Mammals Can Tell The Time Of Day Via Colour

Scientists from the University of Manchester have unveiled that the colour of light has a big impacts on brain clock.The colour of light has play a big role in how animals measure what time of day it is and the physiology and behaviour change according to light's colour.

The Study was published in the Open Access journal PLOS Biology which explains that the mammal's internal clock could be affected by the change in light at dawn and dusk.Light intensity changes with the sun sets and rises, the scientists discovered that light is bluer in the twilight than during the day time.Then the scientists got electrical activity of mice's brain clock, as the mice were shown several visual stimuli.They found that their neurons were more sensitive to changes in colour between blue to yellow than respond to changes in brightness.

The researchers utilized an artificial sky that changes colour and brightness.When the mice were placed in the artificial sky for several days, their body temperatures were high, when it turned dark blue.It the brightness was changed, the mice were more active before dusk, without changing the colour.This experiment shows that the mice's body clock do not have right sync with the day and night cycle.

Dr Timothy Brown from the Faculty of Life Sciences, who led the research said, "this is the first time that we've been able to test the theory that colour affects our body clock in any mammal. It has always been very hard to separate the change in colour to the change in brightness but using new experimental tools and a psychophysics approach we were successful. What's exciting about our research is that the same findings can be applied to humans. So, in theory, colour could be used to manipulate our clock, which could be useful for shift workers or travellers wanting to minimise jet lag."

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Engineers Prepared High-Tech Ink To Build Do-It-Yourself Sensors

A team of nanoengineer from the University of California, San Diego developed a tool that will help to make sensors.The team of researcher has prepared high tech bio-inks which react with chemical such as glucose.Researchers filled the pens with this inks and draw sensors on the skin and on the leaves to measure glucose and pollution respectively.The pen could be used on phones for health monitoring and on building walls to monitor toxic pollutants.It also has potiential to detect explosives and nerve agents on the battlefield.

A member of research team Wang said, "Our new biocatalytic pen technology, based on novel enzymatic inks, holds considerable promise for a broad range of applications on site and in the field."

During development the researchers faced a big challenge which was making inks from chemicals that are not toxic to plants and humans and able to act as the sensors electrodes and ability to keep their properties over long times in storage and in different conditions.They used polyethylene glycol which is biocompatible, used in some drug delivery applications as a binder.For the conductive of inks they used graphite powder.Then they added chitosan, an antibacterial agent used in bandages to reduce bleeding, to make the ink adhered.The inks also contains xylitol, a sugar substitute for the stabilization of enzymes that react with chemicals the do-it-yourself sensors are designed to monitor.

One ink loaded pen can draw 500 glucose sensor strips directly on the skin and could control eletrodes with electronic device via Bluetooth, device known as potentiostat, to collect data.For detection of pollutants, draw a sensor on a leaf then enzymes react with an industrial chemical phenol.Then put the leaf in a solution of phenol and water and the sensor was connected to a detector.

Nanoengineers explain that their next steps include connecting the sensors to devices wirelessly and checking sensors performance in difficult situations such as extreme temperatures and altering humidity.

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Most Powerful X-Ray Laser In The World Has Developed, Research

In Palo Alto, california researchers have developed the most powerful X-ray laser at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory.It is a billion times brighter than old version lasers.It uses Linac Coherent Light Source to experience how atoms and molecules move in living systems and allows to track chemical reactions as well.

Prof Mike Dunne said that "the LCLS fired extremely fast bursts of X-rays.He said let suppose a person is running the hundred metres and from first to second place different is 1/100th of a second.Now take 1/100th of a second, divide it a million times.Once again take one of those divisions and divide it another million times.That's how fast this burst of X-rays is."This genuinely is a revolution, also said Prof Dunne."

Researcher Dr Meng Liang was making a dish of the material found in the brains of people who have Parkinson's disease. She said that the new laser has the ability to change investigation in her field of study.

"To image these things in real time with the brightness and the fastness that LCLS has will be really special, so we can film them and see them instead of just looking at evidence for these kind of things," she said.

Prof Anders Nilsson who is working on atoms behaviour in a chemical reaction, said that the work would help chemists speed up and increase the efficiency of chemical production.

After the success of the LCLS, In Hamburg, Germany, Europe is building its own version and the Japanese government has also made a same kind of system as well.

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Paper-Like Material Can Boost Vehicle Batteries

At the University of California researchers have developed paper-like material for lithium-ion batteries, which has possibility to increase the energy capacity that can be delivered per unit weight of lithium-ion battery.It contains sponge-like silicon nanofibers which are more than hundred times thinner than human hair.This paper-like material can be used in batteries for personal electonics and electronic cars as well.

The journal Nature Scientific Reported that "Towards Scalable Binderless Electrodes: Carbon Coated Silicon Nanofiber Paper via Mg Reduction of Electrospun SiO2 Nanofibers."In this process the nanofibers produced by 

electrospinning technique, whereby a solution of tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS), used in the semiconductor industry, is put into a rotating drum and a nozzle with 20,000 to 40,000 volts.Exposure to magnesium vapor then creates the spongr-like silicon fiber.

Researchers used anodes which are made by copper foil with silicon material except of graphite mixture.Silicon has ten times higher electrical charge than graphite.But silicon is volumetric expansion which can degrade the battery.Researchers solved this problem by creation of nanofiber structure which enables the battery to be cycled hundreds of times without degradation.

Zach Favors who is graduate student at Bourns College of Engineering said,"Eliminating the need for metal current collectors and inactive polymer binders while switching to an energy dense material such as silicon will significantly boost the range capabilities of electric vehicles." 

Free-standing materials such as carbon nanotubes or silicon nanowires, are produced by using chemical vapor deposition, can only be created in small quantities in a lab, rather than an industrial levels.

The researchers are thinking to integrate the nanofibers into a pouch cell format lithium-ion battery, which can be used in electric vehicles and other devices on large scale.

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Vehicles Exposed To High Levels Of Air Pollution At Red Light, Study Found

Research has found that when stopped at red lights vehicles exposed to more pollutants.Researchers at the university of Surrey in the UK have discovered that where drivers take 2% time of their journey to cross the red lights, during this period of time contributes approximately 25% of exposure to these nanoparticles.

The team of researcher has mentioned some points where drivers exposed to air pollutants.Researchers found high levels of pollution at signals because of changes in driving conditions, pollutant particle concentration was found 29% higher than free moving conditions.Researchers also said, at signals when vehicles stopped closely increase the level of air pollution.

"Our time spent traveling in cars has remained same during the past 10 years despite the efforts to reduce it and with more cars than ever joining the roads, we are being exposed to increasing levels of air pollution as we undertake our daily commutes." said lead author Dr. Prashant Kumar.

A study author, Dr Prashant Kumar said,"Recently air pollution was placed in the top ten health risks faced by human.According to the World Health Organization, every year seven million people die due to air pollution".

"It is not possible to eliminate air pollution but we can decrease its level by awareness.Some of the best ways to reduce exposure is to keep windows shut, fans off and keep more distance as much as possible between you and the vehicle just in front of you.Pedestrians should find other routes less depend on traffic lights.Transport agencies could help by introducing signals free tracks and also by reducing signals waiting time.

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Orange Light Makes People To Be More Alert, Research

In Belgium a team of researchers has discovered that people exposed to blue light show less brain activity and the other hand those exposed to orange light show more brain activity.

The study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers explain study, how they shined different colour lights in eyes of volunteers going for fMRI scanning and orange light might have an effect on the circadian rhythm.

The researchers was working on melanopsin and have believed that the melanopsin has an impact on the circadian rhythm.For more detail, the orange, blue or different lights were shined in volunteers eye's for ten minutes then their brains were scanned.

The researchers found during the brain scans studying, when the volunteers were exposed to orange light greater the brain activity, when exposed to green light a very small increase were noticed and blue light did not show any activity.The researchers said, orange light make melanopsin more active than other lights and messaging the brain to when it's time to be more alert.

The study did not show that orange light has an effect on the circadian rhythm and makes more alert.If it possible or turn out to be true in future then it might be a helpful for people to remain more alert where need to be.

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4 To 6 Years Old Nursery Kids Can Solve Algebra

Solving algebraic equations is not so much easy for every student, but most nursery kids and kindergarteners can solve algebraic questions before becoming a part of maths class.

Recently published study in the journal Developmental Science, reseachers find that most nursery students and kindergarteners, children between four and six, can solve basic algebra and study lead by author and post-doctoral fellow Melissa Kibbe and Lisa Feigenson, associate professor of psychological and brain sciences at Johns Hopkins University's Krieger School of Arts and Sciences.

Post-doctoral fellow Melissa Kibbe said, "these are very young children, some of whom are just learning to count, and few of whom have even gone to school yet, are solving basic algebra with little effort." "They do it by using their "Approximate Number System" their inborn sense of quantity and number."

The "Approximate Number System" is also known as "number sense" and helps humans and animals to size up the quantity of objects.

In the study, children sat one by one with an examiner who told them about the two characters, each of whom had a cup filled with an unknown quantity of items.They saw the pile before it was added to, and after, so they had to decide how many objects Gator's cup and Cheetah's cup kept.

At the end, the examiner mixed up the cups, and asked the children select whose cup it was.Mostly the children knew whose cup it was.Director of Johns Hopkins Laboratory for Child Development, Feigenson said , "What was in the cup was the x and y variable, and children nailed it." "Gator's cup was the x variable and Cheetah's cup had y variable. We found that young children are very good at this. It appears that they are harnessing their gut level number sense to solve this task."

Algebra is difficult for teenagers because "One possibility is that formal algebra relies on memorized rules and symbols that seem to trip many people up," Feigenson said.The ANS helps in solving basic algebra and are needed to master the complex algebra problems that are taught later in the school age years.The study find that an ANS ability does not follow gender boys versus girls, both have equal proportions in solving algebra.Feigenson said, "we see no evidence for gender differences in our work on basic number sense."

Feigenson said, "We find links at all ages between the precision of people's Approximate Number System and their formal math ability." "But this does not necessarily mean that children with poorer precision grow up to be bad at math. For example,children with poorer number sense may need to rely on other strategies, besides their gut sense of number, to solve math problems. But this is an area where much future research is needed."

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