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upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

High-fructose corn syrup boosts intestinal tumor growth in mice

First, Yun and her colleagues generated a mouse model of early-stage colon cancer where APC gene is deleted. "APC is a gatekeeper in colorectal cancer. Deleting this protein is like removing the breaks of a car. Without it, normal intestinal cells neither stop growing nor die, forming early stage tumors called polyps. More than 90 percent of colorectal cancer patients have this type of APC mutation," Yun said.

Using this mouse model of the disease, the team tested the effect of consuming sugar-sweetened water on tumor development. The sweetened water was 25 percent high-fructose corn syrup, which is the main sweetener of sugary drinks people consume. High-fructose corn syrup consists of glucose and fructose at a 45:55 ratio.

When the researchers provided the sugary drink in the water bottle for the APC-model mice to drink at their will, mice rapidly gained weight in a month. To prevent the mice from being obese and mimic humans' daily consumption of one can of soda, the researchers gave the mice a moderate amount of sugary water orally with a special syringe once a day. After two months, the APC-model mice receiving sugary water did not become obese, but developed tumors that were larger and of higher-grade than those in model mice treated with regular water.

[...] The team then investigated the mechanism by which this sugar promoted tumor growth. They discovered that the APC-model mice receiving modest high-fructose corn syrup had high amounts of fructose in their colons. "We observed that sugary drinks increased the levels of fructose and glucose in the colon and blood, respectively and that tumors could efficiently take up both fructose and glucose via different routes."

Using cutting-edge technologies to trace the fate of glucose and fructose in tumor tissues, the team showed that fructose was first chemically changed and this process then enabled it to efficiently promote the production of fatty acids, which ultimately contribute to tumor growth.

[...] To determine whether fructose metabolism or increased fatty acid production was responsible for sugar-induced tumor growth, the researchers modified APC-model mice to lack genes coding for enzymes involved in either fructose metabolism or fatty acid synthesis. One group of APC-model mice lacked an enzyme KHK, which is involved in fructose metabolism, and another group lacked enzyme FASN, which participates in fatty acid synthesis. They found that mice lacking either of these genes did not develop larger tumors, unlike APC-model mice, when fed the same modest amounts of high-fructose corn syrup.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

From New Atlas:

Some of the strongest evidence for dark matter to date has been discovered – and ironically, that's thanks to its absence. In a pair of studies published this week, astronomers have shed new light on dark matter through close observation of a galaxy previously found to have very little of the stuff, while the same team found a new example of a similar oddball galaxy.

It's generally believed that galaxies are held together through the gravitational influence of clumps of dark matter, so to find a galaxy with little to no dark matter was a surprise. And while it might sound like a strike against the theory, it actually ends up supporting it.

A Second Galaxy Missing Dark Matter in the NGC 1052 Group (DOI: 10.3847/2041-8213/ab0d92) (DX)

Still Missing Dark Matter: KCWI High-resolution Stellar Kinematics of NGC1052-DF2 (DOI: 10.3847/2041-8213/ab0e8c) (DX)

Original Submission

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

Just add heat to open this tiny box: Nanocubes automatically connect, disassemble at different temperatures

Researchers have designed two types of nano-sized building blocks that can automatically connect into cubes and scramble back into individual components based on the temperature of their environment. This accomplishment is another step towards chemical systems that more realistically mimic life.

[...]The new building blocks designed by Hiroka's team can connect or scramble themselves automatically because of the different temperature stabilities of the cubes that they form.

The two types of building blocks are nearly identical and are shaped like snowflakes. Researchers color them red or blue in schematic diagrams. A cube assembled from red blocks is stable below 130 degrees Celsius (266 degrees Fahrenheit), while a cube assembled from blue blocks is stable only below 65 degrees Celsius (149 degrees Fahrenheit).

When kept apart, the building blocks connect into entirely red or entirely blue uniform cubes.

When the two types of cubes are mixed together at room temperature (25 degrees Celsius, 77 degrees Fahrenheit), the red and blue building blocks automatically recombine into the most stable type of cubes, which are made of any combination of three red and three blue blocks. This mixture of red-blue cubes is analogous to well-mixed ink and water.

When researchers want to scramble the red-blue cubes to reform entirely red and entirely blue cubes, they do a simple two-step temperature change. This ability represents a chemical accomplishment not possible with a mixture of ink and water.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Tesla Sentry Mode catches deliberate attack against Model 3, vandal arrested

A Tesla Model 3 owner is thanking the video recording capabilities of Sentry Mode after it captured a shocking act of vandalism against his electric car. As could be seen in footage from the security feature, a woman stealthily yet aggressively keyed the Model 3 as she was ushering her children inside a Dodge Journey SUV, resulting in deep scratches to the vehicle's body panels.

A short clip[*] of the incident was shared on YouTube by Rafael "Teslatino" Santoni, who noted in a conversation with Teslarati that while the incident definitely appeared premeditated, the Model 3 owner could not determine the lady's motivation for the attack. The damage from the incident was quoted at $900 in repair costs by a third-party body shop.

Fortunately for the Model 3 owner, the footage from Sentry Mode was able to capture the entire incident, and it featured a clear shot of the woman's face. With her identity determined, the attack was promptly reported to the police, who later arrested the woman on vandalism charges. It remains to be seen if she will be required to pay for the damages she caused to the Model 3.

[...] While remarkable for their technology and performance, Tesla's electric vehicles remain polarizing to some groups of people. Attacks on Teslas have been recorded in the past, including a road rage incident against a Model 3 that resulted in an instant karma crash, as well as an unfortunate incident involving vandals and a Supercharger. Some electric car owners have also found themselves becoming victim to acts colloquially known as ICE-ing, which refers to gas-powered cars (intentionally or unintentionally) blocking access to charging stations.

[*] Direct links to the original video and to some extra footage on YouTube. --martyb

See also: Elon Musk teases "Teslaquila" update while trademark's fate is uncertain

Original Submission

martyb writes:

Staffing: We are fortunate at SoylentNews to have some extremely talented and hard-working people on our staff. It bears mentioning that all work done on the site is by volunteers — nobody has ever received any payment for any of the work done here. That includes maintaining the code, wrangling IRC (Internet Relay Chat), maintaining our e-mail servers, the databases, web servers, etc. It also covers editing community story submissions and posting them to the site as stories for the community to read and comment on.

So, it pains me to report that one of our staff has been having health issues and was in the hospital in February. The initial "event" has been handled, but one of the tests conducted there revealed another matter which is requiring some ongoing intervention. There's other IRL (In Real Life) stuff happening, as well. As he put it: "All in all 2019 is starting out as a major suck of a year."

I have instructed him to take whatever time he needs to take care of things — first things first.

I am sure this attention is somewhat embarrassing to him, but if I have learned anything at all from MDC's passing, is the wisdom behind this saying

*SPOILER* (click to show) *SPOILER* (click to hide)

You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson:

Please join me in wishing a full, and speedy, recovery to Fnord666.

Finances: As alluded to above, it does take real money to run this site (paying for servers, domain registration, and filing taxes are the major expenses). Having just finished the first quarter of the year, I'm pleased to announce that subscriptions to the site have so far been on a trajectory to meet our funding goal for the first half of the year. As of this writing, we have raised $1143 towards a goal of $2000. Most people make ad hoc, one-time contributions. The amounts presented for the different durations are suggested minimums. The majority of contributions received are at the minimum suggested amount, but so far this year we have some generous contributions above that. We had 2 people at $200 (each), one at $100, one at $80, and a couple more at $25. We accept both PayPal and Stripe for payment processing. We do provide an option, should you so wish, to contribute a gift subscription. By default, we use UID #6 as the recipient, though you are free to choose any user on the site. If you run into any problems or have any questions, please post a comment here, post something on IRC, or send an e-mail to admin (at) soylentnews.org and someone will get back to you presently.

What it gets you is a shiny star next to your name whenever you post a comment (which you can toggle on/off in your preferences), some relaxed restrictions on the site, and knowledge that you are helping us continue to provide a unique venue for discussion with a primary focus on science and technology. And, need I say it? Buck Feta! I find it hard to believe it has been over five years since this site forked off from Slashdot, and we have remained advertising-free the whole time!

Thanks: Many, many thanks to all who have subscribed!

If you would like to subscribe or to check your subscription status, please click to go to our subscription page.

Again, please accept my deep and genuine thanks to all who have contributed to this site in any way. Above all, please keep those story submissions coming, moderate comments, and (of course) post new comments, too!

--martyb

Original Submission

darkfeline writes:

The Devuan website looks hacked. Given the timing, it's probable that it is an April's Fools Joke, though it's not clear if it's the Devuan devs' April's Fools joke or the hackers' April's Fools Joke. In any case, it's probably better for any Devuan users to avoid updating their packages and keep an eye out for signs of compromise.

If it is a joke by the devs, then they are taking it pretty far since official channels of communication say that the hack is real (but package are not compromised): https://lists.dyne.org/lurker/message/20190331.191104.169aaf9a.en.html

In any case, it's a warning about taking Devuan too seriously; either they don't know how to secure their servers, or they don't know what it means to take a joke too far.

https://www.devuan.org/ redirects to https://www.devuan.org/pwned.html which displays:

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956

A school in Indiana has been criticised for apparently shooting teachers "execution style" with pellets as part of an "active-shooter drill". The case has reignited conversations about the usefulness of drills and the methods used to prepare schools for shootings.

[...] Many experts agree that discussing and practising how to respond to a dangerous situation will help protect students who find themselves faced with the real thing. Fire drills, for example, are well established tools to teach children how to behave in a potentially life-threatening situation.

[...] While more realistic and stressful situations may be appropriate here, he says "large-scale, prolonged, realistic drills are not ideal" for children.

[...] "Children being asked to pose as victims on the floor covered in fake blood is just pointless and can be traumatising, I can't see why that's necessary."

Source: US school shootings: Have drills gone too far?

Original Submission

upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for Bytram

Brain region discovered that only processes spoken, not written words: Study of rare dementia shows selective attack on areas of brain

Even though these patients could hear and speak perfectly fine, a disease had crept into a portion of their brain that kept them from processing auditory words while still allowing them to process visual ones. Patients in the study had primary progressive aphasia (PPA), a rare type of dementia that destroys language and currently has no treatment.

The study, published March 21 in the journal Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology, allowed the scientists to identify a previously little-studied area in the left brain that seems specialized to process auditory words.

If a patient in the study saw the word "hippopotamus" written on a piece of paper, they could identify a hippopotamus in flashcards. But when that patient heard someone say "hippopotamus," they could not point to the picture of the animal.

Original Submission

martyb writes:

As mentioned here on March 26, Michael David Crawford has passed away. One person in the SoylentNews community was concerned that MDC might, instead, be incapacitated and in a hospital somewhere. He spent a few hours calling around and reported back to me:

Just got off the phone with the Clark County medical examiner
"I can confirm that a Michael Crawford died on March 24th"

Further, we received news that there is an obituary page up for him.

Separately, takyon suggested in a comment to that story:

Maybe we can put a quote or two of his in the quotations thing.

"You say that like it's a bad thing."
"I Am Eternally In Your Debt."
"The Mind Simply Reels."
"Thank You For Your Submission. Our customer service personnel will respond to your request in the order it was received."
etc.

Both TheMightyBuzzard and I ran with the idea and independently posted journal stories asking to gather up MDC sayings.

I am happy to inform the community that, as of 2019-03-31 04:20:00 UTC this morning, SoylentNews now has 31 fortunes attributed to MDC in our fortune rotation. Note: fortunes are chosen at random from all of the fortunes we have, so this represents a very small fraction of those available. Point being that it could be quite a while before you actually see one pop up.

Now that I know how to create and update fortune files, it should be simple to add any additional quotes people suggest. Continue to post any sayings of his to either of those journal articles (with a link to the source for verification, please!) In another week or so, I'll take another look through and update the fortune file as needed.

[Updated 2019-04-02 18:29:28 UTC. MDC quotations can be provided us posting a comment to my journal entry or to TMB's Journal entry. Please provide a link to the source so we can validate it is genuine. Thanks. --martyb]

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956

[...] Kelley Gene Williamson and Randall Yarnall were heading north, directly towards the storm. At the time, on 28 March 2017, they were covering the event for the Weather Channel programme Storm Wranglers. [...] Yarnall was driving his Chevrolet truck at about 70mph (113km/h) at the time, according to a lawsuit filed on Tuesday. A video the friends were live-streaming for the Weather Channel's Facebook page showed they made no attempt to stop at the junction.

The footage cut out a split second before a Jeep driven by Corbin Jaeger drove westbound into the junction. Jaeger, who had the right of way, was driving away from the storm.

Williamson, Yarnall and Jaeger - a respected storm chaser working for the National Weather Service - were all killed on the spot.

The lawsuit, filed by Jaeger's mother, seeks up to $125m (£95m) in damages. It puts the blame firmly at the door of Williamson and Yarnall, whom it calls "habitually reckless and dangerous", as well as the Weather Channel.

Source: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-47720417

Original Submission

MrPlow writes:

Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956.

Kangaroo rats are abundant and seemingly defenseless seed-eating rodents that have to contend with a host of nasty predators, including rattlesnakes -- venomous pit vipers well known for their deadly, lightning-quick strikes.

Research by a student-led team from UC Riverside, San Diego State University, and UC Davis now shows that desert kangaroo rats frequently foil snakes through a combination of fast reaction times, powerful evasive leaps, and mid-air, ninja-style kicks.

[...] Timothy Higham, an associate professor in the Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology at UCR, is a coauthor on two papers published today in Functional Ecology and the Biological Journal of the Linnean Society that present detailed analyses of the behaviors and biomechanics of both kangaroo rats and rattlesnakes.

"Both rattlesnakes and kangaroo rats are extreme athletes, with their maximum performance occurring during these interactions," Higham said. "This makes the system excellent for teasing apart the factors that might tip the scale in this arms race."

[...] A blink of the human eye can last just 150 milliseconds. In contrast, the research team found that the rattlesnakes frequently launched from absolute stillness to reach the kangaroo rats in less than 100 milliseconds. The researchers were surprised to find that the kangaroo rats turned out to be even faster, with typical reaction times around 70 milliseconds. Their data indicate that some kangaroo rats initiated jumps within just 38 milliseconds of a snake starting its strike.

RandomFactor writes:

A Bangladeshi woman gave birth normally and left the hospital, only to return and give birth to fraternal twins less than a month later.

the mom wasn't aware of her unique situation until she was forced to seek medical attention for lower abdominal pain and got an ultrasound.

This was possible because the woman was born with a second uterus.

Women born with two uteruses aren't unheard of. The formal name for the condition is called uterus didelphys. Estimates of how common it is are grainy, largely because many women experience no symptoms as a result of the condition. But it's probably very rare. One 2011 review, for instance, estimated that 0.3 percent of women in the general population had two uteruses.

The birth of the twins occurred 26 days after the delivery of her first baby.

Quirky as the woman's story is, it has troubling implications. The lack of an ultrasound that's standard practice in countries like the U.S. is indicative of the poor healthcare system in Bangladesh

Fortunately all three births were without issue.

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Saudis gained access to Amazon CEO Bezos' phone: Bezos' security chief

The security chief for Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos said on Saturday that the Saudi government had access to Bezos' phone and gained private information from it.

Gavin De Becker, a longtime security consultant, said he had concluded his investigation into the publication in January of leaked text messages between Bezos and Lauren Sanchez, a former television anchor who the National Enquirer tabloid newspaper [had] said Bezos was dating.

Last month, Bezos accused the newspaper's owner of trying to blackmail him with the threat of publishing "intimate photos" he allegedly sent to Sanchez unless he said in public that the tabloid's reporting on him was not politically motivated.

Also at The Daily Beast.

Previously: Jeff Bezos Accuses National Enquirer of Blackmail
The Story Behind the Instant Classic “Bezos Exposes Pecker” Headline

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Microsoft leads the way in banning April Fools' Day pranks

Everyone hates April Fools' Day, and Microsoft is taking a stand against its own corporate pranks. Microsoft's marketing chief Chris Capossela has warned all employees to not participate in the process of annoying hoaxes on Monday. In an internal memo, obtained and verified by The Verge, Capossela explains that "data tells us these stunts have limited positive impact and can actually result in unwanted news cycles." He encourages all teams inside Microsoft not to do any public-facing April Fools' Day stunts.

"I appreciate that people may have devoted time and resources to these activities, but I believe we have more to lose than gain by attempting to be funny on this one day," says Capossela. That's probably a safe bet, as we've seen some April Fools' Day pranks backfire spectacularly in the past. Google was forced to apologize for adding Despicable Me minions into emails and muting threads a few years ago, causing email havoc for Gmail users. Microsoft has also participated in many April Fools' Day pranks over the years, including an MS-DOS mobile for Windows Phone and Google insults.

#FakeNews?

Also at BGR.

See also: Everyone Should Follow Microsoft's Lead in Banning April Fools' Day Pranks

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Intel has teased* plans to return to the discrete graphics market in 2020. Now, some of those plans have leaked. Intel's X^e branded GPUs will apparently use an architecture capable of scaling to "any number" of GPUs that are connected by a multi-chip module (MCM). The "e" in X^e is meant to represent the number of GPU dies, with one of the first products being called X²/X2:

Developers won't need to worry about optimizing their code for multi-GPU, the OneAPI will take care of all that. This will also allow the company to beat the foundry's usual lithographic limit of dies that is currently in the range of ~800mm². Why have one 800mm² die when you can have two 600mm² dies (the lower the size of the die, the higher the yield) or four 400mm² ones? Armed with One API and the Xe macroarchitecture Intel plans to ramp all the way up to Octa GPUs by 2024. From this roadmap, it seems like the first Xe class of GPUs will be X2.

The tentative timeline for the first X2 class of GPUs was also revealed: June 31st, 2020. This will be followed by the X4 class sometime in 2021. It looks like Intel plans to add two more cores [dies] every year so we should have the X8 class by 2024. Assuming Intel has the scaling solution down pat, it should actually be very easy to scale these up. The only concern here would be the packaging yield – which Intel should be more than capable of handling and binning should take care of any wastage issues quite easily. Neither NVIDIA nor AMD have yet gone down the MCM path and if Intel can truly deliver on this design then the sky's the limit.

AMD has made extensive use of MCMs in its Zen CPUs, but will reportedly not use an MCM-based design for its upcoming Navi GPUs. Nvidia has published research into MCM GPUs but has yet to introduce products using such a design.

Intel will use an MCM for its upcoming 48-core "Cascade Lake" Xeon CPUs. They are also planning on using "chiplets" in other CPUs and mixing big and small CPU cores and/or cores made on different process nodes.

*Previously: Intel Planning a Return to the Discrete GPU Market, Nvidia CEO Responds
Intel Discrete GPU Planned to be Released in 2020
Intel Announces "Sunny Cove", Gen11 Graphics, Discrete Graphics Brand Name, 3D Packaging, and More

Related: Intel Integrates LTE Modem Into Custom Multi-Chip Module for New HP Laptop
Intel Promises "10nm" Chips by the End of 2019, and More

Original Submission