As temperatures break records, many are unaware of symptoms of heat-related illnesses

Increasing numbers link extreme heat to climate change

Reports and Proceedings

Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania

 

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Cooling center knowledge

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Credit: Annenberg Public Policy Center

PHILADELPHIA – With NASA data showing that July 22, 2024, was the hottest day on record and indications that July may have been the hottest month, an Annenberg Public Policy Center survey conducted in mid-July found that most people know three of the symptoms of a heat-related illness but do not know the location of their nearest cooling center. At the same time, increasing numbers of people think that heat waves are becoming more frequent and intense and affecting their daily activities.

Knowledge of cooling centers in the case of extreme heat

Although the locations of cooling centers, or indoor air-conditioned facilities such as libraries, community and senior centers, schools are publicized by city governments on hot days, many of those surveyed report being unaware of where to find one. Two-thirds of respondents (67%) say they do not know the location of a cooling center to which they could go to in case of extreme heat, a number statistically unchanged from last November. “Communities must do a better job of making the public, especially the most vulnerable, aware of these centers,” said Ken Winneg, managing director of survey research at APPC.

More today see link between extreme heat and climate change.

When compared with an APPC survey in November 2023, significantly more people now say that climate change is increasing the risk of heat-related illnesses, respiratory diseases, and insect-borne diseases. Two-thirds (67%) hold this view vs. just under 6 in 10 (58%) in November 2023.

More people indicate that heat waves in the United States are becoming more frequent and intense than in the past. About two-thirds (65%) believe heat waves are becoming more frequent and intense. Fifty-eight percent (58%) felt this way in November 2023, when we last asked the question. About a quarter (24%) believe heat waves are about as frequent and intense as they have always been, statistically unchanged from our earlier survey.

At the same time, the proportion of people who say extreme heat has often or frequently affected their typical daily activities in the past year has increased significantly. Forty-three percent (43%) say extreme outdoor heat has often (22%) or frequently (21%) affected their daily activities, an 8-point increase compared with November 2023 (35% in total said either “often” or “frequently”).

Symptoms of heat-related illnesses

Credit

Annenberg Public Policy Center

Signs of heat-related illnesses

Notably, most people also know three of the telltale signs of heat-related illnesses:

• Dizziness (89% compared to 86% in August 2022)
• Nausea (83% compared to 79% in August 2022)
• Hot, red, dry, or damp skin (72%, statistically unchanged from August 2022)
• Cold, pale, and clammy skin (42%, statistically unchanged from August 2022).

Public understands some extreme heat risks better than others

Thinking about the next 10 years, just under 6 in 10 (58%) think that people in their community will be more likely to experience heat stroke caused by extreme heat waves. This is significantly higher than in November 2023 when just over half (52%) said they thought people in their community would be more likely to experience heat stroke caused by extreme heat waves in the next 10 years.

However, only 3 in 10 (30%) know that a pregnant person in the U.S. who is exposed to extreme heat is more likely to deliver their baby early than a pregnant person who is not exposed to extreme heat. About a quarter (23%) incorrectly say that a pregnant person in the U.S. is either less or just as likely to deliver a baby early. Forty-seven percent (47%) are unsure which is correct.

Broad awareness that heat-related deaths are most common among seniors

Two-thirds (67%) know that heat-related deaths are most common among older adults, aged 65 or older, slightly but significantly higher than in August 2022 (62%).

Preventing heat-related illnesses

Nearly all (92%) know that drinking water is better to prevent heat-related illnesses than drinking sugary drinks.

APPC’s ASAPH survey

The survey data come from the 20th wave of a nationally representative panel of 1,496 U.S. adults, first empaneled in April 2021, conducted for the Annenberg Public Policy Center by SSRS, an independent market research company. This wave of the Annenberg Science and Public Health Knowledge (ASAPH) survey was fielded July 11-18, 2024, and has a margin of sampling error (MOE) of ± 3.6 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. All figures are rounded to the nearest whole number and may not add to 100%. Combined subcategories may not add to totals in the topline and text due to rounding.

Download the topline and methodology statement.

The policy center has been tracking the American public’s knowledge, beliefs, and behaviors regarding vaccination, Covid-19, mpox, flu, maternal health, climate change, and other consequential health issues through this Annenberg Science and Public Health (ASAPH) knowledge survey panel for over three years. In addition to Winneg, the APPC team includes senior data analyst Laura Gibson; research analyst Shawn Patterson Jr. and Patrick E. Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Health and Risk Communication Institute.

The Annenberg Public Policy Center was established in 1993 to educate the public and policy makers about communication’s role in advancing public understanding of political, science, and health issues at the local, state, and federal levels.

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Method of Research

Survey

Subject of Research

People

 

New study will provide HIV prevention and treatment for incarcerated people with opioid use disorder

UMass Amherst and Tufts Medical Center receive $4.74 million grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to design, implement and assess the intervention

University of Massachusetts Amherst

The University of Massachusetts Amherst and Tufts Medical Center are conducting a study to provide HIV prevention, diagnosis and treatment for people with opioid use disorders who are incarcerated in the Boston area. 

The study is funded with a $4.74 million CONNECT grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Elizabeth Evans, professor of community health education in the UMass Amherst School of Public Health and Health Sciences, and Dr. Alysse Wurcel, a physician and infectious disease consultant for the Massachusetts Sheriffs Association, will collaborate to lead the research. 

“Many people with opioid use disorder pass through carceral and legal systems,” Evans notes. “Improved access to high-quality, evidence-based treatment for HIV and other infectious diseases in justice settings is critical to addressing the overdose crisis.”

Dr. Wurcel adds, “We’re trying to increase the number of incarcerated people who are tested and treated. Overall people who are incarcerated are more likely to test positive for HIV than people who are not incarcerated. By the CDC guidelines, anyone in jail is at risk.”  

Those who test positive should be given treatment and those who test negative should be offered pre-exposure HIV medications to prevent the disease. Treatment and prevention while incarcerated involves taking medication every day, Wurcel says. 

“Dr. Wurcel and I are fortunate to lead this study in collaboration with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health and the Suffolk County jail system, where there is unprecedented cross-sector motivation to learn how to improve HIV care for incarcerated people and integrate HIV care into the jails’ existing programs,” Evans says.

  Initial study activities are focused on developing an intervention program called ID-TOUCH. Linnea Evans and Kaitlyn Jaffe, assistant professors of health promotion and policy at UMass Amherst, are co-leading efforts to examine the feasibility and acceptability of the intervention by incarcerated people, staff at the Suffolk jails and other community-based partners. 

“HIV testing and medications that prevent HIV (pre-exposure prophylaxis, known as PrEP) are evidence-based and cost-effective, yet are not adequately reaching justice-involved people,” Linnea Evans says. “Many are members of minoritized racial/ethnic groups and live in communities disproportionately impacted by HIV and the opioid epidemic. Addressing the health disparities that these service-need gaps exacerbate for socially and economically marginalized groups is a key impetus for our study.”

The study will serve as the foundation for future research that may create a model HIV treatment and prevention program for other jurisdictions around the commonwealth and the country.

“Our research will help us better understand how to create equitable access to infectious disease healthcare and treatment for people living in jail settings and returning to the community,” Jaffe says. “Along the way, we are involving people with lived and living experience of incarceration and opioid use to ensure that the intervention is matched to the needs of this population.”

 

Lemurs use long-term memory, smell, and social cues to find food

Multiple factors work in tandem to help lemurs locate cantaloupe and remember where to find the fruit weeks later

New York University

 

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Two mongoose lemurs find cantaloupe hidden in a container at the Lemur Conservation Foundation in Florida.

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Credit: Elena Cunningham

How do foraging animals find their food? A new study by New York University researchers shows that lemurs use smell, social cues, and long-term memory to locate hidden fruit—a combination of factors that may have deep evolutionary roots.

“Our study provides evidence that lemurs can integrate sensory information with ecological and social knowledge, which demonstrates their ability to consider multiple aspects of a problem,” said anthropologist Elena Cunningham, a clinical professor of molecular pathobiology at NYU College of Dentistry and the lead author of the study, published in the International Journal of Primatology.

Animals rely on their senses and environmental and social knowledge to locate food and water. These factors—perhaps in combination—are thought to have played a role in primates evolving to have larger brains and higher cognitive abilities than other animals.

“Historically, there have been two schools of thought on why primates developed bigger brains: ecological pressures, such as needing to find scarce fruit in the forest, and the social pressures of living in a group where everyone is trying to outsmart one another,” said Cunningham. “I have long been interested in the interplay between social and ecological factors when it comes to cognition—it seems like a given that these would have evolved in relation to each other.”

To better understand how primates integrate these factors in order to find food, Cunningham traveled to the Lemur Conservation Foundation in Myakka City, Florida, a reserve dedicated to researching and protecting lemurs outside of their native Madagascar. The Foundation is home to several lemur species, including brown lemurs—social animals who have a keen sense of smell (far better than humans) and whose diet is primarily fruit.

Studying the brown lemurs in pairs and groups of three, the researchers conducted several experiments by hiding pieces of cantaloupe in cardboard takeout containers and placing both fruit-filled and empty containers in the lemurs’ environments. They then observed how the groups of lemurs investigated and opened the containers, noting their interactions with one another.

Despite the empty takeout containers outnumbering the ones with cantaloupe, the lemurs had little trouble finding and eating the fruit—and several factors appeared to be working in tandem. The lemurs quickly learned which containers had food in them, and could remember the location of the fruit-filled containers days, weeks, and even months later: the order in which they approached baited containers was about 50 percent better than chance. But, the lemurs almost always (98 percent of the time) opened the fruit-filled containers first, suggesting that they used their sense of smell to detect the cantaloupe at close range.

In addition, the researchers observed that the lemurs’ individual strategies for finding fruit were influenced by social factors. Some groups were egalitarian and information and melon were willingly shared, while in other more hierarchical groups, the dominant lemurs took advantage of the subordinates discovering the cantaloupe and helped themselves once the fruit was found. But the subordinates were more likely to find the fruit and some used their “finder’s advantage” to eat more of the melon.

“What our study shows is that these three factors are all operating at the same time—the lemurs have memories of where the food is and they are considering olfactory information and social factors,” said Cunningham. “We still have much to learn about how this interplay and the evolution of cognition, but it's important to look at these factors not in isolation, but in conversation.”

Additional study authors include Malvin Janal, Rachelle Wolk, and Maria Gonzalez-Robles of NYU Dentistry. The research was supported by the NYU Research Challenge Fund Program and NYU College of Dentistry Academy of Distinguished Educators Funding Award.

A mongoose lemur looks for food in a takeout container at the Lemur Conservation Foundation in Florida. 

Credit

Elena Cunningham

Journal

International Journal of Primatology

DOI

10.1007/s10764-024-00448-0 

Method of Research

Experimental study

Subject of Research

Animals

Article Title

Brown Lemur (Eulemur spp.) Use of Olfaction, Memory, and Social Strategies to Obtain Cantaloupe

 

Radiotherapy benefits last a decade, breast cancer study reveals

University of Edinburgh

Providing radiotherapy after surgery could prevent breast cancer from returning in the same place for up to 10 years, a long-term study suggests.

This protective effect is limited after a decade, when the risk of cancer recurrence is similar to that in those who have not received radiotherapy.

The findings provide a more complete picture of the long-term benefits of radiotherapy following breast cancer surgery, experts say.

Surgery followed by radiotherapy remains the standard care for women with early-stage breast cancer. Radiotherapy targets high doses of radiation to the breast to destroy any remaining cancer cells after removal of the tumour.

The Scottish Breast Conservation Trial, led by the University of Edinburgh, looked at 585 women who received treatment for early-stage breast cancer in Scotland – half received radiotherapy and half did not. The average follow-up period for patients was 18 years, with some cases followed for more than three decades.

After 10 years, 16 per cent of those who had radiotherapy had experienced the return of their cancer in the same location, compared with 36 per cent of those who did not have the treatment.

Despite a reduction in cancer recurrence, survival rates did not improve with radiotherapy treatment.

Average overall survival rates after 30 years were similar for those who received postoperative radiotherapy and those who did not – 19.2 years and 18.7 years, respectively.

There were fewer deaths from breast cancer among those who received radiotherapy than those who did not – 37 per cent versus 46 per cent. By contrast, there were more deaths from other cancers in the group who received radiotherapy – 20 per cent versus 11 per cent.

Understanding the long-term impact of radiotherapy is increasingly important, as improvements in the detection and treatment of early-stage breast cancer mean that patients are living longer, experts say.

The study, funded by Exact Sciences and the Breast Cancer Institute, part of NHS Lothian Charity, is published in the journal The Lancet Oncology: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanonc/article/PIIS1470-2045(24)00347-4/fulltext [URL will become active after embargo lifts].

The research team included experts from the Usher Institute and the Institute of Genetics and Cancer at the University of Edinburgh, Public Health Scotland, Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow, and the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh.

Dr Linda Williams, from the University of Edinburgh’s Usher Institute and lead author, said: “This 30-year study marks the longest follow-up of postoperative radiotherapy in the treatment of early-stage breast cancer. Long-term studies like this, which go beyond 10 years of follow up, are crucial to fully assess the risks and benefits of treatments.”

Professor Ian Kunkler, from the University of Edinburgh’s Institute of Genetics and Cancer, said: “Our evidence suggests that radiotherapy protects against cancer returning in the same breast for up to 10 years. It supports the continued use of radiotherapy after breast-conserving surgery for most patients with early breast cancer. Like other anti-cancer treatments, radiotherapy loses its beneficial effects in the long term."

For further information, please contact: Jess Conway, Press and PR Office, 07979 446209, jess.conway@ed.ac.uk  

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Journal

The Lancet Oncology

DOI

10.1016/S1470-2045(24)00347-4 

Method of Research

Randomized controlled/clinical trial

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Postoperative radiotherapy in women with early operable breast cancer (Scottish Breast Conservation Trial): 30-year update of a randomised, controlled, phase 3 trial

Article Publication Date

7-Aug-2024

 

Finding pearls in the mud: eco-friendly tungsten recovery from semiconductor waste

Pohang University of Science & Technology (POSTECH)

 

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Schematic design and economic assessment of tungsten recovery processes from semiconductor wastewater

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Credit: POSTECH

Semiconductor industry waste is typically seen as a costly disposal problem and an environmental hazard. But what if this waste could be transformed into a valuable resource? In an exciting development, researchers from Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH) and the Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology (SAIT) have unveiled an eco-friendly method to extract rare metals from semiconductor waste. This innovative approach not only recovers precious tungsten but also assesses its economic viability, offering a sustainable solution for waste management in the tech industry.

Professor Jeehoon Han from the Department of Chemical Engineering, alongside PhD candidate Yoonjae Lee and alumnus Hyunseo Choi, collaborated with Dr. Soonchun Chung and Dr. Joonsong Park from SAIT to pioneer an environmentally friendly and cost-effective process for tungsten recovery. Their research was featured as a supplementary cover in ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering.

Tungsten is widely used in electronics, semiconductors, aviation, and automotive industries. Given its rarity and the limited number of countries where it can be mined, research into recovering metals from industrial waste has become increasingly important. To prepare for the depletion of these metal resources, recovering metals from industrial wastewater is crucial. Industrial wastewater, if not properly treated, can severely impact water quality and soil, making this field of research a promising solution for both resource recovery and environmental protection.

In this study, the research team used bioleaching to recover tungsten from wastewater generated by the semiconductor manufacturing industry and assessed the economic feasibility of the technology. Microorganisms, which can derive energy necessary for survival and growth from metals, dissolve metals from ores or waste using their natural capabilities. This method, compared to traditional chemical processes, has a lower environmental impact and can extract metals at relatively low energy and cost.

The researchers utilized the fungus Penicillium simplicissimum, commonly found in soil, air, and plants, to dissolve tungsten and other metals. Following bioleaching, they recovered tungsten from the solution using two purification processes: activated carbon-based adsorption-desorption and ammonium paratungstate (APT) precipitation.

The economic analysis revealed that the activated carbon-based adsorption-desorption process was about 7 percent cheaper than the precipitation process. The study found that improving microbial strain adaptation and growth, as well as reducing reaction time, were crucial for enhancing process efficiency. The research confirmed the economic feasibility of an environmentally friendly process for treating semiconductor industry wastewater, highlighting its significance in preventing environmental pollution and recycling resources.

Professor Jeehoon Han of POSTECH highlighted, “Our study demonstrates the economic and industrial feasibility of an eco-friendly bioleaching process for tungsten recovery.” Dr. Soonchun Chung of SAIT added, “We aim to enhance the economic viability of this process by developing high-efficiency microbial strains.”

This research was supported by the Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology and the Young Researcher Program funded by the Ministry of Science and ICT.

Process flow diagram for tungsten recovery from semiconductor wastewater

Credit

POSTECH

Journal

ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering

DOI

10.1021/acssuschemeng.4c02941 

Article Title

Economic Feasibility Evaluation of Bioleaching-Based Tungsten Recycling of Semiconductor Industry Waste

More evidence on the dangerous attitudes of men who ogle

A new Edith Cowan University (ECU) study has provided further evidence that men who frequently stare at women’s bodies, rather than their faces, are more likely to harbour harmful attitudes and show tendencies that may lead to sexual assault

Edith Cowan University


A new Edith Cowan University (ECU) study has provided further evidence that men who frequently stare at women’s bodies, rather than their faces, are more likely to harbour harmful attitudes and show tendencies that may lead to sexual assault.

The study by ECU psychology researcher Dr Ross Hollett examined pervasive body gaze associations with explicit, implicit, and physiological sexual assault propensity measures. 



“The most significant finding is that pervasive body gaze behaviour in heterosexual men towards women is strongly correlated with various markers of sexual assault propensity,” Dr Hollett said.



“Specifically, pervasive body gaze is linked with rape myth acceptance attitudes, prior perpetration of sexual assault, stronger implicit associations between erotica and aggression, and lower physiological emotional responses to images of partially dressed injured women,” he said.



“This indicates that men who frequently engage in body gaze are more likely to hold insidious attitudes and exhibit behaviours that facilitate sexual assault and are potentially desensitised to victimised women.”



Excessive body gaze shown to be reliable marker



This study builds on previous research by further validating the ‘pervasive body gaze scale’, a self-report research method developed by Dr Hollett in 2022, which has been verified through the use of eye tracking technology to measure gaze patterns.



“The previous study established correlations between body gaze behaviour and victim-blaming attitudes,” Dr Hollett said.



“The current study extends these findings by demonstrating that pervasive body gaze also correlates with implicit and psychological measures related to sexual assault, as well as the actual perpetration of sexual assault, providing stronger evidence of the validity of the body gaze scale as a marker of sexual objectification and assault propensity.”



Implications for the research



Dr Hollett said understanding the attitudes and behaviours that precede or accompany sexual assault is crucial for predicting and reducing the likelihood of offending.



“Because pervasive body gaze is a readily observable social behaviour, these new insights offer valuable guidance for detecting deviant sexual objectification attitudes,” he said.



“This could be instrumental in developing risk assessments, estimating intervention efficacy, and enhancing public awareness about sexual assault and objectification.”



Future research



Dr Hollett said the next steps for the research involve implementing the pervasive body gaze scale in applied settings, such as prevention or intervention programs for university students or sex offenders.



“Longitudinal studies could track changes in body gaze behaviour and its correlation with sexual assault-related outcomes over time,” he said.



“Additionally, developing gaze intervention tasks to deliberately disrupt body gaze towards women and encourage face gaze behaviour could be beneficial. This could involve developing brief computerised attention tasks that aim to reduce cognitive and attentional biases towards women’s bodies.”



The paper ‘Evidence that pervasive body gaze behaviour in heterosexual men is a social marker for implicit, physiological, and explicit sexual assault propensities’ was published in the journal Archives of Sexual Behaviour.



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Media contact:



Tori Pree, (08) 6304 2208, v.pree@ecu.edu.au

or

ECU Corporate Relations, (08) 6304 2222, pr@ecu.edu.au



Journal

Archives of Sexual Behavior

DOI

10.1007/s10508-024-02953-y

Method of Research

Observational study

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

Evidence That Pervasive Body Gaze Behavior in Heterosexual Men Is a Social Marker for Implicit, Physiological, and Explicit Sexual Assault Propensities

 

Discovering how plants make life-and-death decisions

Michigan State University

 

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A Michigan State University researcher holds a vial of Arabidopsis seeds floating in water. Each seed can be as small as a grain of sand.

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Credit: Kara Headley/MSU-DOE Plant Research Laboratory

Researchers at Michigan State University have discovered two proteins that work together to determine the fate of cells in plants facing certain stresses.

Ironically, a key discovery in this finding, published recently in Nature Communications, was made right as the project's leader was getting ready to destress.

Postdoctoral researcher Noelia Pastor-Cantizano was riding a bus to the airport to fly out for vacation, when she decided to share a promising result she had helped gather a day earlier.

“I didn’t want to wait ten days until I came back to send it. It took almost two years to get there,” said Pastor-Cantizano, who then worked in the Brandizzi lab in the MSU-DOE Plant Research Laboratory, or PRL.

"That's what I remember at the moment," Pastor-Cantizano said. "I was thinking 'I can relax now, at least for one week.'

Pastor-Cantizano had been working identify a gene in the model plant Arabidopsis that could control the plants response to stressors, which can lead to the plant’s death. She and her collaborators had identified a protein in Arabidopsis that seemed to control whether a plant would live or die under stress conditions.

Having identified the gene was just the beginning of the story, despite being years into the journey. It would take five more years to get to this new paper.

The researchers discovered that the proteins BON-associated protein2, or BAP2, and inositol-requiring enzyme 1, or IRE1, work together when dealing with stress conditions — a matter of life and death for plant cells.

Understanding how these proteins function can help researchers breed plants that are more resilient to death conditions.

Creating plants that are more resistant to endoplasmic reticulum stress, or ER stress, has widespread implications in agriculture. If crops can be made to be more resilient in the face of drought or heat conditions, the plants stand a better chance of surviving and thriving, despite the changing climate.

“Research in our lab is fueled by enthusiasm and gratitude to be able to make important contributions to science,” said Federica Brandizzi, MSU Research Foundation Professor in the Department of Plant Biology and at the PRL. “The work was herculean, and has been possible only thanks to the patience, enthusiasm and dedication of a wonderful team. Noelia was simply fantastic.”

Working in tandem

Within eukaryotic cells is an organelle known as the endoplasmic reticulum, or ER. It creates proteins and folds them into shapes the cell can utilize. Like cutting up vegetables to use in a recipe, the proteins must be formed into the right shape before they can be used.

Protein making and protein folding capacity must be in balance, like a sous chef and a chef, working in tandem. If the sous chef is providing the chef with too little or too many ingredients, it throws off the balance in the kitchen.

When the ER cannot properly do its job, or the balance is thrown off, it enters a state known as ER stress. The cell will jumpstart a mechanism known as the unfolded protein response, or UPR, to decide what to do next. If the problem can be resolved, the cell will initiative life saving measures to resolve the problem. If it cannot be, the cell begins to shut down, ending its and potentially the plant’s life.

It was known that the enzyme IRE1 was responsible for directing the mechanisms that would either save the cell or kill it off.

But what calls IRE1 to action?

In this study, the Brandizzi lab researchers were searching for the master regulator of these pro-death processes, known as programmed cell death.

“I had the idea because I read that irritable bowel disease is linked to a mutation in a gene controlled by IRE1 that occurs among humans,” Brandizzi said. “Humans are diverse and so are plants. So I thought to look into plant diversity as a source of new important findings in the UPR.”

The researchers started by looking at hundreds of accessions, or plants of the same species but specific to one locale. For example, a plant that grows in Colombia will have genetic variations to the same species of plant that grows in Spain, and the ways they each respond to stress conditions could differ.

They found extensive variation in the response to ER stress between the different accessions. Taking the accessions whose responses were the most dissimilar, they tried to identify the differences in their genomes. This is where the BAP2 gene candidate came into play.

“We found that BAP2 responds to ER stress,” said Pastor-Cantizano, who is currently a postdoc at the University of Valencia. “And the cool thing is that it is able to control and modify the activity of IRE1. But also IRE1 is able to regulate BAP2 expression.”

BAP2 and IRE1 work together, signaling to each other what the best course of action for the cell is. Having one without the other results in the death of the plant when the ER homeostasis is unbalanced.

Seven years

From start to finish, this project took over seven years of dedicated work.

Day in and out, the researchers spent their time tediously placing seeds onto plates with a medium in which they could grow. Arabidopsis seeds are not much larger than grains of sand at their smallest, so this was delicate work that required time and attention.

From there, the researchers spent several more months with these plants, looking at the accessions offsprings and identifying how BAP2 worked within the plants. This took another few years.

“It has been a long road with its obstacles, but it has been worth it,” said Pastor-Cantizano. “When I started this project, I couldn't imagine how it would end.”

This work was funded by the National Institutes of Health, with contributing support from Chemical Sciences, Geoscience and Biosciences Division, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Office of Science, U.S. Department of Energy; the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center, U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Biological and Environmental Research; and MSU AgBioResearch. Additional contributing support comes from the Generalitat Valenciana, “European Union NextGenerationEU/PRTR.”

 

 

A Michigan State University researcher carefully plates Arabidopsis seeds, which consists of placing seeds in water and dropping them one at a time onto a plate with a growth substrate. Once the seeds sprout, they can be potted and grown for research.

Credit

Kara Headley/MSU-DOE Plant Research Laboratory

Journal

Nature Communications

DOI

10.1038/s41467-024-50105-6 

Article Title

Programmed cell death regulator BAP2 is required for IRE1-mediated unfolded protein response in Arabidopsis