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UMass Amherst food scientists aim to make plant-based protein tastier and healthier

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As meat-eating continues to increase around the world, food scientists are focusing on ways to create healthier, better-tasting and more sustainable plant-based protein products that mimic meat, fish, milk, cheese and eggs.

It’s no simple task, says renowned food scientist David Julian McClements, University of Massachusetts Amherst Distinguished Professor and lead author of a paper in the new Nature journal, Science of Food, that explores the topic.

“With Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods and other products coming on the market, there’s a huge interest in plant-based foods for improved sustainability, health and ethical reasons,” says McClements, a leading expert in food design and nanotechnology, and author of Future Foods: How Modern Science Is Transforming the Way We Eat. [Read more…] about UMass Amherst food scientists aim to make plant-based protein tastier and healthier

Study shows how taking short breaks may help our brains learn new skills

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In a study of healthy volunteers, National Institutes of Health researchers have mapped out the brain activity that flows when we learn a new skill, such as playing a new song on the piano, and discovered why taking short breaks from practice is a key to learning.

The researchers found that during rest the volunteers’ brains rapidly and repeatedly replayed faster versions of the activity seen while they practiced typing a code.

The more a volunteer replayed the activity the better they performed during subsequent practice sessions, suggesting rest strengthened memories. [Read more…] about Study shows how taking short breaks may help our brains learn new skills

Similarity of legs, wheels, tracks suggests target for energy-efficient robots

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A new formula from Army scientists is leading to new insights on how to build an energy-efficient legged teammate for dismounted warfighters. 

In a recent peer-reviewed PLOS One paper, the US Army Combat Capabilities Development Command, known as DEVCOM, Army Research Laboratory’s Drs Alexander Kott, Sean Gart and Jason Pusey offer new insights on building autonomous military robotic legged platforms to operate as efficiently as any other ground mobile systems.

Its use could lead to potentially important changes to Army vehicle development. Scientists said they may not know exactly why legged, wheeled and tracked systems fit the same curve yet, but they are convinced their findings drive further inquiry. [Read more…] about Similarity of legs, wheels, tracks suggests target for energy-efficient robots

How an elephant’s trunk manipulates air to eat and drink

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New research from the Georgia Institute of Technology finds that elephants dilate their nostrils in order to create more space in their trunks, allowing them to store up to nine liters of water.

They can also suck up three liters per second – a speed 50 times faster than a human sneeze (150 meters per second/330 mph).

The Georgia Tech College of Engineering study sought to better understand the physics of how elephants use their trunks to move and manipulate air, water, food and other objects. They also sought to learn if the mechanics could inspire the creation of more efficient robots that use air motion to hold and move things. [Read more…] about How an elephant’s trunk manipulates air to eat and drink

The robot smiled back: Columbia scientists give robot realistic facial expressions

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While our facial expressions play a huge role in building trust, most robots still sport the blank and static visage of a professional poker player.

With the increasing use of robots in locations where robots and humans need to work closely together, from nursing homes to warehouses and factories, the need for a more responsive, facially realistic robot is growing more urgent.

Long interested in the interactions between robots and humans, researchers in the Creative Machines Lab at Columbia Engineering have been working for five years to create EVA, a new autonomous robot with a soft and expressive face that responds to match the expressions of nearby humans. [Read more…] about The robot smiled back: Columbia scientists give robot realistic facial expressions

Significant otter helps couples communicate from the heart

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Even though people stayed in touch during the pandemic’s stay-at-home orders and social distancing, it was easy to feel out of touch with loved ones.

Technology and the internet have expanded the way humans communicate and added much to that communication – think emojis, GIFs and memes. But they can still fall short of being physically with someone.

“Our social cues are limited online,” said Fannie Liu, a research scientist at Snap Inc who earned her Ph.D. from the Human-Computer Interaction Institute in Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Computer Science. “We’re exploring a new way to support digital connection through a deeper and more internal cue.” [Read more…] about Significant otter helps couples communicate from the heart

The when and why of foehn warming in northwestern Japan

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Warm, dry wind events blowing down from mountain slopes, called foehns, are a meteorological phenomenon typically associated with the European Alps or the Rocky Mountains of North America.

However, in recent decades, foehn winds in Japan have caused record-breaking hazardous warm weather events, bringing renewed interest in the behavior of these winds in this part of the world.

In a new study published in the International Journal of Climatology, a research team led by the University of Tsukuba has presented the first comprehensive climatological study of Japan’s south foehn, a windstorm that originates from the Backbone Mountain Range and is observed along the coast of the Sea of Japan, including in the Toyama Plain in northwestern Honshu. [Read more…] about The when and why of foehn warming in northwestern Japan

Researchers create world’s most power-efficient high-speed ADC microchip

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To meet soaring demand for lightning-quick mobile technology, each year tech giants create faster, more powerful devices with longer-lasting battery power than previous models.

A major reason companies like Apple and Samsung can miraculously pull this off year after year is because engineers and researchers around the world are designing increasingly power-efficient microchips that still deliver high speeds.

To that end, researchers led by a team at Brigham Young University have just built the world’s most power-efficient high-speed analog-to-digital converter (ADC) microchip. An ADC is a tiny piece of technology present in almost every electronic piece of equipment that converts analog signals (like a radio wave) to a digital signal. [Read more…] about Researchers create world’s most power-efficient high-speed ADC microchip

Transforming atmospheric carbon into industrially useful materials

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Plants are unparalleled in their ability to capture CO2 from the air, but this benefit is temporary, as leftover crops release carbon back into the atmosphere, mostly through decomposition.

Researchers have proposed a more permanent, and even useful, fate for this captured carbon by turning plants into a valuable industrial material called silicon carbide (SiC) – offering a strategy to turn an atmospheric greenhouse gas into an economically and industrially valuable material.

In a new study, published in the journal RSC Advances on April 27, 2021, scientists at the Salk Institute transformed tobacco and corn husks into SiC and quantified the process with more detail than ever before. [Read more…] about Transforming atmospheric carbon into industrially useful materials

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Dinosaurs that hunted in the dark

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Today’s 10,000 species of birds live in virtually every habitat on Earth, but only a handful have adaptations enabling them to hunt active prey in the dark of night.

Scientists have long wondered whether theropod dinosaurs – the group that gave rise to modern birds – had similar sensory adaptations.

A new study led by University of the Witwatersrand scientist, Professor Jonah Choiniere, sought to investigate how vision and hearing abilities of dinosaurs and birds compared. [Read more…] about Dinosaurs that hunted in the dark

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