Out with a bang: Explosive neutron star merger captured for the first time in millimeter light

Peer-Reviewed Publication

NATIONAL RADIO ASTRONOMY OBSERVATORY

 

IMAGE: IN A FIRST FOR RADIO ASTRONOMY, SCIENTISTS HAVE DETECTED MILLIMETER-WAVELENGTH LIGHT FROM A SHORT-DURATION GAMMA-RAY BURST. THIS ARTIST'S CONCEPTION SHOWS THE MERGER BETWEEN A NEUTRON STAR AND ANOTHER STAR (SEEN AS A DISK, LOWER LEFT) WHICH CAUSED AN EXPLOSION RESULTING IN THE SHORT-DURATION GAMMA-RAY BURST, GRB 211106A (WHITE JET, MIDDLE), AND LEFT BEHIND WHAT SCIENTISTS NOW KNOW TO BE ONE OF THE MOST LUMINOUS AFTERGLOWS ON RECORD (SEMI-SPHERICAL SHOCK WAVE MID-RIGHT). WHILE DUST IN THE HOST GALAXY OBSCURED MOST OF THE VISIBLE LIGHT (SHOWN AS COLORS), MILLIMETER LIGHT FROM THE EVENT (DEPICTED IN GREEN) WAS ABLE TO ESCAPE AND REACH THE ATACAMA LARGE MILLIMETER/SUBMILLIMETER ARRAY (ALMA), GIVING SCIENTISTS AN UNPRECEDENTED VIEW OF THIS COSMIC EXPLOSION. FROM THE STUDY, THE TEAM CONFIRMED THAT GRB 211106A IS ONE OF THE MOST ENERGETIC SHORT-DURATION GRBS EVER OBSERVED. view more 

CREDIT: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), M. WEISS (NRAO/AUI/NSF)

Scientists using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA)— an international observatory co-operated by the US National Science Foundation’s National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO)— have for the first time recorded millimeter-wavelength light from a fiery explosion caused by the merger of a neutron star with another star. The team also confirmed this flash of light to be one of the most energetic short-duration gamma-ray bursts ever observed, leaving behind one of the most luminous afterglows on record. The results of the research will be published in an upcoming edition of The Astrophysical Journal Letters. 

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are the brightest and most energetic explosions in the Universe, capable of emitting more energy in a matter of seconds than our Sun will emit during its entire lifetime. GRB 211106A belongs to a GRB sub-class known as short-duration gamma-ray bursts. These explosions— which scientists believe are responsible for the creation of the heaviest elements in the Universe, such as platinum and gold— result from the catastrophic merger of binary star systems containing a neutron star. “These mergers occur because of gravitational wave radiation that removes energy from the orbit of the binary stars, causing the stars to spiral in toward each other,” said Tanmoy Laskar, who will soon commence work as an Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Utah. “The resulting explosion is accompanied by jets moving at close to the speed of light. When one of these jets is pointed at Earth, we observe a short pulse of gamma-ray radiation or a short-duration GRB.”

A short-duration GRB usually lasts only a few tenths of a second. Scientists then look for an afterglow, an emission of light caused by the interaction of the jets with surrounding gas. Even still, they’re difficult to detect; only half-a-dozen short-duration GRBs have been detected at radio wavelengths, and until now none had been detected in millimeter wavelengths. Laskar, who led the research while an Excellence Fellow at Radboud University in The Netherlands, said that the difficulty is the immense distance to GRBs, and the technological capabilities of telescopes. “Short-duration GRB afterglows are very luminous and energetic. But these explosions take place in distant galaxies which means the light from them can be quite faint for our telescopes on Earth. Before ALMA, millimeter telescopes were not sensitive enough to detect these afterglows.”

At roughly 20 billion light-years from Earth, GRB 211106A is no exception. The light from this short-duration gamma-ray burst was so faint that while early X-ray observations with NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory saw the explosion, the host galaxy was undetectable at that wavelength, and scientists weren’t able to determine exactly where the explosion was coming from. “Afterglow light is essential for figuring out which galaxy a burst comes from and for learning more about the burst itself. Initially, when only the X-ray counterpart had been discovered, astronomers thought that this burst might be coming from a nearby galaxy,” said Laskar, adding that a significant amount of dust in the area also obscured the object from detection in optical observations with the Hubble Space Telescope. 

Each wavelength added a new dimension to scientists’ understanding of the GRB, and millimeter, in particular, was critical to uncovering the truth about the burst. “The Hubble observations revealed an unchanging field of galaxies. ALMA’s unparalleled sensitivity allowed us to pinpoint the location of the GRB in that field with more precision, and it turned out to be in another faint galaxy, which is further away. That, in turn, means that this short-duration gamma-ray burst is even more powerful than we first thought, making it one of the most luminous and energetic on record,” said Laskar.

Wen-fai Fong, an Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Northwestern University added, “This short gamma-ray burst was the first time we tried to observe such an event with ALMA. Afterglows for short bursts are very difficult to come by, so it was spectacular to catch this event shining so bright. After many years of observing these bursts, this surprising discovery opens up a new area of study, as it motivates us to observe many more of these with ALMA, and other telescope arrays, in the future.” 

Joe Pesce, National Science Foundation Program Officer for NRAO/ALMA said, “These observations are fantastic on many levels. They provide more information to help us understand the enigmatic gamma-ray bursts (and neutron-star astrophysics in general), and they demonstrate how important and complementary multi-wavelength observations with space- and ground-based telescopes are in understanding astrophysical phenomena.”

And there’s plenty of work still to be done across multiple wavelengths, both with new GRBs and with GRB 211106A, which could uncover additional surprises about these bursts. “The study of short-duration GRBs requires the rapid coordination of telescopes around the world and in space, operating at all wavelengths,” said Edo Berger, Professor of Astronomy at Harvard University. “In the case of GRB 211106A, we used some of the most powerful telescopes available— ALMA, the National Science Foundation’s Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA), NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the Hubble Space Telescope. With the now-operational James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), and future 20-40 meter optical and radio telescopes such as the next generation VLA (ngVLA) we will be able to produce a complete picture of these cataclysmic events and study them at unprecedented distances.”

Laskar added, "With JWST, we can now take a spectrum of the host galaxy and easily know the distance, and in the future, we could also use JWST to capture infrared afterglows and study their chemical composition. With ngVLA, we will be able to study the geometric structure of the afterglows and the star-forming fuel found in their host environments in unprecedented detail. I am excited about these upcoming discoveries in our field.”

Resource

“The First Short GRB Millimeter Afterglow: The Wide-Angled Jet of the Extremely Energetic SGRB 211106A,” Laskar et al (2022), The Astrophysical Journal Letters

About NRAO

The National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) is a facility of the National Science Foundation, operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc.

About ALMA

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), an international astronomy facility, is a partnership of the European Organisation for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere (ESO), the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Natural Sciences (NINS) of Japan in cooperation with the Republic of Chile. ALMA is funded by ESO on behalf of its Member States, by NSF in cooperation with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) and the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) and by NINS in cooperation with the Academia Sinica (AS) in Taiwan and the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI).

ALMA construction and operations are led by ESO on behalf of its Member States; by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), managed by Associated Universities, Inc. (AUI), on behalf of North America; and by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) on behalf of East Asia. The Joint ALMA Observatory (JAO) provides the unified leadership and management of the construction, commissioning and operation of ALMA.

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JOURNAL

The Astrophysical Journal Letters

ARTICLE TITLE

The First Short GRB Millimeter Afterglow: The Wide-Angled Jet of the Extremely Energetic SGRB 211106A

Explosive neutron star merger captured for first time in millimeter light

Flash is one of the most energetic short-duration gamma-ray bursts ever observed

Peer-Reviewed Publication

NORTHWESTERN UNIVERSITY

 

VIDEO: IN THE FIRST-EVER TIME-LAPSE MOVIE OF A SHORT-DURATION GAMMA-RAY BURST IN MILLIMETER-WAVELENGTH LIGHT, WE SEE GRB 21106A AS CAPTURED WITH THE ATACAMA LARGE MILLIMETER/SUBMILLIMETER ARRAY (ALMA). THE MILLIMETER LIGHT SEEN HERE PINPOINTS THE LOCATION OF THE EVENT TO A DISTANT HOST GALAXY IN IMAGES CAPTURED USING THE HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE. THE EVOLUTION OF THE MILLIMETER LIGHT’S BRIGHTNESS PROVIDES INFORMATION ON THE ENERGY AND GEOMETRY OF THE JETS PRODUCED IN THE EXPLOSION. view more 

CREDIT: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), T. LASKAR (UTAH), S. DAGNELLO (NRAO/AUI/NSF)

For the first time, scientists have recorded millimeter-wavelength light from a fiery explosion caused by the merger of a neutron star with another star.

Led by Northwestern University and Radboud University in the Netherlands, the team also confirmed this flash as one of the most energetic short-duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) ever observed, leaving behind one of the most luminous afterglows on record.

Astrophysicists made the discovery with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), an international observatory operated by the National Science Foundation’s National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO). Located in the high-altitude Atacama Desert in Chile, the ALMA array comprises 66 radio telescopes, making it the largest radio telescope in the world.

“This short gamma-ray burst was the first time we tried to observe such an event with ALMA,” said Northwestern’s Wen-fai Fong, principal investigator of the ALMA program. “Afterglows for short bursts are very difficult to come by, so it was spectacular to catch this event shining so brightly. After many years observing these bursts, this surprising discovery opens up a new area of study, as it motivates us to observe many more of these with ALMA and other telescope arrays in the future.”

The research will be published in an upcoming issue of the Astrophysical Journal Letters.

Fong is an assistant professor of physics and astronomy at Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and a key member of the Center for Interdisciplinary Exploration and Research in Astrophysics(CIERA). Northwestern coauthors include Alicia Rouco Escorial, Genevieve Schroeder, Jillian Rastinejad, Charles Kilpatrick, Kate Alexander and Anya Nugent.

Extreme energy

The brightest and most energetic explosions in the universe, GRBs are capable of emitting more energy in a matter of seconds than our sun will emit during its entire lifetime. In the new study, astrophysicists examined GRB 211106A, which belongs to a GRB subclass known as short-duration gamma ray bursts. Responsible for creating the heaviest elements in the universe, such as platinum and gold, these explosions result from a catastrophic merger of binary star systems containing at least one neutron star.

“These mergers are excellent sources of gravitational waves, making them premier multi-messenger cosmic sources that can be observed with gravitational waves and light,” Fong said. “While this GRB was out of the range of current gravitational wave observatories, we were still able to mobilize several observatories to capture its light in the millimeter, radio and X-ray wavelengths.”

“These mergers occur because of gravitational wave radiation that removes energy from the orbit of the binary stars, causing the stars to spiral in toward each other,” said the study’s lead author Tanmoy Laskar, an Excellence Fellow at Radboud University. “The resulting explosion is accompanied by jets moving at close to the speed of light. When one of these jets is pointed at Earth, we observe a short pulse of gamma-ray radiation or a short-duration GRB.”

The importance of millimeters

A short-duration GRB usually lasts only a few tenths of a second. After it fades, scientists look for an afterglow, an emission of light caused by the interaction of the jets with surrounding gas. Even still, short-duration GRBs are difficult to detect. Only half a dozen short-duration GRBs have been detected at radio wavelengths, and, until now, none had been detected in millimeter wavelengths. 

“Millimeter wavelengths can tell us about the density of the environment around the GRB,” said Schroeder, study coauthor and graduate student in Fong’s research group. “And, when combined with the X-rays, they can tell us about the true energy of the explosion. Because emission at millimeter wavelengths can be detected for a longer time than in X-rays, the millimeter emission also can be used to determine the width of the GRB jet.”

“What makes GRB 211106A so special is it’s not only the first short-duration GRB that we detected in this wavelength, but also, thanks to the millimeter and radio detection, we could measure the opening angle of the jet,” added Rouco Escorial, study coauthor and postdoctoral fellow in CIERA. “The millimeter and radio bands provided us with information we needed to measure the jet opening angle. This is essential to infer the real rates of short GRBs in our universe and to compare them with the rates of binary neutron star or neutron star and black hole mergers.”

Because GRB 211106A occurred when the universe was just 40% of its current age, the light was particularly faint. Although NASA’s Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory detected the explosion with X-ray observations, the host galaxy was undetectable at that wavelength, leaving scientists unable to determine exactly where the explosion was coming from. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope detected optical and infrared light from the host galaxy, while ALMA detected millimeter light from the afterglow. Each wavelength added a new dimension to scientists’ understanding of the GRB, and millimeter, in particular, was critical to uncovering the truth about the burst. 

“The Hubble observations revealed an unchanging field of galaxies,” Laskar said. “ALMA’s unparalleled sensitivity allowed us to pinpoint the location of the GRB in that field with more precision, and it turned out to be in another faint galaxy, which is further away. That, in turn, means that this short-duration gamma-ray burst is even more powerful than we first thought, making it one of the most luminous and energetic on record.”

“ALMA shatters the playing field in terms of its capabilities at millimeter wavelengths and has enabled us to see the faint, dynamic universe in this type of light for the first time,” Fong said. “After a decade of observing short GRBs, it is truly amazing to witness the power of using these new technologies to unwrap surprise gifts from the universe.”

The study, “The first short GRB millimeter afterglow: The wide-angled jet of the extremely energetic SGRB 211106A,” was supported by the National Science Foundation (award numbers AST-1814782, AST-1909358 and AST-2047919), the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and NASA (award numbers NNM11AA01A and GO1-22059X).

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JOURNAL

The Astrophysical Journal Letters

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE

Yale-developed technology restores cell, organ function in pigs after death

Peer-Reviewed Publication

YALE UNIVERSITY

New Haven, Conn. — Within minutes of the final heartbeat, a cascade of biochemical events triggered by a lack of blood flow, oxygen, and nutrients begins to destroy a body’s cells and organs. But a team of Yale scientists has found that massive and permanent cellular failure doesn’t have to happen so quickly. Using a new technology they developed that delivers a specially designed cell-protective fluid to organs and tissues, the researchers restored blood circulation and other cellular functions in pigs a full hour after their deaths, they report in the Aug. 3 edition of the journal Nature. The findings may help extend the health of human organs during surgery and expand availability of donor organs, the authors said. “All cells do not die immediately, there is a more protracted series of events,” said David Andrijevic, associate research scientist in neuroscience at Yale School of Medicine and co-lead author of the study. “It is a process in which you can intervene, stop, and restore some cellular function.” The research builds upon an earlier Yale-led project that restored circulation and certain cellular functions in the brain of a dead pig with technology dubbed BrainEx. Published in 2019, that study and the new one were led by the lab of Yale’s Nenad Sestan, the Harvey and Kate Cushing Professor of Neuroscience and professor of comparative medicine, genetics, and psychiatry.  “If we were able to restore certain cellular functions in the dead brain, an organ known to be most susceptible to ischemia [inadequate blood supply], we hypothesized that something similar could also be achieved in other vital transplantable organs,” Sestan said. In the new study — which involved senior author Sestan and colleagues Andrijevic, Zvonimir Vrselja, Taras Lysyy, and Shupei Zhang, all from Yale — the researchers applied a modified version of BrainEx called OrganEx to the whole pig. The technology consists of a perfusion device similar to heart-lung machines — which do the work of the heart and lungs during surgery — and an experimental fluid containing compounds that can promote cellular health and suppress inflammation throughout the pig’s body. Cardiac arrest was induced in anesthetized pigs, which were treated with OrganEx an hour after death. Six hours after treatment with OrganEx, the scientists found that certain key cellular functions were active in many areas of the pigs’ bodies — including in the heart, liver, and kidneys — and that some organ function had been restored. For instance, they found evidence of electrical activity in the heart, which retained the ability to contract. “We were also able to restore circulation throughout the body, which amazed us,” Sestan said. Normally when the heart stops beating, organs begin to swell, collapsing blood vessels and blocking circulation, he said. Yet circulation was restored and organs in the deceased pigs that received OrganEx treatment appeared functional at the level of cells and tissue. “Under the microscope, it was difficult to tell the difference between a healthy organ and one which had been treated with OrganEx technology after death,” Vrselja said. As in the 2019 experiment, the researchers also found that cellular activity in some areas of the brain had been restored, though no organized electrical activity that would indicate consciousness was detected during any part of the experiment. The team was especially surprised to observe involuntary and spontaneous muscular movements in the head and neck areas when they evaluated the treated animals, which remained anesthetized through the entire six-hour experiment. These movements indicate the preservation of some motor functions, Sestan said. The researchers stressed that additional studies are necessary to understand the apparently restored motor functions in the animals, and that rigorous ethical review from other scientists and bioethicists is required. The experimental protocols for the latest study were approved by Yale’s Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee and guided by an external advisory and ethics committee. The OrganEx technology could eventually have several potential applications, the authors said. For instance, it could extend the life of organs in human patients and expand the availability of donor organs for transplant. It might also be able to help treat organs or tissue damaged by ischemia during heart attacks or strokes. “There are numerous potential applications of this exciting new technology,” said Stephen Latham, director of the Yale Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics. “However, we need to maintain careful oversight of all future studies, particularly any that include perfusion of the brain.” The research was funded by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, National Institutes of Health, and National Institute of Mental Health. This work was supported by the NIH grants MH117064, MH117064-01S1, R21DK128662, T32GM136651, F30HD106694, and Schmidt Futures.

 

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JOURNAL

Nature

DOI

10.1038/s41586-022-05016-1 

ARTICLE TITLE

Cellular Recovery After Prolonged Warm Ischemia of the Whole Body

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

3-Aug-2022

MAKE MEDICINE A TRADE/CRAFT

Primary care doctors would need more than 24 hours/day to provide recommended care

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO MEDICAL CENTER

Following national recommendation guidelines for preventive, chronic disease and acute care would take a primary care physician 26.7 hours per day to see an average number of patients, a new study finds.

That breaks down to 14.1 hours/day for preventive care, 7.2 hours/day for chronic disease care, 2.2 hours/day for acute care, and 3.2 hours/day for documentation and inbox management.

The research, conducted by the University of Chicago, Johns Hopkins University, and Imperial College London, used a simulation study to compute time per patient based on data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.

“There is this sort of disconnect between the care we’ve been trained to give and the constraints of a clinic workday,” said Justin Porter, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Chicago and lead author of the paper. “We have an ever-increasing set of guidelines, but clinic slots have not increased proportionately.”

The study also looked at physician time as part of a team, where nurses, physician assistants, counselors and others help to deliver recommended care.

It found that team-based care reduced the time a physician needed to deliver care to 9.3 hours/day, broken into 2.0 hours/day for preventive care, 3.6 hours/day for chronic disease care, 1.1 hours/day for acute care, and 2.6 hours/day for documentation and inbox management.

“Team-based care is a movement that has been around in medicine for a while and has gathered steam more recently,” said Porter. “Doctors do not give care in a vacuum. There are other extremely important members of the healthcare team that are working together and often independently to provide care for patients. This is a huge opportunity and partial solution to the time constraints currently faced in medical care.”

The study, “Revisiting the Time Needed to Provide Adult Primary Care,” is published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine.

Adding to the evidence

This new study joins and builds on others that have found a discrepancy between guidelines and a physician’s time.

In 2003, a Duke University study estimated it would take a primary care physician 7.4 hours/day to provide preventive care for an average-sized patient population, while a 2005 study from Mount Sinai found it would take 8.6 hours/day. A complementary study from Duke in 2005 calculated an additional 10.6 hours/day to manage the Top 10 chronic diseases. Together, that indicates a doctor would need at least 18 hours/day to provide both preventive and chronic care.

The new study went one step further by including all types of care a primary care physician provides – preventive, acute, and chronic – as well as administrative tasks, and accounted for changes to the guidelines that have occurred since the earlier studies were published. It also used a different methodology, employing real patient data from an annual national survey to calculate its results. The earlier studies used hypothetical patient populations based on the U.S. population.

“When you're dealing with real people, you have more complexity to the data. A person may have multi-morbidity, or several chronic diseases at once,” said Porter. “That patient would be treated differently than a hypothetical, average patient. This leads to more comprehensive and precise calculations.”

The study’s data on team-based care also expanded the information available on time constraints for primary care physicians.

The researchers used the Comprehensive Primary Care Plus (CPC+) model to develop the estimates for team-based care. The model allows physicians to focus on advanced care and brings in specialized medical professionals to take over other areas. Dietitians, for instance, would handle nutritional counseling for patients with diabetes or obesity, a time-intensive task. Overall, the researchers determined that 65% of primary care services could be handled by other team members.

More time, better care

Moving to a team-care model would require systemic changes to the way Americans pay for care. Currently, payment for many counseling services depends on patients having a qualifying disease. Yet the benefits of team-based care make the effort worth it, the researchers say.

The time pressure that physicians face has real consequences for the delivery of healthcare. According to the researchers, time constraints are a key factor in physician burnout, one of the drivers pushing medical students from the field.

For patients, the researchers say, time pressure helps explain why improvements in outcomes have not kept pace with advances made in the field. It plays a role in inequities in health care, with vulnerable populations typically receiving care at overburdened clinics. It also has an impact on patient satisfaction.

“If you do surveys with patients about what frustrates them about their medical care, you’ll frequently hear, 'My doctor doesn’t spend time with me’ or ‘My doctor doesn’t follow up,’” said Porter. “I think a lot of times this is interpreted as a lack of empathy, or a lack of willingness to care for a patient. But the reality – for the majority of doctors – is simply a lack of time.”

Additional authors include Neda Laiteerapong, MD, MS, University of Chicago; Cynthia Boyd, MD, MPH, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine; and M. Reza Skandari, PhD, Imperial College Business School, London.

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JOURNAL

Journal of General Internal Medicine

DOI

10.1007/s11606-022-07707-x 

ARTICLE TITLE

Revisiting the Time Needed to Provide Adult Primary Care

Children with rare genetic disorders more likely to be (MIS) diagnosed with developmental, behavioural and mental health problems

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE

A major study of children with intellectual disabilities has highlighted the additional challenges that they often face, including a much-increased likelihood of being diagnosed as autistic, as well as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and other mental health difficulties.

With the advent of rapid whole genome sequencing, children presenting with an intellectual disability or developmental delay are recommended to have their DNA sequenced to identify the underlying genetic cause.

To capitalise on this recent NHS development, researchers at the University of Cambridge, University College London and Cardiff University established IMAGINE ID, a national UK cohort study that aims to discover how genetic changes affect children and young people’s behaviour, in order to inform better care of families and children now and in the future.

Writing in The Lancet Psychiatry today, the researchers have published the results of an analysis of data from almost 2,800 young people with rare genomic variants – changes to their DNA – that are associated with intellectual disability.

Professor Lucy Raymond from the University of Cambridge, the study’s senior author, said: “Thanks to all the families that have taken part in our research, we’ve been able to conduct the largest study to date of the impact of rare genetic variants associated with intellectual disability. What we’ve found from parents is that these children are extremely likely to develop other neurodevelopmental or mental health conditions, which can present additional challenges both to the children and their families.”

All the participants were aged between four and 19 years. Just under three-quarters (74%) had an intellectual disability caused by a duplication or deletion of sections of DNA – a so-called copy number variant (CNV). The remaining young people had a disability caused by a single ‘spelling error’ in their DNA – a change in the A, C, G or T nucleotides – referred to as a single nucleotide variant (SNV).

Compared to the English national population, children in the study were almost 30 times as likely to have been diagnosed as autistic. In the general population, 1.2% of people are diagnosed with the condition compared to 36% of the study participants. Similarly, 22% of the study population were diagnosed with ADHD, compared to 1.6% of the general population, meaning that they were more than 13 times more likely to have the condition.

Around one in eight children (12%) had been diagnosed with oppositional defiant disorder, in which children are uncooperative, defiant, and hostile toward others – a rate 4.4 times higher than in the general population.

One in ten (11%) had an anxiety disorder, a 1.5 times increased risk. Rates of childhood depression were significantly lower, at just 0.4% compared with 2.1% of the general population, but this may increase over the next few years as some mental health disorders do not start until later adolescence or early adult life. Almost all of the children (94%) were reported to have at least one significant physical health problem, including disturbed sleep (65%), motor or movement disorders (64%) or seizures (30%).

Dr Jeanne Wolstencroft from Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health, University College London, said: “Routine genomic testing now allows parents to understand the genetic cause of intellectual disabilities in an increasing number of children but, because so many of these conditions are rare, we still lack information on the impact this has on their children’s future mental health.

“We already know that intellectual disabilities tend to be associated with an increased likelihood of neurodevelopmental conditions, as well as emotional and behavioural difficulties, but we found that where there is an identifiable genetic cause, the likelihood is amplified considerably. This suggests that these children should be provided with early assessment and help where appropriate.”

The team has also shown for the first time that children with intellectual disability caused by a genetic variant inherited from a family member, are more likely to come from a more deprived socioeconomic background. This suggests that some parents or family members with the same variant may also have unrecognised difficulties that placed them at a social and educational disadvantage. These children were more likely to be diagnosed with a neuropsychiatric condition and were also more likely to exhibit behavioural difficulties.

Professor David Skuse from Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health, University College London, said: “We hope this work helps improve the targeting of assessments and interventions to support families at the earliest opportunity. We’d like to see better training for health care providers about the wider use and utility of genetic testing. We have identified its potential value in terms of prioritising children with mental health needs for child mental health services, who are currently hugely limited in the UK.”

The research was funded by the Medical Research Council (part of UK Research & Innovation) and the Medical Research Foundation. Additional support was provided by the NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Resource Centre and the NIHR GOSH BRC.

Reference
Wolstencroft, J et al. Neuropsychiatric risk in children with intellectual disability of genetic origin: IMAGINE - The UK National Cohort Study. Lancet Psychiatry; 4 Aug 2022; DOI: 10.1016/PIIS2215-0366(22)00207-3

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JOURNAL

The Lancet Psychiatry

DOI

10.1016/PIIS2215-0366(22)00207-3 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Neuropsychiatric risk in children with intellectual disability of genetic origin: IMAGINE - The UK National Cohort Study

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-Aug-2022

Händel Animal Welfare Prize 2022 for the use of alternatives to animal experiments in research on tumors and barrier organs

DFG awards Michael Karl Melzer and the Würzburg Initiative 3R (WI3R) / Award ceremony scheduled for 13 October in Münster

Grant and Award Announcement

DEUTSCHE FORSCHUNGSGEMEINSCHAFT

The physician Dr. Michael Karl Melzer of the University of Ulm and the Würzburg Initiative 3R (WI3R), based at the Fraunhofer Translational Center Regenerative Therapies and the University of Würzburg, are to receive the Ursula M. Händel Animal Welfare Prize 2022 from DFG. Endowed with a total of €80,000, the prize is now being awarded for the ninth time to researchers who have brought about improvements in animal welfare in research based on the 3Rs principle. The three Rs stand for Replace, Reduce and Refine

While Michael Karl Melzer  is an early-career physician involved in both clinical work and scientific research, the Würzburg Initiative 3R (WI3R) is made up of a long-established team of scientists, namely Dr. Antje Appelt-Menzel, Dr. Gudrun Dandekar, Dr. Florian Groeber-Becker, Dr. Christian Lotz, assistant professor Dr. Marco Metzger, Dr. Maria Steinke and Dr. Daniela Zdzieblo.

“As a result of Michael Karl Melzer’s research findings, the use of experimental mice can be significantly reduced and replaced at several levels in the future, particularly in cancer research. His method is impressive in its simplicity and in view of the resulting ease with which it can be transferred into practice,” said the chair of the DFG Senate Commission for Animal Protection and Experimentation, Professor Dr. Brigitte Vollmar, who is also a member of the Händel Animal Welfare Prize jury. “The scientists involved in the Würzburg Initiative 3R (WI3R) have spent years involved in the development of several tissue models to replace animal experiments for use not just in research but also in the pharmaceutical, chemical and cosmetic industries. The team’s success is reflected in an impressive number of publications, patents and projects.”

Michael Karl Melzer impressed the jury with his proposal to reduce the consumption of so-called basement membrane matrix such as Matrigel by using pig bladder, which is not generally processed for the production of meat in Germany. Basement membrane matrices are used for research into embryonic development and tumour formation, for example. They are produced in mice by transplanting tumour cells. Melzer was able to show in his studies that both pancreatic organoids and pancreatic carcinoma organoids can grow very well on pig bladder. Previously it was necessary to transplant the carcinoma cells into experimental mice for this purpose. Melzer aims to primarily use his prize money to advance his research in these areas.

He studied medicine at the Technical University of Munich and obtained his doctorate there in 2020. Since 2019 he has worked as an assistant physician at the Department of Urology and Paediatric Urology at the University Hospital of Ulm. In addition to his clinical work, he has already published eight papers as a postdoc – an outstanding achievement given his career stage. Melzer is currently doing research into stem cell-based systems to better understand cancer development in the pancreas.

In its application, the Würzburg Initiative 3R (WI3R) presented the development and application of six in vitro models of the barrier organs skin, cornea, intestine, blood-brain barrier and lung as well as solid tumours: these serve to implement the “replacement” element of the 3R concept. The models are already widely used in infection and cancer research, for example, as well as in the testing of cosmetics, food supplements and medical products such as drugs and vaccinations. With the prize money, the team will seek to establish a 3R network, initiate scientific meetings and sponsor small-scale projects.

For more than ten years, the Würzburg Initiative 3R (WI3R) has been working on the highly complex modelling of disease processes and the testing of drug effects in ways which avoid animal experiments. One common underlying feature here is the goal of mimicking barrier functions of the body in vitro. The results achieved are of high technical quality and relevance to the application, as evidenced by a large number of publications in renowned international journals.

The prize winner and the prize-winning group were selected from among twelve applicants. The award ceremony is scheduled to be held on 13 October as part of an Animal Welfare Day, which is being organised by the University of Münster.

The Ursula M. Händel Animal Welfare Prize was instigated by its eponymous benefactress. Over a period of decades, Ursula M. Händel (1915-2011) from Düsseldorf engaged in a range of different activities to campaign for animal welfare. Among other things, she founded the Bonn Working Group for Animal Protection Law and was involved in the amendment of the Animal Protection Act. Händel provided the DFG with funds for the Animal Welfare Prize based on her deep commitment to animal welfare in science and research. The highest-endowed research prize of its kind in Germany, it is awarded every two years.

Information on the prize, Ursula M. Händel and the prize winners at:

www.dfg.de/haendel-preis

Programme contact at the DFG Head Office:

Dr. Paulin Wendler, Life Sciences 1, Tel. +49 228 885-3155, paulin.wendler@dfg.de

THINK Academia, the world’s first global initiative against bullying in the academic community

Business Announcement

CACTUS COMMUNICATIONS PVT. LTD.

Today Cactus Communications (CACTUS), a science communications and technology company, launched ‘THINK Academia’, an initiative that envisions a global academic culture that is free from all forms of bullying. THINK stands for Thoughtful, Humane, Inclusive, Nurturing, and Kind­— all the qualities that we believe are necessary to create a better, safer, and more welcoming work environment for researchers globally.

Commenting on this initiative, Abhishek Goel, CEO & Co-founder, CACTUS said, “The CACTUS Mental Health Survey was only the beginning of our quest to support researchers and the academic community. Over the past few years, a growing body of evidence has pointed to an alarming incidence of bullying within academia and academic institutions. To address this issue and bring it to the fore, CACTUS is launching the THINK Academia initiative. We believe that the vast majority of researchers are willing to declare their support for best practices and also fully inform themselves on what constitutes academic bullying. THINK Academia will work towards creating a better academia – one where bullying is no longer ignored.”

In 2020, the CACTUS Mental Health Survey – with over 13,000 responses from researchers globally –found that over one-third (37%) of survey respondents had experienced some form of bullying or discrimination at the workplace. Also, nearly 40% of respondents indicated that their organizations lacked stringent policies to avert or act against such hostile behaviours in the workplace. The data further showed that bullying is one of the major factors negatively affecting the mental health and wellbeing of researchers.

One of the main goals of THINK Academia is to spread awareness on what academic bullying looks like, including certain acts and behaviours that might be subtle, non-verbal, and invisible. We are encouraging researchers and academics to embody more positive behaviour, to lead with kindness and empathy in their interactions, and to be more mindful of their actions and behaviour. CACTUS is also urging academic institutions to create safer channels of communication and to implement policies that prioritize their people’s safety, health, and holistic wellbeing.

This initiative is calling several stakeholders within academia, including individual researchers and academics, universities, research institutions, academic societies, research-related organizations, and others, to sign the THINK Academia pledge and join us in our mission towards creating a global academic culture that is free from bullying.

To extend your support and get involved, sign the THINK Academia Pledge today – https://cactusglobal.com/think-academia
 

About Cactus Communications

Founded in 2002, Cactus Communications (cactusglobal.com) is a science communications and technology company. CACTUS solves problems for researchers, universities, publishers, academic societies, and life science organizations through innovative products and services developed under the brands Editage, Cactus Life Sciences, Researcher.Life, Impact Science, UNSILO, Paperpal and Cactus Labs. CACTUS has offices in Princeton, London, Aarhus, Singapore, Beijing, Shanghai, Seoul, Tokyo, and Mumbai; a global workforce of over 3,000 experts; and customers from over 190 countries. CACTUS is considered a pioneer in its workplace best practices and has been consistently ranked a great place to work over the last several years.

Recording the seasons in nature's notebook

Peer-Reviewed Publication

AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES

The proliferation of citizen science platforms has allowed for widespread collection of data in countless disciplines, including phenology, the study of the timing of seasonal events in plants and animals. Writing in BioScience, Theresa Crimmins of the USA National Phenology Network (NPN) and colleagues survey the research and applied scientific advances made using the Network’s digital platform, Nature’s Notebook.

According to the authors, since the platform launched in 2009, community members throughout North America have contributed over 30 million phenological records. Drawing on previous surveys, the authors were able to detect patterns in usership: first, individuals tend to use the platform for personal enjoyment and record observations, but the majority only contribute data for one season. Members of preexisting organized groups, such as schools, tend to contribute much more consistently and frequently, but on a more limited diversity of organisms. Other users are natural resource professionals and researchers. Data on the timing of seasonal events is critical for natural resource management, and data from Nature’s Notebook is increasingly employed for these purposes. For example, The US Fish and Wildlife Service engages the southern Arizona public to track the timing of flower resources used by the migratory lesser long-nosed bat, a species recently removed from the US Endangered Species List.

To conclude, the authors find that the platform is well-suited for asking and answering well-defined questions, but has limitations for answering unplanned questions as a result of spatial and temporal unevenness and species biases in data collection. They propose more structure in the data collection process as a solution to expand the potential uses of the data. However, they note that the NPN is "well positioned to drive phenology data collection across the country." The authors also touch on how to partner with Indigenous communities in the study of phenology with respect for data sovereignty, especially related to data on the locations of certain plants and animals.

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JOURNAL

BioScience

DOI

10.1093/biosci/biac061 

ARTICLE TITLE

Science and Management Advancements Made Possible by the USA National Phenology Network's Nature's Notebook Platform

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

3-Aug-2022

Experts to discuss 'tipping points' alliance

Meeting Announcement

UNIVERSITY OF EXETER

Experts will meet next month to discuss catastrophic climate "tipping points" – and the power of positive tipping points to avert the climate crisis.

The meeting, from 12-14 September at the University of Exeter, is intended as a "call to action" to build an alliance that can improve early warnings and accelerate positive change.

The world faces a growing threat of climate tipping points – thresholds which, once crossed, trigger irreversible changes such as the loss of the Amazon rainforest or the West Antarctic ice sheet.

But positive tipping points offer hope, and the meeting will consider ways to trigger these across sectors, communities and countries.

Speakers will include Professors Ricarda Winkelmann and Johan Rockström, from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research; Kate Raworth, author of "Doughnut Economics"; Dr Laura Pereira, from the University of Witwatersrand; and Keywan Riahi, from the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis

The meeting will be hosted by Exeter's Global Systems Institute (GSI).

Professor Tim Lenton, Director of the GSI, said: "The world seems to be crying out for this kind of joined-up thinking and action agenda.

"Attendees will have the opportunity to shape future research and positive action to address tipping points risks and opportunities."

Professor Rockström said: "The global tipping points conference comes at a critical juncture for humanity.

"We need a dramatic acceleration of progress, or we risk crossing irreversible tipping points.

"Join Tim Lenton and myself and other leading thinkers on tipping points at the conference to discuss how transformational change can be generated."

Scarlett Benson, Director at SYSTEMIQ and the Food and Land Use Coalition, said: "Understanding the potential for these positive tipping points is extremely empowering, since it is clear that many different actors have important roles to play.

"The conference in September will be an amazing opportunity for researchers, academia, civil society, policymakers, business and beyond to identify accelerated pathways for triggering systemic change towards sustainable transformation."

The event is open to anyone working on or interested in tipping points.

Speakers will be from academia, industry, government and NGOs to highlight the need for rapid and transformative solutions, as well as the risks and early warning requirements on negative tipping points.

There will be active engagement in a series of breakout workshops designed to co-develop new approaches for triggering positive tipping points for a socially just transformation.

The breakouts will work on opportunities for positive tipping points in finance, landscape restoration, food systems, finance, communications, behaviour change and on the role of social movements.

Most of the meeting will take place in person, with a small number of talks live-streamed for virtual audiences.

It has been organised by the Global Systems Institute, Earth Commission, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, World Climate Research Programme and Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.

For more information – including how to register or become a sponsor – visit: https://global-tipping-points.org/

Standard registration will close on August 8. Late registration opens on August 9 and closes on August 21.

NCAR study identifies where coral reefs may be buffered against warming oceans

Interactive global atlas can aid conservation efforts

Peer-Reviewed Publication

NATIONAL CENTER FOR ATMOSPHERIC RESEARCH/UNIVERSITY CORPORATION FOR ATMOSPHERIC RESEARCH

As warming ocean temperatures threaten the existence of coral reefs, scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) have successfully used an extremely high-resolution computer simulation of ocean circulation to identify possible “thermal refugia” where these biodiverse ecosystems are more likely to survive.

The research team has published an interactive, freely available online global atlas with the locations of these areas, where ocean dynamics and cooler waters combine to provide possible havens for coral reefs. 

“We hope this work serves as a starting point for other scientists who are interested in reefs,” said NCAR scientist Scott Bachman, who led the new study, published in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science. “We invite researchers to look at our website, identify where refugia may be, and then go observe the health of the reefs.”

The research was supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation, which is NCAR’s sponsor. The study was co-authored by scientists at the University of Tasmania and the University of Auckland.

Waves of cooler water

Climate change poses such a threat to coral reefs worldwide that the majority are expected to be lost in less than three decades, with warming ocean waters bleaching the reefs and leaving behind lifeless skeletons. The loss of coral reefs has far-reaching ramifications for the environment and society. They are home to almost a third of marine species and support hundreds of millions of people worldwide. Reefs generate an estimated global economic value of $10 trillion per year, and the protection they provide to shorelines from storm and flood damage is worth billions of dollars each year, according to NCAR scientist and study co-author Joan Kleypas. 

However, scientists have found that some reefs do fare better than others. In some regions of the ocean, for example, cooler water, lifted from the deep ocean by subsurface oscillations known as internal ocean gravity waves, can lap over the reefs and buffer them from increased heat.

“These gravity waves are everywhere, and under special conditions, they can bring cooler water near the surface of the ocean where reefs are,” Bachman said. “You need powerful waves with large amplitudes to collide with physical obstacles, like a seamount, to force the waves to slosh upwards.”

Scientists have understood for some time that this gravity wave phenomenon exists in select places. For example, a combination of the tides and the deep basins of the Coral Triangle — a marine area that includes the waters of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and other nearby countries — create conditions that favor gravity waves bringing cooler water to the surface. But it has been difficult to determine all the places across the globe where similar conditions could exist, in part because the gravity waves may not bring the water all the way to the surface and therefore cannot be identified by satellites.

Without the ability to observe the thermal refugia from space, scientists are left with computer modeling as a tool to identify them globally. The main obstacle for models, however, is scale. Coral reefs are relatively tiny compared to the vastness of the ocean, and running a simulation at high enough resolution over the entire globe to capture how gravity waves interact with a specific reef requires massive computational resources.

However, one such simulation exists. NASA’s Estimating the Circulation and Climate of the Ocean (ECCO) Project simulated the entire ocean at a resolution of about 2 kilometers and saved data at hourly time steps, frequent enough to accurately capture how internal gravity waves behave. To do the analysis that was necessary to identify thermal refugia, Bachman downloaded a staggering 400 terabytes of data from the ECCO Project.

“This type of study is not uncommon on a local scale,” Bachman said. “But it’s rare on a regional scale, and until now, it’s never before been done on a global scale.”

The resulting atlas offers some hope, according to Kleypas, who has conducted pioneering research into the effects of climate change on coral reefs.

“Coral reefs are not doing well, and we’ve all been going through a period of mourning,” Kleypas said. “This study highlights where there is cause for hope. We’re not saying that this atlas will solve everything, but it can help us be smarter about our approach to conserving the reefs that have the best chance of survival.”

This material is based upon work supported by the National Center for Atmospheric Research, a major facility sponsored by the National Science Foundation and managed by the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

 

About the article

Title: “A global atlas of potential thermal refugia for coral reefs generated by internal gravity waves”

Authors: Scott D. Bachman, Joan A. Kleypas, Mark Erdmann, and Edy Setyawan

Journal: Frontiers in Marine Science

 

On the web: news.ucar.edu

On Twitter: @NCAR_Science

 

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JOURNAL

Frontiers in Marine Science

DOI

10.3389/fmars.2022.921879 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Computational simulation/modeling

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Not applicable

ARTICLE TITLE

A global atlas of potential thermal refugia for coral reefs generated by internal gravity waves

New York City switch to clean buses cut air pollution

Peer-Reviewed Publication

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY'S MAILMAN SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH

The transition of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) bus fleet in New York City to cleaner fuels and engines was followed by declines in air pollution, particularly nitrous oxide. The study was led by scientists at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia Irving Medical Center, and Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health. The findings are published in the Journal Of Exposure Science And Environmental Epidemiology.

Beginning in 2000, the MTA began deploying compressed natural gas, hybrid electric, and low-sulfur diesel buses to reduce urban air pollution. In addition, existing buses were retrofitted with diesel particulate filters. The Federal Clean Air Act of 1990 set standards for all new bus purchases. Select cities, including New York City, were mandated to purchase clean fuel buses.

The researchers examined air pollution concentrations in 9,670 300mx300m grid cell areas across the five boroughs, as measured by the New York City Community Air Survey, between 2009 and 2014, as the MTA transitioned its fleet to clean buses. Data were assessed alongside depot- and route-specific data on the fleet transition and bus traffic sourced from publicly-available data and FOIL (Freedom of Information Law) requests.

The researchers found declines in nitrogen oxide (NO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and black carbon (BC), even in the 40 percent of cells without bus service. Declines in concentrations of NO and NO2 were greater in areas with more bus service and with higher proportional shifts toward clean buses, adjusted for truck route presence and total traffic volume.

Shifts toward clean bus service were associated with slower declines in BC concentration. This finding may be explained by the fact that hybrid diesel buses can produce more particulate matter than their conventional counterparts due to their smaller engine size. Alternately, it may be because the study was better attuned to measures of fresh combustion emissions such as NO, for which exposure rapidly decreases with distance to busy roadways.

“Our results provide evidence that the New York City clean bus program impacted concentrations of air pollution,” says first author Gina Lovasi, PhD, associate dean for education and Dornsife associate professor of urban health at Drexel University Dornsife School of Public Health. “It is likely that similar changes have happened or could be realized in other cities.”

“Air pollution is harmful to everyone, particularly children, and is known to raise risk for a host of health problems, from asthma to cognitive and behavioral problems,” adds study co-author Frederica Perera, PhD, director of translational research at Columbia University Center for Children’s Environmental Health and professor of environmental health sciences at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health.

Additional co-authors include Isha Shah, Alique Berberian, and Marianthi-Anna Kioumourtzoglou, Columbia Mailman School of Public Health; Christian Treat, Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons; and Dustin Fry and Jane Clougherty, Drexel University School of Public Health.

Funding support was provided by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) and the Environmental Protection Agency (ES09600), the NIEHS Center for28 Environmental Health in Northern Manhattan (ES009089), the John and Wendy Neu Family Foundation, and the Blanchette Hooker Rockefeller Foundation. The authors confirm no conflicting financial interests.

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JOURNAL

Journal of Exposure Science & Environmental Epidemiology

DOI

10.1038/s41370-022-00454-5 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Clean fleets, different streets: evaluating the effect of New York City’s clean bus program on changes to estimated ambient air pollution