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Mi weekly selection #137

Mi weekly selection #137

Humanities & Social SciencesScienceTechnologyWeekly Selection

By César Tomé

Mice regain some hearing after gene therapy Researchers were able to partially repair hearing loss in mice using gene therapy, according to a study. The mice were either missing the gene TMC1, responsible for a protein required for proper inner ear hair cell functioning, or it had mutated, and scientists introduced a normal copy of […]

The Sandia Z machine unveils the interior of gas-giant planets

The Sandia Z machine unveils the interior of gas-giant planets

Planetary Science

By Francisco R. Villatoro

The standard three-layer model for the interior of Jupiter and Saturn claims that an outer layer of molecular hydrogen surrounds an inner layer of liquid metallic hydrogen, with a probable rocky, molten core. The Z machine at Sandia National Laboratories has been used to explore the boundary between the insulator and metallic hydrogen layers. At […]

Alzheimer’s disease: type 3 diabetes?

Alzheimer’s disease: type 3 diabetes?

BiomedicineHealthMedicine

By Jaime de Juan Sanz

Increasing numbers of people are developing diabetes in our society and current predictions estimate that nowadays this disease affects about 9% of the whole population. As a consequence, health care systems in industrialized countries have developed many types of clinical interventions that prevent and treat classic complications of this disease and improve the lifetime and […]

Salt and your IQ

Salt and your IQ

Science

By Laura Cascales

Iodized salt has been on the market for decades, but do you know why it is so important for you? Iodine deficiency is one of the most common causes of preventable mental retardation worldwide. Moderate to severe iodine deficiency is associated with reductions of 13.5 points in mean intelligence quotient (IQ). Iodine is an important […]

Food of gods

Food of gods

Health

By José Ramón Alonso

Mayans considered chocolate to be the food of gods, something that is remembered in the scientific name of the cacao plant ( Theobroma cacao ). Although these presumably consumers are not any longer considered, c hocolate is an important dietary source of flavonoid antioxidants, which are hypothesized to have a beneficial effect on endothelial function […]

Heat creates spin

Heat creates spin

Computer scienceCondensed matterMaterialsPhysicsQuantum physics

By DIPC

When quantum computing comes, it very likely will rely for the fast storage and processing of information on spintronics. Spintronics (from spin transport electronics) is a branch of technology that specifically makes use of quantum-mechanical spin, and especially of the transport of that spin, in electronic devices. Spin is the part of the total angular […]

Measuring the reality of the wavefunction

Measuring the reality of the wavefunction

Philosophy of sciencePhysicsQuantum physics

By Daniel Manzano

Quantum mechanics represented a revolution in physics with implications in many other fields like chemistry and biology. It also conducted changes on some of the main scientific lines of thought, including a farewell to determinism. In the science before quantum mechanics probability was accepted only as a lack of knowledge from the system being studied […]