Accurate aging of wild animals thanks to first epigenetic clock for bats

UMD-led research identifies age-related changes to DNA and reveals longevity-related differences between bat species

UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND

Research News

 

IMAGE: UMD-LED STUDY REVEALED AGE-RELATED CHANGES TO THE DNA OF BATS RELATED TO LONGEVITY. CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: COMMON VAMPIRE BAT, (G. WILKINSON), GREATER HORSESHOE BAT, RHINOLOPHUS FERRUMEQUINUM (G. JONES), VELVETY... view more 

CREDIT: G. WILKINSON, G. JONES, S. PUECHMAILLE, M. TSCHAPKA

A new study led by University of Maryland and UCLA researchers found that DNA from tissue samples can be used to accurately predict the age of bats in the wild. The study also showed age-related changes to the DNA of long-lived species are different from those in short-lived species, especially in regions of the genome near genes associated with cancer and immunity. This work provides new insight into causes of age-related declines.

This is the first research paper to show that animals in the wild can be accurately aged using an epigenetic clock, which predicts age based on specific changes to DNA. This work provides a new tool for biologists studying animals in the wild. In addition, the results provide insight into possible mechanisms behind the exceptional longevity of many bat species. The study appears in the March 12, 2021, issue of the journal Nature Communications.

"We hoped that these epigenetic changes would be predictive of age," said Gerald Wilkinson, a professor of biology at UMD and co-lead author of the paper. "But now we have the data to show that instead of having to follow animals over their lifetime to be sure of their age, you can just go out and take a tiny sample of an individual in the wild and be able to know its age, which allows us to ask all kinds of questions we couldn't before."

The researchers looked at DNA from 712 bats of known age, representing 26 species, to find changes in DNA methylation at sites in the genome known to be associated with aging. DNA methylation is a process that switches genes off. It occurs throughout development and is an important regulator for cells. Overall, methylation tends to decrease throughout the genome with age. Using machine learning to find patterns in the data, the researchers found that they could estimate a bat's age to within a year based on changes in methylation at 160 sites in the genome. The data also revealed that very long-lived bat species exhibit less change in methylation overall as they age than shorter-lived bats.

Wilkinson and his team then analyzed the genomes of four bat species--three long-lived and one short-lived--to identify the specific genes present in those regions of the genome where age-related differences in methylation correlated with longevity. They found specific sites on the genome where methylation was more likely to increase rather than decrease with age in the short-lived bats, but not in long-lived bats, and that those sites were located near 57 genes that mutate frequently in cancerous tumors and 195 genes involved in immunity.

"What's really interesting is that the sites where we found methylation increasing with age in the short-lived bats are near genes that have been shown to be involved in tumorigenesis--cancer--and immune response," Wilkinson said. "This suggests there may be something to look at in these regions regarding mechanisms responsible for longevity."

Wilkinson said analyzing methylation may provide insight into many age-related differences between species and lead to a better understanding of the causes for age-related declines across many species.

"Bats live a long time, and yet their hearing doesn't decay with age, the way ours does," he said. "You could use this method to see whether there are differences in methylation that are associated with hearing. There are all kinds of questions like this we can ask now."

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In addition to Wilkinson, co-authors of the paper from UMD include current postdoctoral associate Danielle M. Adams (Ph.D. '19, biological sciences) and former graduate students Bryan Arnold (Ph.D. '11, behavior, ecology, evolution, and systematics), now an associate professor at Illinois College; and Gerald Carter (Ph.D., '15, biology), now an assistant professor at Ohio State University; Edward Hurme (Ph.D. '20, biological sciences), now a postdoctoral associate at the University of Konstanz in Germany.

The research paper, "DNA methylation predicts age and provides insight into exceptional longevity of bats," was published in the March 12, 2021, issue of Nature Communications.

This work was supported by a grant from the Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group. The content of this article does not necessarily reflect the view of this organization.

Media Relations Contact: Kimbra Cutlip, 301-405-9463, kcutlip@umd.edu

University of Maryland
College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences
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@UMDscience

About the College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences

The College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences at the University of Maryland educates more than 9,000 future scientific leaders in its undergraduate and graduate programs each year. The college's 10 departments and more than a dozen interdisciplinary research centers foster scientific discovery with annual sponsored research funding exceeding $200 million.

'Magical' fire suppressant kills zombie fires 40% faster than water alone

ZOMBIE FIRES BURNING FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS UNDERGROUND 

IMPERIAL COLLEGE LONDON

Research News

 

The researchers say this is a big step in tackling smouldering peat fires, which are the largest fires on Earth. They ignite very easily, are notoriously difficult to put out, and release up to 100 times more carbon into the atmosphere than flaming fires, contributing to climate change.

The fires, known as 'zombie fires' for their ability to hide and smoulder underground and then reanimate as new flames days or weeks after the wildfire had been extinguished, are prevalent in regions like Southeast Asia, North America, and Siberia.

They are driven by the burning of soils rich in organic content like peat, which is a large natural reservoir of carbon. Worldwide, peat fires account for millions of tonnes of carbon released into the atmosphere each year.

Firefighters currently use millions to billions of litres of water per to tackle a peat fire: The 2008 Evans Road peat fire in the USA consumed 7.5 billion litres of water, and the 2018 Lake Cobrico peat fire in Australia consumed 65 million.

However, when water alone is used to extinguish peat fires, it tends to create a few large channels in the soil, diverting the water from nearby smouldering hotspots where it is most needed. This is partly why they take can so long to be extinguished.

Now, researchers at Imperial College London have combined water with an environmentally friendly fire suppressant that is already used to help extinguish flaming wildfires, to measure its effectiveness against peat fires at different concentrations.

During laboratory experiments at Imperial's HazeLab, they found that adding the suppressant to water helped them put out peat fires nearly twice as fast as using water alone, while using only a third to a half of the usual amount of water.

Lead author Muhammad Agung Santoso of Imperial's Department of Mechanical Engineering said: "The suppressant could enable firefighters to put out peat fires much faster while using between a third to half of the amount of water. This could be critical in ending pollution-related deaths, devastation of local communities, and environmental damage caused by these fires."

The results are published in International Journal of Wildland Fire.

IT IS AN ORGANIC SURFACTANT 

The suppressant, also known as a 'wetting agent', increases the penetrating properties of liquids like water by reducing their surface tension. This agent is made from plant matter and is biodegradable so it doesn't harm the environment. 

The researchers mixed the wetting agent with water at three concentrations: 0% (pure water), 1% (low concentration), and 5% (high concentration). They used each concentration on a laboratory peat fire with varying rates of flow between 0.3 and 18 litres per hour.

They found that the suppressant reduced the surface tension of the liquid, which made it less likely to create large channels and instead flow uniformly through the soil. Low-concentration solutions reduced the average fire suppression time by 39%, and the high concentration solution reduced it by 26% but more consistently. The average volume of liquid needed for suppression was 5.7 litres per kilogram of burning peat, regardless of flow rates or suppressant.

They also learned that the agent acts thermally and not chemically: it encapsulates the fire to bring down the temperature and remove the 'heat' element from the fire triangle. The other two essential elements for fire are oxygen and fuel.

Senior author Professor Guillermo Rein, Head of Hazelab at Imperial's Department of Mechanical Engineering, said: "Fighting peat fires uses an incredible amount of work, time and water, and this biodegradable wetting agent could help everybody: fire brigades, communities and the planet. This magical suppressant could make it easier to put zombie fires to rest for good."

The results provide a better understanding of the suppression mechanism of peat fires and could help to improve firefighting and mitigation strategies. The researchers are now looking to replicate their findings in controlled peat fires outside the lab in real peatlands.

This research was funded by the European Research Council and the Indonesia Endowment Fund for Education.

"Laboratory study on the suppression of smouldering peat wildfires: effects of flow rate and wetting agent" by Muhammad A. Santoso, Wuquan Cui, Hafiz M. F. Amin, Eirik G. Christensen, Yulianto S. Nugroho, and Guillermo Rein. Published 9 March 2021 in International Journal of Wildland Fire.

   

Research discovers malaria devastating humans far earlier than expected

UNIVERSITY OF OTAGO

Research News

 

New bioarchaeological research shows malaria has threatened human communities for more than 7000 years, earlier than when the onset of farming was thought to have sparked its devastating arrival.

Lead author Dr Melandri Vlok from the Department of Anatomy, University of Otago, says this ground-breaking research, published today in Scientific Reports, changes the entire understanding of the relationship humans have had with malaria, still one of the deadliest diseases in the world.

"Until now we've believed malaria became a global threat to humans when we turned to farming, but our research shows in at least Southeast Asia this disease was a threat to human groups well before that.

"This research providing a new cornerstone of malaria's evolution with humans is a great achievement by the entire team," Dr Vlok says.

Still a serious health issue, as recently as 2019 the World Health Organization reported an estimated 229 million cases of malaria around the world, with 67 per cent of malaria deaths in children under the age of 5 years.

While malaria is invisible in the archaeological record, the disease has changed the evolutionary history of human groups causing consequences visible in prehistoric skeletons. Certain genetic mutations can lead to the inheritance of Thalassemia, a devasting genetic disease that in its milder form provides some protection against malaria.

Deep in humanity's past, the genes for malaria became more common in Southeast Asia and the Pacific where it remains a threat, but up until now the origin of malaria has not been pinpointed. This research has identified thalassemia in an ancient hunter-gatherer archaeological site from Vietnam dated to approximately 7000 years ago, thousands of years before the transition to farming in the region.

In some parts of the world, slashing and burning in agricultural practice would have created pools of stagnant water attracting mosquitos carrying malaria, but in Southeast Asia these mosquitos are common forest dwellers exposing humans to the disease long before agriculture was adopted.

The study Forager and farmer evolutionary adaptations to malaria evidenced by 7000 years of thalassemia in Southeast Asia is a result of combined efforts from years of investigation by a team of researchers led by Professor Marc Oxenham (currently at the University of Aberdeen) and including researchers from University of Otago, the Australian National University (ANU), James Cook University, Vietnam Institute of Archaeology and Sapporo Medical University.

The research is the first of its kind to use microscopic techniques to investigate changes in bone tissue to identify thalassemia. In 2015, Professor Hallie Buckley from the University of Otago noticed changes in the bone of hunter-gatherers that made her suspicious that thalassemia might be the cause, but the bones were too poorly preserved to be certain. Professor Buckley called in microscopic bone expert Dr Justyna Miszkiewicz of ANU to investigate. Under the microscope, the ancient samples from Vietnam showed evidence for abnormal porosity mirroring modern-day bone loss complications in thalassemic patients.

At the same time, Dr Vlok, completing her doctoral research in Vietnam, found changes in the bones excavated in a 4000-year-old agricultural site in the same region as the 7000-year-old hunter-gatherer site. The combined research suggests a long history of evolutionary changes to malaria in Southeast Asia which continues today.

"A lot of pieces came together, then there was a startling moment of realisation that malaria was present and problematic for these people all those years ago, and a lot earlier than we've known about until now," Dr Vlok adds.

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New insulation takes heat off environment

Wool fibre + industrial waste = green solution

FLINDERS UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

IMAGE: ORGANIC CHEMIST ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR JUSTIN CHALKER, FLINDERS UNIVERSITY, AUSTRALIA view more 

CREDIT: FLINDERS UNIVERSITY

Waste cooking oil, sulfur and wool offcuts have been put to good use by green chemists at Flinders University to produce a sustainable new kind of housing insulation material.

The latest environmentally friendly building product from experts at the Flinders Chalker Lab and colleagues at Deakin and Liverpool University, has been described in a new paper published in Chemistry Europe ahead of Global Recycling Day (18 March 2021)

The insulating composite was made from the sustainable building blocks of wool fibres, sulfur, and canola oil to produce a promising new model for next-generation insulation - not only capitalising on wool's natural low flammability but also to make significant energy savings for property owners and tenants.

The new composite is one of several exciting new composites and polysulfide polymers made from waste products that are now being commercialised, says lead author Associate Professor Justin Chalker, the New Innovators winner in the 2020 Prime Minister's Prizes for Science.

"The aim of this new study was to evaluate a composite made from sulfur, canola oil, and wool as thermal insulation. The material is prepared by hot pressing raw wool with a polymer made from sulfur and canola oil," Associate Professor Chalker says.

"The promising mechanical and insulation properties of this composite bodes well for further exploration in energy saving insulation in our built environment."

The new study adds to a suite of other composites, such as a new type of building block and a renewable rubber material created in the Chalker Lab.

The long-term biodegradation of these materials in a safe and responsible way at the end of their life is also a target of the research.

The last decade has been described as the hottest on record, and reusing waste is one way to extend the life of billions of tonnes of natural resources consumed every year.

Global company Clean Earth Technologies is commercialising the polymers for a range of applications - from removing mercury contamination from soil and retrieving oil after a large-scale spill, to a polymer to release fertiliser more slowly to reduce run-off, and facilitating a safer method of leaching and extracting gold.

In line with the UN's Sustainable Development Goals 2030, Global Recycling Day recognises individuals, governments and organisations taking direct action to support the global green agenda.

Recycling is a key part of the circular economy, helping to protect our natural resources. Each year the 'Seventh Resource' (recyclables) saves over 700 million tonnes in CO2 emissions and this is projected to increase to 1 billion tonnes by 2030

CAPTION

ChemSusChem diagram in the new paper

CREDIT

Flinders University

The paper 'Insulating composites made from sulfur, canola oil, and wool' (2021) by IB Najmah, NA Lundquist, MK Stanfield, F Stojcevski, JA Campbell, LJ Esdaile, CT Gibson, DA Lewis, LC Henderson, T Hasell and JM Chalker has been published by the Wiley journal ChemSusChem (Chemistry-Sustainability-Energy-Materials) European Chemical Societies Publishing DOI: 10.1002/cssc.202100187

Funding for this research came from the Australian Research Council and the Royal Society with support from Flinders University Microscopy and Microanalysis Centre and SA node of the Australian National Fabrication Facility under the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy to provide nano and microfabrication facilities for Australia's researchers.

SYSTEMIC SEXIST HEALTHCARE

Heart attack diagnosis missed in women more often than in men

EUROPEAN SOCIETY OF CARDIOLOGY

Research News 

Chest pain is misdiagnosed in women more frequently than in men, according to research presented today at ESC Acute CardioVascular Care 2021, an online scientific congress of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC).1 The study also found that women with chest pain were more likely than men to wait over 12 hours before seeking medical help.

"Our findings suggest a gender gap in the first evaluation of chest pain, with the likelihood of heart attack being underestimated in women," said study author Dr. Gemma Martinez-Nadal of the Hospital Clinic of Barcelona, Spain. "The low suspicion of heart attack occurs in both women themselves and in physicians, leading to higher risks of late diagnosis and misdiagnosis."

This study examined gender differences in the presentation, diagnosis, and management of patients admitted with chest pain to the chest pain unit of an emergency department between 2008 and 2019. Information was collected on risk factors for a heart attack including high blood pressure and obesity. The researchers recorded the physician's initial diagnosis after the first evaluation of each patient, which is based on clinical history, physical examination, and an electrocardiogram (ECG) and occurs before other examinations like blood tests.

"We had the first impression of the doctor as to whether the chest pain had a coronary cause or another origin such as anxiety or a musculoskeletal complaint," explained Dr. Martinez-Nadal.

A total of 41,828 patients with chest pain were included, of which 42% were women. The median age was 65 years in women and 59 years in men. Women were significantly more likely to present late to the hospital (defined as waiting 12 hours or longer after symptom onset): this occurred in 41% of women compared to 37% of men.

"This is worrying since chest pain is the main symptom of reduced blood flow to the heart (ischaemia) because an artery has narrowed," said Dr. Martinez-Nadal. "It can lead to a myocardial infarction which needs rapid treatment."

In the physician's initial diagnosis, acute coronary syndrome was more likely to be considered the cause of chest pain in men compared to women. Specifically, in 93% of patients, the ECG did not provide a definitive diagnosis. In those patients, the doctor noted a probable acute coronary syndrome (ACS) in 42% of cases - when analysed according to gender, probable ACS was noted in 39% of women and 44.5% of men (p<0.001). The significantly lower suspicion of ACS in females was maintained regardless of the number of risk factors or the presence of typical chest pain.

Dr. Martinez-Nadal said: "In the doctor's first impression, women were more likely than men to be suspected of a non-ischaemic problem. Risk factors like hypertension and smoking should instil a higher suspicion of possible ischaemia in patients with chest pain. But we observed that women with risk factors were still less likely than men to be classified as 'probable ischaemia'."

In women, 5% of ACS were initially misdiagnosed, whereas in men, 3% of ACS were initially misdiagnosed (p<0.001). After multivariate analysis, female gender was an independent risk factor for an initial impression of non-ACS.

Dr. Martinez-Nadal said: "Heart attack has traditionally been considered a male disease, and has been understudied, underdiagnosed, and undertreated in women, who may attribute symptoms to stress or anxiety. Both women and men with chest pain should seek medical help urgently."

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Authors: ESC Press Office
Tel: +33 (0)4 89 87 20 85
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Email: press@escardio.org

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Notes to editor

Funding: Josep Font 2019 Grant.

Disclosures: None.

References and notes

1Abstract title: An analysis based on sex & gender in the chest pain unit of an emergency department during the last 12 years.

About the Association for Acute CardioVascular Care

The Association for Acute CardioVascular Care (ACVC) is a branch of the ESC. Its mission is to improve the quality of care and outcomes of patients with acute cardiovascular disease.

About ESC Acute CardioVascular Care Congress 2021 #ACVC2021

ESC Acute CardioVascular Care Congress 2021 is the online annual congress of the Association for Acute CardioVascular Care of the ESC.

About the European Society of Cardiology

The European Society of Cardiology brings together health care professionals from more than 150 countries, working to advance cardiovascular medicine and help people lead longer, healthier lives.

Information for journalists about registration for ESC Acute CardioVascular Care 2021

ESC Acute CardioVascular Care 2021 takes place 13 and 14 March online.

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Multiyear workplace health promotion program shown to prevent health risks

The results of an eight-year workplace health promotion program were encouraging for health promotion

UNIVERSITY OF JYVÄSKYLÄ - JYVÄSKYLÄN YLIOPISTO

Research News

 

IMAGE: A MULTIYEAR WORKPLACE HEALTH PROMOTION PROGRAM CAN SLOW DOWN THE INCREASE IN HEALTH RISKS FOR WORKING-AGE PEOPLE. view more 

CREDIT: 4EVENT OY / TUOMAS VUORIO

A multiyear workplace health promotion program can slow down the increase in health risks for working-age people. A study by the Faculty of Sport and Health Sciences at the University of Jyväskylä followed what kind of changes happened among participants during an eight-year workplace health promotion program in smoking, minor exercise, high blood pressure, musculoskeletal disorders, and overweight. The results of the study were encouraging for health promotion.

According to earlier studies, a high number of health risks are connected to an increase in occupational health care costs, lower productivity at work, and the growing number of sickness absences. Multiyear preventive actions at workplaces have not yet been studied much, and no research results have previously been available for studying which changes in health risks can be achieved during several years of intervention.

"Earlier studies have indicated that prevention is possible, but most of the studied programs have lasted only from one to three years," states Antti Äikäs, a doctoral student at the University of Jyväskylä. "Our research showed that in the long run we can prevent people in the low- or moderate-level risk groups from transitioning into the group of high-level health risks."

According to the research results, the study group had fewer health risks than average Finnish working-age people. The health risk assessments showed that 50-60% of the male-dominated personnel were categorized to the low-level health risk group (0-1 risks), 30-35% to the moderate-level group (2-3 risks), and 9-11% to the high-level health risk group (more than 4 risks).

The study also compared changes between low-, moderate- and high-risk groups during the multiyear health promotion program, and found that most of the personnel remained at the same level, 13-15% improved their rating, while the rating deteriorated for only 12-21%.

Impacts of aging were delayed

Health risks tend to get more common as people age. However, this study showed no statistically significant growth in the total number of health risks in the target population.

"Our research team detected improvements as well as deterioration among the participants, which means that the overall change was minimal," Äikäs notes. "The results are encouraging for maintaining working ability and enhancing national health."

The study examined a multiyear workplace health promotion program that was carried out by a Finnish forest corporation (N = 523-651) and a Finnish wellness company 4event Ltd from 2010 to 2017. The average age of the participants was 43.8 years. Over 120 separate services were performed around Finland during the program. During the first four years, the services were focused to support the lifestyle change of the employees, and the last four years were focused on mental resources and workplace atmosphere. The incidence of health risks was surveyed through three different health risk assessments by carrying out physiological measurements and questionnaires in 2010-2011, 2013-2014, and 2016-2017.

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This article is part of the dissertation by Antti Äikäs, which was financed by the Juho Vainio Foundation and the Urheiluopistosäätiö. Äikäs worked previously as the wellness business director in 4event Ltd.

High emotional intelligence 'can help to identify fake news'

UNIVERSITY OF STRATHCLYDE

Research News

 

People with high levels of emotional intelligence are less likely to be susceptible to 'fake news', according to research at the University of Strathclyde.

The study invited participants to read a series of news items on social media and to ascertain whether they were real or fictitious, briefly describing the reasons for their answers. They were also asked to complete a test to determine their levels of emotional intelligence (EQ or emotional quotient) and were asked a number of questions when considering the veracity of each news item.

Researchers found that those who identified the types of news correctly were most likely to score highly in the EQ tests. There was a similar correlation between correct identification and educational attainment.

The study, by researchers in Strathclyde's School of Psychological Sciences & Health and School of Government & Public Policy, has been published in the journal PLOS ONE.

Dr Tony Anderson, Senior Teaching Fellow in Psychology at Strathclyde and partner in the research, said: "Fake news on social media is now a matter of considerable public and governmental concern. Research on dealing with this issue is still in its infancy but recent studies have started to focus on the psychological factors which might make some individuals less susceptible to fake news.

"We assessed whether people were better able to disregard the emotionally charged content of such items and better equipped to assess the veracity of the information. We found that, while distinguishing real news content from fake was challenging, on average participants were more likely to make the correct decision than not.

"Previous research has shown that people can be trained to enhance their own EQ levels. This should help them to discern with a greater degree of accuracy which news is reliable and which is misleading."

Participants were presented with real and fabricated news stories on issues including health, crime, wealth inequality and the environment. Fictitious items featured aspects including emotive language, brief information and a lack of attributed sources.

Comments from people who incorrectly believed fabricated stories were real included: "I have personal experience of this"; "My kids are in this position so I completely get this"; "The graph shows it all" and "The commenter on the post has the same thoughts as me." Those who correctly identified fictitious stories made comments including: "There is emotive/condescending language in the blurb"; "Fearmongering article with no data"; "The source is not an official scientific or governmental source" and "Comes across as more of a rant."

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How to spot deepfakes? Look at light reflection in the eyes

University at Buffalo deepfake spotting tool proves 94% effective with portrait-like photos, according to study

UNIVERSITY AT BUFFALO

Research News

 

IMAGE: QUESTION: WHICH OF THESE PEOPLE ARE FAKE? ANSWER: ALL OF THEM. view more 

CREDIT: CREDIT: WWW.THISPERSONDOESNOTEXIST.COM AND THE UNIVERSITY AT BUFFALO.

BUFFALO, N.Y. - University at Buffalo computer scientists have developed a tool that automatically identifies deepfake photos by analyzing light reflections in the eyes.

The tool proved 94% effective in experiments described in a paper accepted at the IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing to be held in June in Toronto, Canada.

"The cornea is almost like a perfect semisphere and is very reflective," says the paper's lead author, Siwei Lyu, PhD, SUNY Empire Innovation Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering. "So, anything that is coming to the eye with a light emitting from those sources will have an image on the cornea.

"The two eyes should have very similar reflective patterns because they're seeing the same thing. It's something that we typically don't typically notice when we look at a face," says Lyu, a multimedia and digital forensics expert who has testified before Congress.

The paper, "Exposing GAN-Generated Faces Using Inconsistent Corneal Specular Highlights," is available on the open access repository arXiv.

Co-authors are Shu Hu, a third-year computer science PhD student and research assistant in the Media Forensic Lab at UB, and Yuezun Li, PhD, a former senior research scientist at UB who is now a lecturer at the Ocean University of China's Center on Artificial Intelligence.

Tool maps face, examines tiny differences in eyes

When we look at something, the image of what we see is reflected in our eyes. In a real photo or video, the reflections on the eyes would generally appear to be the same shape and color.

However, most images generated by artificial intelligence - including generative adversary network (GAN) images - fail to accurately or consistently do this, possibly due to many photos combined to generate the fake image.

Lyu's tool exploits this shortcoming by spotting tiny deviations in reflected light in the eyes of deepfake images.

To conduct the experiments, the research team obtained real images from Flickr Faces-HQ, as well as fake images from http://www.thispersondoesnotexist.com, a repository of AI-generated faces that look lifelike but are indeed fake. All images were portrait-like (real people and fake people looking directly into the camera with good lighting) and 1,024 by 1,024 pixels.

The tool works by mapping out each face. It then examines the eyes, followed by the eyeballs and lastly the light reflected in each eyeball. It compares in incredible detail potential differences in shape, light intensity and other features of the reflected light.

'Deepfake-o-meter,' and commitment to fight deepfakes

While promising, Lyu's technique has limitations.

For one, you need a reflected source of light. Also, mismatched light reflections of the eyes can be fixed during editing of the image. Additionally, the technique looks only at the individual pixels reflected in the eyes - not the shape of the eye, the shapes within the eyes, or the nature of what's reflected in the eyes.

Finally, the technique compares the reflections within both eyes. If the subject is missing an eye, or the eye is not visible, the technique fails.

Lyu, who has researched machine learning and computer vision projects for over 20 years, previously proved that deepfake videos tend to have inconsistent or nonexistent blink rates for the video subjects.

In addition to testifying before Congress, he assisted Facebook in 2020 with its deepfake detection global challenge, and he helped create the "Deepfake-o-meter," an online resource to help the average person test to see if the video they've watched is, in fact, a deepfake.

He says identifying deepfakes is increasingly important, especially given the hyper-partisan world full of race-and gender-related tensions and the dangers of disinformation - particularly violence.

"Unfortunately, a big chunk of these kinds of fake videos were created for pornographic purposes, and that (caused) a lot of ... psychological damage to the victims," Lyu says. "There's also the potential political impact, the fake video showing politicians saying something or doing something that they're not supposed to do. That's bad."

Study suggests role of sleep in healing traumatic brain injuries

Technique developed at OHSU measures brain's waste-clearance system through MRIs

OREGON HEALTH & SCIENCE UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

Sound sleep plays a critical role in healing traumatic brain injury, a new study of military veterans suggests.

The study, published in the Journal of Neurotrauma, used a new technique involving magnetic resonance imaging developed at Oregon Health & Science University. Researchers used MRI to evaluate the enlargement of perivascular spaces that surround blood vessels in the brain. Enlargement of these spaces occurs in aging and is associated with the development of dementia.

Among veterans in the study, those who slept poorly had more evidence of these enlarged spaces and more post-concussive symptoms.

"This has huge implications for the armed forces as well as civilians," said lead author Juan Piantino, M.D., MCR, assistant professor of pediatrics (neurology) in the OHSU School of Medicine and Doernbecher Children's Hospital. "This study suggests sleep may play an important role in clearing waste from the brain after traumatic brain injury - and if you don't sleep very well, you might not clean your brain as efficiently."

Piantino, a physician-scientist with OHSU's Papé Family Pediatric Research Institute, studies the effects of poor sleep on recovery after traumatic brain injuries.

The new study benefited from a method of analyzing MRIs developed by study co-author Daniel Schwartz and Erin Boespflug, Ph.D., under the direction of Lisa Silbert, M.D., M.C.R., professor of neurology in the OHSU School of Medicine. The technique measures changes in the brain's perivascular spaces, which are part of the brain's waste clearance system known as the glymphatic system.

"We were able to very precisely measure this structure and count the number, location and diameter of channels," Piantino said.

Co-author Jeffrey Iliff, Ph.D., professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and of neurology at the University of Washington and a researcher at the VA Puget Sound Health Care System, has led scientific research into the glymphatic system and its role in neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer's disease. During sleep, this brain-wide network clears away metabolic proteins that would otherwise build up in the brain.

The study used data collected from a group of 56 veterans enrolled by co-authors Elaine Peskind, M.D., and Murray Raskind, M.D., at the Mental Illness Research, Education and Clinical Center at the VA Puget Sound between 2011 and 2019.

"Imagine your brain is generating all this waste and everything is working fine," Piantino said. "Now you get a concussion. The brain generates much more waste that it has to remove, but the system becomes plugged."

Piantino said the new study suggests the technique developed by Silbert could be useful for older adults.

"Longer term, we can start thinking about using this method to predict who is going to be at higher risk for cognitive problems including dementia," he said.

The study is the latest in a growing body of research highlighting the importance of sleep in brain health.

Improving sleep is a modifiable habit that can be improved through a variety of methods, Piantino said, including better sleep hygiene habits such as reducing screen time before bed. Improving sleep is a focus of research of other OHSU scientists, including Piantino's mentor, Miranda Lim, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of neurology, medicine and behavioral neuroscience in the OHSU School of Medicine.

"This study puts sleep at the epicenter of recovery in traumatic brain injury," Piantino said.

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The study was supported by the National heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health, award K23HL150217-01; the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Rehabilitation Research and Development Service Merit Review grant B77421; and NIH award P30AG008017-18.

DEEPWATER HORIZON

Oil in the ocean photooxides within hours to days, new study finds

Study provides new details on the fate of spilled oil in the marine environment, effectiveness of chemical dispersants

UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI ROSENSTIEL SCHOOL OF MARINE & ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCE

Research News

 

IMAGE: SATELLITE IMAGE TAKEN ON MAY 9, 2010 OF THE DEEPWATER HORIZON OIL SPILL SITE IN THE GULF OF MEXICO. view more 

CREDIT: MODIS ON NASA'S AQUA SATELLITE, 9 MAY 2010 @ 190848 UTC. DOWNLINK AND PROCESSED AT THE UM ROSENSTIEL SCHOOL'S CENTER FOR SOUTHEASTERN TROPICAL ADVANCED REMOTE SENSING (CSTARS)

MIAMI--A new study lead by scientists at the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science demonstrates that under realistic environmental conditions oil drifting in the ocean after the DWH oil spill photooxidized into persistent compounds within hours to days, instead over long periods of time as was thought during the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill. This is the first model results to support the new paradigm of photooxidation that emerged from laboratory research.

After an oil spill, oil droplets on the ocean surface can be transformed by a weathering process known as photooxidation, which results in the degradation of crude oil from exposure to light and oxygen into new by-products over time. Tar, a by-product of this weathering process, can remain in coastal areas for decades after a spill. Despite the significant consequences of this weathering pathway, photooxidation was not taken into account in oil spill models or the oil budget calculations during the Deepwater Horizon spill.

The UM Rosenstiel School research team developed the first oil-spill model algorithm that tracks the dose of solar radiation oil droplets receive as they rise from the deep sea and are transported at the ocean surface. The authors found that the weathering of oil droplets by solar light occurred within hours to days, and that roughly 75 percent of the photooxidation during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill occurred on the same areas where chemical dispersants were sprayed from aircraft. Photooxidized oil is known to reduce the effectiveness of aerial dispersants.

"Understanding the timing and location of this weathering process is highly consequential. said Claire Paris, a UM Rosenstiel School faculty and senior author of the study. "It helps directing efforts and resources on fresh oil while avoiding stressing the environment with chemical dispersants on oil that cannot be dispersed."

"Photooxidized compounds like tar persist longer in the environment, so modeling the likelihood of photooxidation is critically important not only for guiding first response decisions during an oil spill and restoration efforts afterwards, but it also needs to be taken into account on risk assessments before exploration activities" added Ana Carolina Vaz, assistant scientist at UM's Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies and lead author of the study.

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The study, titled "A Coupled Lagrangian-Earth System Model for Predicting Oil Photooxidation," was published online on Feb 19, 2021 in the journal Frontiers in Marine Science. The authors of the paper include: Ana Carolina Vaz, Claire Beatrix Paris and Robin Faillettaz.

The study was supported by the Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative (GoMRI): C-IMAGE III (Center for the Integrated Modeling and Analysis of the Gulf Ecosystem) and RECOVER 2 (Relationship of Effects of Cardiac Outcomes in ?sh for Validation of Ecological Risk).