How climate change could be affecting your brain

A new element of the catastrophic impacts of climate change is emerging -- how global warming is impacting the human brain.

In a paper published today in Nature Climate Change, an international team of academics explore the ways in which research has shown that a changing environment affects how our brains work, and how climate change could impact our brain function in the future. The paper is led by the University of Vienna with input from the universities of Geneva, New York, Chicago, Washington, Stanford, Exeter in the UK and the Max Plank Institute in Berlin. It also explores the role that neuroscientists can play in further understanding and addressing these challenges.

Lead author Dr Kimberly C. Doell, of the University of Vienna, said: "We've long known that factors in our environment can lead to changes in the brain. Yet we're only just beginning to look at how climate change, the greatest global threat of our time, might change our brains. Given the increasingly frequent extreme weather events we're already experiencing, alongside factors such as air pollution, the way we access nature and the stress and anxiety people experience around climate change, it's crucial that we understand the impact this could all have on our brains. Only then can we start to find ways to mitigate these changes."

Since the 1940s, scientists have known from mouse studies that changing environmental factors can profoundly change the development and plasticity of the brain. This effect as also been seen in humans in research looking at the effects of growing up in poverty, which found disturbances to brain systems, including lack of cognitive stimulation, exposure to toxins, poor nutrition, and heightened childhood stress. While not entirely surprising, this research highlights the profound impact that one's environment can have on their brain.

Now, the authors are calling for research to explore the impact on the human brain of being exposed to more extreme weather events, such as heatwaves, droughts, and hurricanes, and associated forest fires and floods. They believe such events may change brain structure, function, and overall health, and also call for more research to evaluate how this may explain changes in well-being and behaviour.

The paper also explores the role that neuroscience can play in influencing the way we think about climate change, our judgments and how we respond.

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Earth's surface water dives deep, transforming core's outer layer

A few decades ago, seismologists imaging the deep planet identified a thin layer, just over a few hundred kilometers thick. The origin of this layer, known as the E prime layer, has been a mystery -- until now.

An international team of researchers, including Arizona State University scientists Dan Shim, Taehyun Kim and Joseph O'Rourke of the School of Earth and Space Exploration, has revealed that water from the Earth's surface can penetrate deep into the planet, altering the composition of the outermost region of the metallic liquid core and creating a distinct, thin layer. Illustration of silica crystals coming out from the liquid metal of the Earth's outer core due to a water-induced chemical reaction.

Their research was recently published in Nature Geoscience.

Research indicates that over billions of years, surface water has been transported deep into the Earth by descending, or subducted, tectonic plates. Upon reaching the core-mantle boundary, about 1,800 miles below the surface, this water triggers a profound chemical interaction, altering the core's structure.

Along with Yong Jae Lee of Yonsei University in South Korea, Shim and his team have demonstrated through high-pressure experiments that subducted water chemically reacts with core materials. This reaction forms a hydrogen-rich, silicon-depleted layer, altering the topmost outer core region into a film-like structure. Additionally, the reaction generates silica crystals that rise and integrate into the mantle. This modified liquid metallic layer is predicted to be less dense, with reduced seismic velocities, in alignment with anomalous characteristics mapped by seismologists.

Illustration of Earth's interior revealing subducting water and a rising plume of magma. At the interface where subducting water meets the core, a chemical exchange occurs to form a hydrogen-rich layer in the topmost outer core and dense silica in the bottom of the mantle. Image courtesy Yonsei University

"For years, it has been believed that material exchange between Earth's core and mantle is small. Yet, our recent high-pressure experiments reveal a different story. We found that when water reaches the core-mantle boundary, it reacts with silicon in the core, forming silica," said Shim. "This discovery, along with our previous observation of diamonds forming from water reacting with carbon in iron liquid under extreme pressure, points to a far more dynamic core-mantle interaction, suggesting substantial material exchange."

This finding advances our understanding of Earth's internal processes, suggesting a more extensive global water cycle than previously recognized. The altered "film" of the core has profound implications for the geochemical cycles that connect the surface-water cycle with the deep metallic core.

This study was conducted by an international team of geoscientists using advanced experimental techniques at the Advanced Photon Source of Argonne National Lab and PETRA III of Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron in Germany to replicate the extreme conditions at the core-mantle boundary.

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AI faces look more real than actual human face

White faces generated by artificial intelligence (AI) now appear more real than human faces, according to new research led by experts at The Australian National University (ANU).

In the study, more people thought AI-generated white faces were human than the faces of real people. The same wasn't true for images of people of colour.

The reason for the discrepancy is that AI algorithms are trained disproportionately on white faces, Dr Amy Dawel, the senior author of the paper, said.

"If white AI faces are consistently perceived as more realistic, this technology could have serious implications for people of colour by ultimately reinforcing racial biases online," Dr Dawel said.

"This problem is already apparent in current AI technologies that are being used to create professional-looking headshots. When used for people of colour, the AI is altering their skin and eye colour to those of white people."

One of the issues with AI 'hyper-realism' is that people often don't realise they're being fooled, the researchers found.

"Concerningly, people who thought that the AI faces were real most often were paradoxically the most confident their judgements were correct," Elizabeth Miller, study co-author and PhD candidate at ANU, said.

"This means people who are mistaking AI imposters for real people don't know they are being tricked."

The researchers were also able to discover why AI faces are fooling people.

"It turns out that there are still physical differences between AI and human faces, but people tend to misinterpret them. For example, white AI faces tend to be more in-proportion and people mistake this as a sign of humanness," Dr Dawel said.

"However, we can't rely on these physical cues for long. AI technology is advancing so quickly that the differences between AI and human faces will probably disappear soon."

The researchers argue this trend could have serious implications for the proliferation of misinformation and identity theft, and that action needs to be taken.

"AI technology can't become sectioned off so only tech companies know what's going on behind the scenes. There needs to be greater transparency around AI so researchers and civil society can identify issues before they become a major problem," Dr Dawel said.

Raising public awareness can also play a significant role in reducing the risks posed by the technology, the researchers argue.

"Given that humans can no longer detect AI faces, society needs tools that can accurately identify AI imposters," Dr Dawel said.

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Second-most distant galaxy discovered using James Webb Space Telescope

The second- and fourth-most distant galaxies ever observed have been discovered in a region of space known as Pandora's Cluster, or Abell 2744, using data from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). Following up on a deep field image of the area, an international team led by Penn State researchers confirmed the distance of these ancient galaxies and inferred their properties using new spectroscopic data -- information about light emitted across the electromagnetic spectrum -- from JWST. At nearly 33 billion light years away, these incredibly distant galaxies offer insights into how the earliest galaxies might have formed.

Unlike other galaxies confirmed at this distance that appear in images as red dots, the new galaxies are larger and appear like a peanut and a fluffy ball, according to the researchers. A paper describing the galaxies appears today (Nov 13) in the journal Astrophysical Journal Letters.

"Very little is known about the early universe, and the only way to learn about that time and to test our theories of early galaxy formation and growth is with these very distant galaxies," said first-author Bingjie Wang, postdoctoral scholar in the Penn State Eberly College of Science and a member of the JWST UNCOVER (Ultradeep NIRSpec and NIRCam ObserVations before the Epoch of Reionization) team that conducted the research. "Prior to our analysis, we knew of only three galaxies confirmed at around this extreme distance. Studying these new galaxies and their properties has revealed the diversity of galaxies in the early universe and how much there is to be learned from them."

Because the light from these galaxies had to travel for so long to reach Earth, it provides a window into the past. The research team estimates that the light detected by JWST was emitted by the two galaxies when the universe was about 330 million years old and traveled for about 13.4 billion light years to reach the JWST. But, the researchers said, the galaxies are currently closer to 33 billion light years away from Earth due to the expansion of the universe over this time.

"The light from these galaxies is ancient, about three times older than the Earth," said Joel Leja, assistant professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Penn State and a member of UNCOVER. "These early galaxies are like beacons, with light bursting through the very thin hydrogen gas that made up the early universe. It is only by their light that we can begin to understand the exotic physics that governed the galaxy near the cosmic dawn."

Notably, the two galaxies are considerably larger than the three galaxies previously located at these extreme distances. One is at least six times larger at about 2,000 light years across. For comparison, the Milky Way is approximately 100,000 light years across, but, Wang said, the early universe is thought to have been very compressed, so it's surprising that the galaxy is as large as it is.

"Previously discovered galaxies at these distances are point sources -- they appear as a dot in our images," Wang said. "But one of ours appears elongated, almost like a peanut, and the other looks like a fluffy ball. It is unclear if the difference in size is due to how the stars formed or what happened to them after they formed, but the diversity in the galaxy properties is really interesting. These early galaxies are expected to have formed out of similar materials, but already they are showing signs of being very different than one another."

The two galaxies were among 60,000 sources of light in Pandora's Cluster detected in one of JWST's first deep field images taken during 2022, its first year of science operations. This region of space was selected in part because it is located behind several galaxy clusters that create a natural magnification effect called gravitational lensing. The gravitational pull of the clusters' combined mass warps the space around it, focusing and magnifying any light that passes nearby and providing a magnified view behind the clusters.

In a matter of months, the UNCOVER team narrowed down the 60,000 light sources to 700 candidates for follow up study, eight of which they thought could potentially be among the first galaxies. Then, JWST again pointed at Pandora's Cluster, recording the candidates' spectra -- a sort of fingerprint detailing the amount of light given off at each wavelength.

"Several different teams are using different approaches to look for these ancient galaxies, and each have their strengths and weaknesses," Leja said. "The fact that we're pointing at this giant magnifying lens in space gives us an incredibly deep window, but it's a very small window so we were rolling the dice. Several of the candidates were inconclusive, and at least one was a case of mistaken identity -- it was something much closer that mimics a distant galaxy. But we were lucky, and two turned out to be these ancient galaxies. It's incredible."

The researchers also used detailed models to infer the properties of these early galaxies when they emitted the light detected by JWST. As the researchers expected, the two galaxies were young, had few metals in their composition, and were growing rapidly and actively forming stars.

"The first elements were forged in the cores of early stars through the process of fusion," Leja said. "It makes sense that these early galaxies don't have heavy elements like metals because they were some of the first factories to build those heavy elements. And, of course, they would have to be young and star-forming to be the first galaxies, but confirming these properties is an important basic test of our models and helps confirm the whole paradigm of the Big Bang theory."

The researchers noted that, alongside the gravitational lens, JWST's powerful infrared instruments should be able to detect galaxies at an even further distance, if they exist.

"We had a very tiny window into this region, and we didn't observe anything beyond these two galaxies, even though JWST has the capability," Leja said. "That could mean that galaxies just didn't form before that time and that we're not going to find anything further away. Or it could mean we didn't get lucky enough with our small window."

This work was the result of a successful proposal submitted to NASA suggesting how to use JWST during its first year of science operations. In the first three cycles of submissions, NASA received four to ten times more proposals than available observing time on the telescope would allow and had to select only a fraction of those proposals.

"Our team was very excited and a little surprised when our proposal was accepted," Leja said. "It involved coordination, quick human action and the telescope pointing at the same thing twice, which is a lot to ask of a telescope in its first year. There was a lot of pressure because we only had a few months to determine the objects for follow up. But JWST was built for finding these first galaxies, and it's so exciting to be doing that now."

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Diverse forests hold huge carbon potential, as long as we cut emissions

Research results published in the journal, Nature, show that realistic global forest carbon potential is approximately 226 Gigatonnes (Gt) of carbon. The study, which involved hundreds of scientists around the world, highlights the critical importance of forest conservation, restoration, and sustainable management in moving towards international climate and biodiversity targets. The researchers stress that this potential can be achieved by incentivizing community-driven efforts to promote biodiversity.

The forest carbon potential has been a highly controversial topic. Four years ago, a study published in the journal Science found that the restoration of forests could capture over 200 Gt of carbon -- which could draw down approximately 30 percent of excess anthropogenic carbon. While this study elevated a discussion about the role of nature in fighting climate change, it also raised concerns around the adverse environmental impacts of mass tree plantations, carbon offsetting schemes, and greenwashing. While some scientific studies have supported the scale of this finding, others argued that this forest carbon estimate could be up to 4 or 5 times too high.

To address this controversial topic an international team of hundreds of researchers led by the Crowther Lab at ETH Zurich joined forces to build an integrated assessment using a comprehensive range of approaches, including vast ground-sourced data and satellite datasets.

Achieving forest carbon potential

Due to ongoing deforestation, the total amount of carbon stored in forests is ~328 Gt below its natural state. Of course, much of this land is used for extensive human development including urban and agricultural land. However, outside of those areas, researchers found that forests could capture approximately 226 Gt C in regions with a low human footprint if they were allowed to recover. Approximately 61 percent of this potential can be achieved by protecting existing forests, so that they can recover to maturity. The remaining 39 percent can be achieved by reconnecting fragmented forest landscapes through sustainable ecosystem management and restoration.

"Most of the world's forests are highly degraded. In fact, many people have never been in one of the few old growth forests that remain on Earth," said Lidong Mo, a lead author of the study. "To restore global biodiversity, ending deforestation must be a top priority."

The dataset revealed that biodiversity accounts for approximately half of the global forest productivity. As such, the researchers highlighted that, to achieve the full carbon potential, restoration efforts should include a natural diversity of species. In addition, sustainable agricultural, forestry, and restoration practices that promote biodiversity have the greatest potential for carbon capture.

Redefining restoration

The authors stress that responsible restoration is a fundamentally social endeavour. It includes countless actions such as conservation, natural regeneration, rewilding, silviculture, agroforestry, and all other community-driven efforts to promote biodiversity. It requires equitable development, driven by policies that prioritize the rights of local communities and Indigenous people.

"We need to redefine what restoration means to many people," said Thomas Crowther, the senior author of the paper and a professor at ETH Zurich. "Restoration is not about mass tree plantations to offset carbon emissions. Restoration means directing the flow of wealth towards millions of local communities, Indigenous populations, and farmers that promote biodiversity across the globe. Only when healthy biodiversity is the preferred choice for local communities will we get long-term carbon capture as a biproduct."

The researchers conclude that ecologically responsible forest restoration does not include the conversion of other ecosystems that would not naturally contain forests. "Global restoration is not only about trees," said Constantin Zohner, a senior researcher at ETH Zurich. "We have to protect natural biodiversity in all ecosystems including grasslands, peatlands, and wetlands that are equally essential for life on Earth."

Nature for climate

This study brings to light the critical importance of natural, diverse forests in contributing to 30 percent of carbon drawdown potential. However, forests cannot be a substitute for cutting fossil fuel emissions. If emissions continue to rise, the study warns, then on-going droughts, fires, and warming will threaten forests and limit their ability to absorb carbon.

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Solar-powered device produces clean water and clean fuel at the same time

A floating, solar-powered device that can turn contaminated water or seawater into clean hydrogen fuel and purified water, anywhere in the world, has been developed by researchers.

The device, developed by researchers at the University of Cambridge, could be useful in resource-limited or off-grid environments, since it works with any open water source and does not require any outside power.

It takes its inspiration from photosynthesis, the process by which plants convert sunlight into food. However, unlike earlier versions of the 'artificial leaf', which could produce green hydrogen fuel from clean water sources, this new device operates from polluted or seawater sources and can produce clean drinking water at the same time.

Tests of the device showed it was able to produce clean water from highly polluted water, seawater, and even from the River Cam in central Cambridge. The results are reported in the journal Nature Water.

"Bringing together solar fuels production and water purification in a single device is tricky," said Dr Chanon Pornrungroj from Cambridge's Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry, the paper's co-lead author. "Solar-driven water splitting, where water molecules are broken down into hydrogen and oxygen, need to start with totally pure water because any contaminants can poison the catalyst or cause unwanted chemical side-reactions."

"In remote or developing regions, where clean water is relatively scarce and the infrastructure necessary for water purification is not readily available, water splitting is extremely difficult," said co-lead author Ariffin Mohamad Annuar. "A device that could work using contaminated water could solve two problems at once: it could split water to make clean fuel, and it could make clean drinking water."

Pornrungroj and Mohamad Annuar, who are both members of Professor Erwin Reisner's research group, came up with a design that did just that. They deposited a photocatalyst on a nanostructured carbon mesh that is a good absorber of both light and heat, generating the water vapour used by the photocatalyst to create hydrogen. The porous carbon mesh, treated to repel water, served both to help the photocatalyst float and to keep it away from the water below, so that contaminants do not interfere with its functionality.

In addition, the new device uses more of the Sun's energy. "The light-driven process for making solar fuels only uses a small portion of the solar spectrum -- there's a whole lot of the spectrum that goes unused," said Mohamad Annuar.

The team used a white, UV-absorbing layer on top of the floating device for hydrogen production via water splitting. The rest of the light in the solar spectrum is transmitted to the bottom of the device, which vaporises the water.

"This way, we're making better use of the light -- we get the vapour for hydrogen production, and the rest is water vapour," said Pornrungroj. "This way, we're truly mimicking a real leaf, since we've now been able to incorporate the process of transpiration."

A device that can make clean fuel and clean water at once using solar power alone could help address the energy and the water crises facing so many parts of the world. For example, the indoor air pollution caused by cooking with 'dirty' fuels, such as kerosene, is responsible for more than three million deaths annually, according to the World Health Organization. Cooking with green hydrogen instead could help reduce that number significantly. And 1.8 billion people worldwide still lack safe drinking water at home.

"It's such a simple design as well: in just a few steps, we can build a device that works well on water from a wide variety of sources," said Mohamad Annuar.

"It's so tolerant of pollutants, and the floating design allows the substrate to work in very cloudy or muddy water," said Pornrungroj. "It's a highly versatile system."

"Our device is still a proof of principle, but these are the sorts of solutions we will need if we're going to develop a truly circular economy and sustainable future," said Reisner, who led the research. "The climate crisis and issues around pollution and health are closely related, and developing an approach that could help address both would be a game-changer for so many people."

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New drug-like molecule extends lifespan, ameliorates pathology in worms and boosts function in mammalian muscle cells

Having healthy mitochondria, the organelles that produce energy in all our cells, usually portends a long healthy life whether in humans or in C. elegans, a tiny, short-lived nematode worm often used to study the aging process. Researchers at the Buck Institute have identified a new drug-like molecule that keeps mitochondria healthy via mitophagy, a process that removes and recycles damaged mitochondria in multicellular organisms. The compound, dubbed MIC, is a natural compound that extended lifespan in C. elegans, ameliorated pathology in neurodegenerative disease models of C. elegans, and improved mitochondrial function in mouse muscle cells. Results are published in the November 13, 2023, edition of Nature Aging.

The impact of mitochondrial dysfunction in age-related disease

Defective mitophagy is implicated in many age-related diseases. It's tied to neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's; it plays a role in cardiovascular diseases including heart failure; it influences metabolic disorders including obesity and type 2 diabetes; it is implicated in muscle wasting and sarcopenia and has a complex relationship with cancer progression. Even though interventions that restore mitophagy and facilitate the elimination of damaged mitochondria hold great promise for addressing these conditions, not one treatment has been approved for human use despite advances in the field.

What's MIC?

MIC (Mitophagy-Inducing Compound) is a coumarin, which are naturally bioactive compounds that have anticoagulant, antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral, anticancer, and antihyperglycemic properties (among others) as well as being an antioxidant with neuroprotective effects. Coumarin is found in many plants and is found in high concentrations in certain types of cinnamon, which is one of the most frequent sources for human exposure to the substance.

A new mechanism of action in mitophagy

The project started in a mouse model of Parkinson's disease where researchers in the laboratory of Julie Andersen, PhD, a senior author of the paper, were looking at known enhancers of mitophagy, including rapamycin. "Co-author Shankar Chinta, PhD, started screening natural compounds in neuronal cells and MIC came up as a major hit," she said. "Rather than taking MIC immediately into a mouse model we wanted to understand its impact on overall aging and identify its mechanism of action, so we took the work into the worm where we found that MIC is in a different class of molecules that enhance the expression of a key protein, TFEB."

In an effort spearheaded by Andersen and research scientist Manish Chamoli, PhD, lead author of the study, researchers found that MIC enhanced the activity of transcription factor TFEB, which is a master regulator of genes involved in autophagy and lysosomal functions. Autophagy is the intracellular recycling process whereby cells clean up damaged proteins; it derives its abilities from the lysosome. Researchers found that MIC robustly increased the lifespan of C. elegans while also preventing mitochondrial dysfunction in mammalian cells.

"This paper helps support the overall notion of TFEB being a key autophagy regulator that extends lifespan, "said Buck professor and Chief Scientific Officer Malene Hansen, PhD, who collaborated on the paper. She added, "Mitophagy is a selective and very significant form of autophagy. The field has recognized TFEB as a player when it comes to quality control in mitochondria. This study provides a possible translational route to induce mitophagy in a TFEB-dependent fashion."

A link to the brain/gut connection

Mechanistically MIC works upstream of TFEB by inhibiting ligand-induced activation of the nuclear hormone receptor DAF-12 (in worms)/FXR (in humans), which in turn induces mitophagy and extends lifespan. FXR is best known for its ability to act in the liver and gut to maintain lipid homeostasis, where it acts to regulate levels of TFEB as part of a feed-fast cycle, but recently TFEB was shown to also be present in brain neurons. This provided Andersen with the clue needed to piece together MIC's potential mechanism of action in the latter. "This study provides another piece of the puzzle when it comes to understanding the brain/gut connection in terms of health and disease," said Andersen.

FXR is regulated by bile salts which are formed in the gut microbiome. "The gut microbiome impacts the body's use of bile acids. Aging impacts our microbiome," said Chamoli. "If levels of bile acids aren't correct it hinders mitophagy. That's how FXR can impact neuronal health. Neurons have a lot of mitochondria which makes mitophagy important in terms of neurodegeneration," he said, noting that experiments are underway to explore neuronal FXR as a therapeutic target for Alzheimer's disease as part of a jointly funded grant shared by the Andersen and Lithgow labs.

MIC as a general geroprotective therapeutic

"There's a bottleneck in efforts to develop potential therapeutics in the field of geroscience, and the bottleneck is that we don't have enough molecules in the pipeline," said Gordon Lithgow, PhD, Buck Professor and Vice President of Academic Affairs and senior co-author. "MIC is a great candidate to bring forward given its therapeutic effect across multiple models and the fact that it is a naturally occurring molecule."

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Milky Way-like galaxy found in the early universe

Using the James Webb Space Telescope, an international team, including astronomer Alexander de la Vega of the University of California, Riverside, has discovered the most distant barred spiral galaxy similar to the Milky Way that has been observed to date.

Until now it was believed that barred spiral galaxies like the Milky Way could not be observed before the universe, estimated to be 13.8 billion years old, reached half of its current age.

The research, published in Nature this week, was led by scientists at the Centro de Astrobiología in Spain.

"This galaxy, named ceers-2112, formed soon after the Big Bang," said coauthor de la Vega, a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. "Finding ceers-2112 shows that galaxies in the early universe could be as ordered as the Milky Way. This is surprising because galaxies were much more chaotic in the early universe and very few had similar structures to the Milky Way."

Ceers-2112 has a bar in its center. De la Vega explained that a galactic bar is a structure, made of stars, within galaxies. Galactic bars resemble bars in our everyday lives, such as a candy bar. It is possible to find bars in non-spiral galaxies, he said, but they are very rare.

"Nearly all bars are found in spiral galaxies," said de la Vega, who joined UCR last year after receiving his doctoral degree in astronomy at Johns Hopkins University. "The bar in ceers-2112 suggests that galaxies matured and became ordered much faster than we previously thought, which means some aspects of our theories of galaxy formation and evolution need revision."

Astronomers' previous understanding of galaxy evolution was that it took several billion years for galaxies to become ordered enough to develop bars.

"The discovery of ceers-2112 shows that it can happen in only a fraction of that time, in about one billion years or less," de la Vega said.

According to him, galactic bars are thought to form in spiral galaxies with stars that rotate in an ordered fashion, the way they do in the Milky Way.

"In such galaxies, bars can form spontaneously due to instabilities in the spiral structure or gravitational effects from a neighboring galaxy," de la Vega said. "In the past, when the universe was very young, galaxies were unstable and chaotic. It was thought that bars could not form or last long in galaxies in the early universe."

The discovery of ceers-2112 is expected to change at least two aspects of astronomy.

"First, theoretical models of galaxy formation and evolution will need to account for some galaxies becoming stable enough to host bars very early in the universe's history," de la Vega said. "These models may need to adjust how much dark matter makes up galaxies in the early universe, as dark matter is believed to affect the rate at which bars form. Second, the discovery of ceers-2112 demonstrates that structures like bars can be detected when the universe was very young. This is important because galaxies in the distant past were smaller than they are now, which makes finding bars harder. The discovery of ceers-2112 paves the way for more bars to be discovered in the young universe."

De la Vega helped the research team by estimating the redshift and properties of ceers-2112. He also contributed to the interpretation of the measurements.

"Redshift is an observable property of a galaxy that indicates how far away it is and how far back in time the galaxy is seen, which is a consequence of the finite speed of light," he said.

What surprised de la Vega most about the discovery of ceers-2112 is how well the properties of its bar could be constrained.

"Initially, I thought detecting and estimating properties of bars in galaxies like ceers-2112 would be fraught with measurement uncertainties," he said. "But the power of the James Webb Space Telescope and the expertise of our research team helped us place strong constraints on the size and shape of the bar."

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Southern Alaska's national forests key to meeting climate, conservation goals

Analyses of U.S. national forests led by Oregon State University scientists shows that increased protections for two Alaskan forests is a key to meeting climate and biodiversity goals.

In a paper published in AGU Advances, OSU College of Forestry researchers make the case that greater conservation efforts in the Tongass and Chugach national forests in southern Alaska are crucial because of their landscape integrity, high carbon stocks and wildlife habitat extent.

"More thoroughly safeguarding those forests from industrial development would contribute significantly to climate change mitigation and species adaptation in the face of the severe ecological disruption that's expected to occur over the next few decades as the climate rapidly gets warmer," said Oregon State's Bev Law, who co-led the study.

At 16.7 million acres, the Tongass is America's largest national forest. The Chugach is the second-largest at just under 7 million acres.

Not only are they the biggest national forests, they are the most intact, Law said, and provide habitat for iconic, keystone species such as the bald eagle, brown bear and gray wolf.

"Those forests are also cool and wet, with carbon stocks that are only minimally affected by wildfire, stocks that are likely to increase as the climate changes," she said. "Protecting the Tongass and Chugach is a high priority if we want to have a chance to attain global goals relating to climate and diversity of species."

Law and collaborators in the College of Forestry teamed up with researchers at Southern Oregon University, the Woodwell Climate Research Center and EcoSpatial Services L.L.C. to look at 152 national forests and compare them in terms of carbon density and accumulation, total biomass carbon stocks, habitat for eagles, bears and wolves, and landscape integrity -- defined as degree of modification by humans.

The authors report that almost 31% of all high-landscape-integrity area found in national forests -- areas with minimal or no human modification -- is in the Tongass and Chugach, at 25.3% and 5.6%, respectively.

Those forests also combine to account for nearly half of all bald eagle habitat available in national forests, 37% of brown bear habitat and 18% of gray wolf habitat -- no other location has more than 4% of the total wolf habitat found in the U.S. inventory of national forests. All three species were once widespread and abundant across much of North America.

"Forests play an incredibly important part in trying to mitigate climate change and support biodiversity," Law said. "For six decades, ecosystems on land have annually been removing roughly 30% of all the carbon dioxide humans have been putting into the atmosphere, and forests do most of that work. But intact forests with high carbon density and high biodiversity are disappearing at a frightening pace, lost to agriculture, logging and other industries, and development."

In addition to sequestering carbon and providing wildlife habitat, intact forests provide a range of ecosystem services, including helping to keep water clean, the authors note. And in the quest to establish nature-based climate solutions, public lands have outsized importance because they are more likely than private lands to afford more stable carbon storage.

Still, at present, federal forest lands are caught up in a numbers game, and conservation has some ground to make up on the scoreboard, Law said.

"National forests account for 76% of all federal forest land, but logging and other industrial activities are allowed throughout most of that, with only about 19% classified as reserved in one way or another from timber production," she said. "That means there is a substantial gap between current preservation and the preservation targets for protecting biodiversity and carbon stocks."

Ramping up protection in the Alaskan forests offers a big opportunity for closing that gap, the authors point out. Right now, 35% of the Tongass is protected at the two highest levels as categorized by the U.S. Geological Survey and the International Union for Conservation of Nature, and 57.6% of the Chugach.

"Those two forests have historically been wetter and cooler than most national forests, and over the next 100 years they are projected to have much larger increases in precipitation and much lower increases in maximum temperatures," Law said. "Combined with a relatively low occurrence of wildfire, that makes preserving these forests in their intact state highly possible -- if there is the political will to take bold action."

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187 new genetic variants linked to prostate cancer found in largest, most diverse study of its kind

A globe-spanning scientific team has compiled the most comprehensive list of genetic variants associated with prostate cancer risk -- 451 in all -- through a whole-genome analysis that ranks as the largest and most diverse investigation into prostate cancer genetics yet. The research, led by the USC Center for Genetic Epidemiology, the Keck School of Medicine of USC and USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, and in the United Kingdom by The Institute of Cancer Research, London, included major increases in representation among men from racial and ethnic groups that have often been left out of such research, revising what is known about genetic risk for the disease.

With these findings, the researchers improved a system they developed for measuring genetic risk so that it was more effective in predicting who would or wouldn't develop prostate cancer -- even distinguishing between the likelihood of aggressive and less-serious cases among men of African descent. The finding that higher risk scores based on the 451 variants correlated with more-aggressive disease in men of African ancestry is a meaningful step toward improving early detection and making better informed decisions about screening.

The study, published in Nature Genetics, builds on 2021 research documented in the same journal that found 269 genetic variants correlating with prostate cancer risk, based on a sample of nearly 235,000 men. The new results were derived from genomic information from close to 950,000 men.

"We're not going to learn everything there is to know about the genetics of prostate cancer by studying only white men," said co-senior author Christopher Haiman, ScD, holder of the AFLAC Chair in Cancer Research and professor of population and public health sciences at the Keck School of Medicine. "Larger and larger studies, engaging a broader spectrum of populations, are important if we're going to identify genetic markers of risk and develop risk prediction tools that are equally effective across populations."

A substantial revision of what's known about genetic risk for prostate cancer

The researchers compared genomic data from 156,319 prostate cancer patients with that of a control group totaling 788,443. From the previous study, there was an 87% increase in the number of prostate cancer cases included from men of African ancestry, 45% from Latino ethnicity, 43% from European ancestry and 26% from Asian ancestry.

Haiman and his colleagues found 187 new genetic variants associated with prostate cancer risk. They also found 150 genetic variants from earlier research that were replaced by variants in nearby spots on the DNA double helix that better correlated with prostate cancer risk through the lens of the larger, more diverse sample.

"It's an important refinement to find markers that are better at capturing risk across populations," said Haiman, who is also director of the USC Center for Genetic Epidemiology and co-leader of the Cancer Epidemiology Program at USC Norris cancer center. "The idea of precision medicine and global medicine for all rely on including and integrating information across populations, because the best marker determined in whites might not be the best marker overall."

Progress in assessing risk thanks to an international effort

In addition to fueling further research, the results have the potential to benefit human health by providing men with personalized risk information that they can use when having discussions with their doctors about screening and treatment. Ultimately the research could lay the ground work for genetic testing to identify those at greater risk for aggressive prostate cancer and enable early detection by screening them earlier and more often.

Because many prostate cancer cases diagnosed today might never reach the point where they are life-threatening -- leading to unnecessary treatment that can degrade quality of life -- differentiating between risk for aggressive disease is key. Up until now, the scientists' system for calculating risk scores has correlated with likelihood of developing prostate cancer, but lacked predictive value about how serious a given case may be.

"We'll continue to improve this risk score, and look for markers that help to distinguish aggressive from less aggressive disease," Haiman said. "Clinical trials will be required to evaluate the effectiveness of the risk score in helping doctors and patients make decisions about screening."

This research combined the data from virtually every study to date examining DNA for genetic variants associated with prostate cancer risk. The U.S. Veterans Health Administration's Million Veteran Program and Argonne National Laboratory proved to be essential partners [for including diverse populations in the study]. Bringing it all together required a team effort encompassing more than 300 researchers from well over 100 institutions, in 26 nations -- from Barbados to Bulgaria, Nigeria to the Netherlands and Japan to Ghana.

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