction. Knowing the boat’s age allows archeologists to put it into context with other discoveries from that era.Mesopotamia SocietyRemnants of comparable craft have been found in Kuwait and Egypt. But unlike them, this Mesopotamian boat remains relatively intact. Archeologists are considering restoring it, but few, if any people, have expertise.Although Mesopotamia, often called the “Cradle of Civilization” is well studied — from the frequency its citizens kissed to the way they recorded business transactions — many mysteries remain — including why its society faded away.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:EGU General Assembly 2025. Timing of the First Mesopotamian Boat Unearthed in a Euphrates Paleochannel near Uruk (Iraq)Before joining Discover Magazine, Paul Smaglik spent over 20 years as a science journalist, specializing in U.S. life science policy and global scientific career issues. He began his career in newspapers, but switched to scientific magazines. His work has appeared in publications including Science News, Science, Nature, and Scientific American. Source: https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/a-3-600-year-old-reed-boat-provides-clues-to-early-urbanization-in #3600yearold #reed #boat #provides #clues #early #urbanization #mesopotamia

Using advanced medical algorithms, researchers have identified six breast texture patterns that may indicate a high risk for breast cancer. In a new study, one of the largest of its kind, published in the journal Radiology, a research team analyzed the mammograms of over 30,000 women and condensed the information down into six phenotypes. With this new information, the research team hopes to improve breast cancer screening and prevention. Breast Tissue PatternsFull-field digital mammography (FFDM) images in a 52-year-old woman show a high-risk phenotype (top), and FFDM images in a 58-year-old woman show a low-risk phenotype (bottom). The high-risk phenotype was defined by having high values of the first principal component (PC1) and was assigned to cluster 3 (top row), and the low-risk phenotype was defined by having low values of the PC1 and was assigned to cluster 1 (bottom row). The index images (left side; before any diagnosis of cancer) are provided as well as follow-up images obtained at either the time of cancer diagnosis (for the high-risk phenotype, top right) or at the last follow-up (low-risk phenotype, bottom right). The red circle indicates the location of subsequent breast cancer. Both women had a Breast Imaging Reporting and Data System breast density of C. The woman at high risk for breast cancer was Black and the woman at low risk for breast cancer was White. (Image Credit: Radiological Society of North America (RSNA))For those with denser breast tissue, meaning the breast contains more glandular tissue instead of fatty tissue, detecting cancer with a mammogram can be more difficult. This is because dense tissue and cancer growth can look similar in the mammogram image, as each appears white. Those with dense breast tissue also have a higher risk of developing breast cancer. To make matters more difficult, women with similar dense breast tissue could actually have different tissue patterns. However, understanding these breast tissue patterns and characteristics could lead to improved monitoring and discovery of breast cancer. “We hypothesized that some patterns or phenotypes would be associated with a high risk of future breast cancer and suggest which women may benefit from supplemental screening or prevention strategies,” said Celine M. Vachon, Ph.D., a professor of epidemiology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota and one of the lead study authors in a press release. “Other phenotypes could be associated with low risk, ultimately, suggesting less frequent screening.”Breast Cancer Algorithms and Medical Images For this study, the research team used radiomics — a method that uses data algorithms to extract information from a medical image — on mammograms from over 30,000 patients from three different cohorts. The patients didn’t have a prior history of breast cancer. The radiomics pulled patterns and characteristics in the breast tissue that weren't often visible to the human eye. From the information, the radiomics pulled 390 features and separated them into six different phenotypes. The research team then applied these phenotypes to 3,500 patients, some of whom had developed breast cancer and some of whom had not. The results found that these phenotypes were associated with a higher risk of breast cancer in both Black and white patients. “We were surprised to find that these radiomic phenotypes showed suggestion of a stronger risk among Black vs. white women,” said Despina Kontos, Ph.D., Herbert and Florence Irving Professor of Radiological Sciences and chief research information officer at Columbia University Irving Medical Center, and study co-author, in a press release. “This is particularly important as breast cancer tends to be more aggressive in Black women, highlighting the need for novel risk factors in this population.”Making Breast Cancer Detection More Accurate According to the study, these phenotypes could cause a patient’s mammogram to come back as a false negative, meaning the cancer diagnosis was missed. “Understanding who is at greatest risk of invasive breast cancer, especially the most aggressive types, is crucial for preventing cancer and diagnosing it early for potentially the choice of less intensive treatments,” said co-senior author Karla M. Kerlikowske, M.D., professor of medicine and epidemiology and biostatistics at University of California San Francisco in a press release. The team plans to implement these findings into other applications that could help more accurately detect breast cancer and decipher who is more at risk. “Our next steps include extending our investigations to larger groups of women in the U.S. population, especially examining 3D mammograms, and combining these radiomic risk factors with genetic and other lifestyle factors to improve our ability to define who is (and who is not) at increased risk of invasive breast cancer,” Vachon said in a press release.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:A graduate of UW-Whitewater, Monica Cull wrote for several organizations, including one that focused on bees and the natural world, before coming to Discover Magazine. Her current work also appears on her travel blog and Common State Magazine. Her love of science came from watching PBS shows as a kid with her mom and spending too much time binging Doctor Who. Source: https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/patterns-in-breast-tissue-could-reveal-risk-of-invasive-breast-cancer #patterns #breast #tissue #could #reveal #risk #invasive #cancer

Earth has been home to life for billions of years, but could the planet itself be considered a living thing? Most people simply think of Earth as a giant rock — one with the perfect conditions to nurture life as we know it today, from animals and plants to microscopic bacteria. But English environmental scientist James Lovelock thought differently. Departing from traditional scholarly views, Lovelock collaborated with American evolutionary biologist Lynn Margulis in the 1970s to develop a new perspective called the Gaia hypothesis. This idea frames Earth as a living system in which all organisms influence the surrounding environment to maintain homeostasis (in other words, stability). Although the hypothesis remains highly controversial to this day, it has broadened scientific dialogue about the identity of our planet. The Gaia HypothesisIn formulating the Gaia hypothesis, Lovelock took inspiration from ancient Greek mythology. Gaia, the Greek goddess of Earth, was worshipped as the mother of all creation. In a chapter of the 1988 book “Biodiversity,” Lovelock insinuates that the idea of a living Earth is deep-rooted in humankind, but was largely lost in the scientific community after the 19th century. The Gaia hypothesis revived this buried idea, proposing that Earth is a whole living entity, essentially a superorganism composed of many parts acting in synergy (much like an ant or bee colony). Earth lives and breathes, Lovelock suggested, by way of closed feedback loops that balance the planet’s conditions and keep them favorable for life. By this hypothesis, organisms are said to facilitate processes that regulate things like atmospheric temperature and ocean salinity, for example. Criticisms Against the Gaia HypothesisMost criticisms that initially surfaced from opponents of the hypothesis asserted that Earth and living organisms could not be acting to support the planet consciously, with an intentional goal in mind. Staunch proponents of Darwinism didn’t believe that organisms could “reach a common good by natural selection and that natural selection cannot act on the whole planet,” in the words of a 2021 EarthArXiv preprint paper.Others argued that the hypothesis was more of a metaphor, since it couldn’t be tested for validity. Scientists debated the Gaia hypothesis over the course of four Gaia conferences, trying to resolve disagreements. In the second Gaia conference, held in 1988, Lovelock responded to criticism by developing a mathematical model called Daisyworld. Here, a hypothetical planet modeled after Earth contains two types of daisies: black daisies that absorb light and warm the planet, and white daisies that reflect light and cool the planet. The model suggests that the daisies stabilize the climate in a way that allows the planet to maintain an optimal temperature for both types to live. Daisyworld would not silence critics entirely, as they would continue to find issues with the lack of additional contributing factors that could affect life and cause the system to become unstable. For example, a system could have “cheaters” — selfish organisms that don’t work toward a planet’s stability. Making Our Planet More IntelligentEarth may not be alive in the traditional sense, but does it have a mind of its own? Scientists pondered this question in a 2022 study published in the International Journal of Astrobiology.Partially inspired by the Gaia hypothesis, researchers presented the concept of planetary intelligence, explaining how collective activity can create a self-sustaining system on Earth. The study states that the planet is currently in a stage called the “immature technosphere,” in which technology has not yet been fully implemented to drive Earth’s systems. Right now, we’re still exhausting natural resources like fossil fuels without benefiting the planet in return. Eventually, though, we may unlock the next stage of planetary intelligence, what the researchers call the “mature technosphere." This would require technology to directly support Earth’s well-being without inflicting negative impacts. Although there is no telling when we would reach this point, the researchers say making Earth more intelligent with technology could help in the fight against climate change.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Biodiversity. The Earth as a Living OrganismEncyclopedia of Ecology. Gaia HypothesisReview of Geophysics. Daisyworld: A reviewInternational Journal of Astrobiology. Intelligence as a planetary scale processJack Knudson is an assistant editor at Discover with a strong interest in environmental science and history. Before joining Discover in 2023, he studied journalism at the Scripps College of Communication at Ohio University and previously interned at Recycling Today magazine. Source: https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/could-earth-develop-its-own-consciousness-the-gaia-hypothesis-offers-an #could #earth #develop #its #own #consciousness #the #gaia #hypothesis #offers #unorthodox #answer

Underneath miles-deep ice sheets covering Antarctica lies the largest mountain range no one on Earth has ever seen. Even though a few of its tallest points peek through in some places, relatively few people know of the entire range’s existence.However, geologists studying it have long argued about how and when these buried peaks were formed. A team of geologists propose a new explanation in an article in the journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters.“The ice conceals some of Earth’s most enigmatic features,” according to the paper. One such feature is the Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains, which rises over 9,000 feet above sea level and is covered by about 10,000 feet of ice. Its highest point is considered the coldest place on Earth. The range is equivalent in size and shape to the Swiss alps.Creation of the Antarctica MountainsMany geologists think these features were created when multiple tectonic plates that include what is now known as Africa, South America, Australia, India, and Antarctica collided to create a supercontinent called Gondwana. However, beyond that event, there is less agreement.“...the timing and three-dimensional structure of the collisional zone, known as the Kuunga Orogen, remain highly controversial,” according to the paper.The new study provides a bit more detail. The authors propose that the tectonic plates collision first uplifted the Gamburtsev Mountains when they had ground together. The tectonic collision then unleashed a flow of molten rock beneath the mountains. As that molten layer became hotter and thicker, the mountains above it collapsed under their own weight. The base of the mountains now rest upon the Earth’s mantle, the layer beneath the planet’s crust.Rock Beneath the Ice SheetThe geologists tracked this massive activity by looking at tiny objects — zircon grains deposited by rivers flowing from the mountains more than 250 million years ago. These grains act as geologic timers, because they contain uranium, which decays at a rate scientists can use to measure their age.According to the grains found at various points of the range, the mountains begin their rise about 650 million years ago, reached Himalayan heights by 580 million years ago, then completed their sinking by about 500 million years ago. A massive layer of ice has covered them since, making them one of the best preserved mountain ranges on the planet, because the ice shields them from the erosion that wears down more exposed mountains.The scientists could learn more about the range’s composition by drilling through the ice to extract rock samples. However, that is a long and expensive process. They are now looking at exposed rocks from Antarctica’s east coast to get a hint of what kinds of rock might lie beneath the massive ice sheet.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Earth and Planetary Science Letters. Gondwanan continental collision drives gravitational spreading and collapse of the ancestral East Antarctic mountainsBefore joining Discover Magazine, Paul Smaglik spent over 20 years as a science journalist, specializing in U.S. life science policy and global scientific career issues. He began his career in newspapers, but switched to scientific magazines. His work has appeared in publications including Science News, Science, Nature, and Scientific American. Source: https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/the-largest-mountain-range-no-one-has-seen-lives-under-antarcticas-ice #the #largest #mountain #range #one #has #seen #lives #under #antarctica039s #ice #sheets