According to a new study carried out by an international team of scientists from Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, the human-caused biodiversity decline started much earlier than was previously proposed, and not even by our own species, but by that of some of our ancestors millions of years ago. The study was published in the scientific journal Ecology Letters. 

Soren Faurby, a researcher at Gothenburg University and main author of the study said, “the extinctions that we see in the fossils are often explained as the results of climatic changes but the changes in Africa within the last few million years were relatively minor and our analyses show that climatic changes were not the main cause of the observed extinctions.” Computational biologist and co-author of the study, Daniele Silvestro, added, “our analyses show that the best explanation for the extinction of carnivores in East Africa is instead that they are caused by direct competition for food with our extinct ancestors.”

There were thought to be many of our common ancestors living throughout East Africa for many millions of years. And during this time, multiple extinctions are thought to have taken place. By studying African fossils, researchers can see a big reduction in the number of large carnivores, starting around 4 million years ago. It’s during this time that our ancestors are also thought to have started using a new kind of technology called kleptoparasitism in which to get food.   

Kleptoparasitism is essentially the stealing of recently slaughtered animals from other predators. On the surface, the individual animal goes hungry. But deeper than that, the whole species eventually dies out. “This may be the reason why most large carnivores in Africa have developed strategies to defend their prey,” hypothesizes Faurby. We as humans affect the planet far more today than we ever have. But, as Faurby says, “this does not mean that we previously lived in harmony with nature. Monopolization of resources is a skill we and our ancestors have had for millions of years, but only now are we able to understand and change our behavior and strive for a sustainable future. “   

As well as being used as treatment for erectile dysfunction, Viagra is being looked at to be used in a number of other medical settings, including the treatment of fetal growth restriction (FGR). This is a condition in which babies don’t grow properly in the womb. 

However, following a recent study conducted by a group of scientists at the University of Manchester, it seems Viagra may not be as versatile as they were hoping. Because Viagra enhances blood flow it was seen as a potential choice of treatment for FGR. However, following a recent study involving mice, no real improvement was seen in terms of fetal growth, only a high blood pressure level when the pups got older. So, is the drug all it’s cracked up to be?

Perhaps not in this circumstance.

Almost 3 in every 100 pregnancies are affected by FGR. Babies that are affected and survive are more likely to suffer from developmental issues and health concerns such as diabetes and heart disease. Most of these FGR cases are caused by poor functioning of the placenta. As the blood flow becomes restricted, so does the transferring of nutrients from mother to baby. There are currently no treatments in place for FGR. For the baby to have any chance at survival, the only option is to deliver the baby early and care for it as best as possible outside of the womb. 

The results of the study conducted by the Manchester team were published in the American Journal of Physiology – Heart and Circulatory Physiology. Around the same time, an international clinical trial of Viagra and its affects on severe human FGR took place, called STRIDER. It too found no significant link between the taking of Viagra and the improvement of FGR. Unfortunately, the STRIDER trial was ground to a halt as 11 babies whose mothers were directly involved in the study and used Viagra died from lung complications. However, neither the UK-Ireland nor New Zealand trials saw any similar results.          

Going back to the Manchester study, more than 90% of baby mice whose mothers were fed Viagra while pregnant saw a hike in their blood pressure to a range similar to that of a high blood pressure level seen in humans. Female mice also saw a gain in weight after a birth and a slight reduction in their glucose intolerance after just 8 weeks. 

“The evidence from this study and others suggest that caution should be used for the use of Viagra in Fetal Growth Restriction,” said Dr. Mark Dilworth, leader of the study. “Our study suggests there may be long-term risks associated with its use in mice and importantly, there is a lack of beneficial effect in recent human clinical trials.” 

So, it seems, there is still a lot of work to be done in order to find a suitable treatment for FGR. And, it’s “important to continue to conduct studies which look at longer term impacts of giving medication during pregnancy as there is surprisingly little research on this,” concluded Dilworth. 

Doctors have been using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) on the brain for quite some time now. While it is effective in producing clear images of the human brain, there’s always room for improvement. Using artificial intelligence (AI), researchers of the ICAI Group-Computational Intelligence and Image Analysis – of the University of Malaga (UMA) have designed a new method that improves the resolution of such brain scans. 

Using a deep learning artificial neural network, the new model boosts the quality of the image’s resolution from low to high without any distortion at all. Karl Thurnhofer, researcher and main author of the study says that it’s because of this technique, identification can be done without the help of a human. 

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The study, published in the journal Neurocomputing, represents quite a big breakthrough for science as the new model is the most accurate and efficient we’ve ever seen. “So far, the acquisition of quality brain images has depended on the time the patient remained immobilized in the scanner; with our method, image processing is carried out later on the computer,” explains Thurnhofer. Specialists can now use the algorithm to find brain-related pathologies such as cancer, physical injuries, or language disorders with much greater accuracy than ever before.   

The number one, most popular choice of cooking oil used today in the United States is soybean oil. It’s used in fast food frying, livestock feeds, and added to many packaged foods. The problem is that it’s very unhealthy. Not only does it lead to obesity and diabetes, new research has also revealed it may also affect certain neurological conditions too including depression, anxiety, autism, and Alzheimer’s disease.

Recent studies carried out at UC Riverside have revealed that soybean oil isn’t for consumption for either human or mouse. During the research mice were given three different high-fat diets. One consisted of just soybean oil. Another was made up of soybean oil that had been modified to be low in linoleic acid. While the third was coconut oil.

In 2015, the same team concluded that some of soybean oil’s detrimental health implications included the inducing of diabetes, obesity, fatty liver, and insulin resistance in mice. Then, just two year later, the same team discovered that soybean oil is much less harmful if engineered to be low in linoleic acid. But in this most recent study, there was no difference in the effect on the brain for either variant of the oil. Instead, what they did find was that a pronounced effect was taking place in the hypothalamus where many of the body’s most critical processes are carried out. 

“The hypothalamus regulates body weight via your metabolism, maintains body temperature, is critical for reproduction and physical growth as well as your response to stress,” explained Margarita Curras-Collazo, an associate professor of neuroscience at UCR and lead author on the study. Part of the research involved determining what genes in the soybean oil fed mice weren’t working properly. The team discovered that one of these genes was responsible for producing oxytocin, otherwise known as the “love hormone”. However, in those mice given soybean oil the level of oxytocin found in the hypothalamus decreased.

Another discovery made as part of the research was that soybean oil in the diet also affected around 100 other different genes. However, the team does make it clear that this just applies to soybean oil and not to vegetable oil or other soy products. And, it should also be noted that this research was carried out on male mice and therefore the results may be different in humans. 

One thing that is yet to be determined is which chemicals in the oil are responsible for the changes they observed in the hypothalamus. All the researchers do know for sure is that it’s not linoleic acid or stigmasterol. But being able to identify the responsible compounds it a vital part of the research. As Poonamjot Deol, an assistant project scientist at UCR and first author on the study said, “this could help design healthier dietary oils in the future.” Adding to that Frances Sladek, a UCR toxicologist and professor cell biology said, “the dogma is that saturated fat is bad and unsaturated fat is good. Soybean oil is a polyunsaturated fat, but the idea that it’s good for you is just not proven.”               

Some of the galaxy’s oldest stars can be found on the outskirts of the Milky Way. But in addition to those, astronomers have discovered something else – a flock of new stars. Upon investigating these stars in more depth astronomers also found that they have an extragalactic origin. It seems they were formed from the material of two nearby dwarf galaxies known as the Magellanic Clouds.

Those two galaxies are well known to astronomers already as they are on course to collide with our own. However, what researchers have recently discovered is that they’re a lot closer than previously thought.  The discovery of the new stars could provide us with a better understanding of the history of the Milky Way, including whether a collision with the Magellanic Clouds had occurred in the past.  

Being able to identify new star clusters is difficult. The galaxy is full of radiant orbs which sometimes obscure the view, making them look distorted and therefore harder to judge their distance from us. Some stars are only neighbors temporarily before swiftly moving on in the opposite direction. Figuring out which stars are clusters and which aren’t is a lengthy process that involves the recording of precise measurements over time.   

The Gaia spacecraft provided the data for the initial measurements of 1.7 billion stars. While primary discoverer Adrian Price-Whelan, a research fellow at the Flatiron’s Institute’s Center for Computational Astrophysics based in New York City, began to catalog it all. He was searching for something in particular among the dataset – blue stars. Once these were found, Price-Whelan was able to identify the cluster of stars moving next to them. After the careful cross-matching and removing of known clusters from the equation just one remained. 

Aged at just 117 million years old, the newfound cluster is actually quite young for a galactic entity such as this. It’s located at the edge of the Milky Way near a river of gas called the Magellanic Stream and stretches towards the Milky Way. From their research, those working on the project proposed that the cluster originally formed while the gas emitted from the Magellanic Stream passed through the gas that surrounds the Milky Way. As this happened it created a drag force that condensed the gas enough to prompt the formation of stars. Eventually, these stars moved in front of the gas and became a part of the Milky Way. 

Judging by the current positions and movements of the stars in the cluster, it’s been estimated that the edge of the Magellanic Stream is around 90,000 light-years from that of the Milky Way. “If the Magellanic Stream is closer, especially the leading arm closest to our galaxy, then it’s likely to be incorporated into the Milky Way sooner than the current model predicts,” commented David Nidever, assistant professor of physics at Montana State University in Bozeman. 

This new research will improve current models that show where the Magellanic Clouds have been and where they’re headed to next. And with the improved numbers, we may even learn for sure whether the Magellanic Clouds passed through the Milky Way previously. Being able to answer that will greatly help astronomers better understand our own galaxy’s properties and history.     

In today’s world, a business has to have a strong online presence to build a brand and to stay connected with the target demographic. To achieve that, it’s critical that your online network is protected against common cyber-attacks and hacking attempts so that there is minimal downtime. Network monitoring allows you to bolster your business network and also to make the most of your resources.

Your current network infrastructure can be improved in two different ways with networking monitoring. This is because you can optimize both processes and resources. With this technique, you can identify failing hardware components and network nodes, and also fix broken links that might bring down the network efficiency.

When you install a comprehensive network monitoring tool, then you can validate the network links automatically, take care of the hardware, and ensure that your network is protected from unwanted and unauthorized entities.  

How do you pick the best network monitoring tool? 

There is a slew of network monitoring tools on the internet- some are absolutely free while some come with a subscription fee. Then there are also big brands like Bitdefender whose products millions of users trust, and there are also products from less reputed brands that are less expensive but also less effective. Naturally, it can be difficult for you to make a choice but you can filter the options by keeping your objectives in mind. The following are a few factors that you can consider to make the choice easier: 

Features: An ideal network monitoring program offers several features that can come in handy, such as support for the entire IT infrastructure complete with servers, routers, etc. It should also make upscaling easier so that when your business grows, your expanding network can be monitored easily. 

Compatibility: There is no point in investing in a good networking monitoring software if it doesn’t support the hardware you are using. For instance, if you mainly use Unix-based operating systems in your company, then you should get a software that supports that OS, and if you are using Windows, then you should get a software that supports that. It’s the same concept as using Bitdefender Antivirus for Mac when you run Apple products and using a Windows antivirus when you run standard PC systems. 

Automation: Even when you have a good network monitoring software, your staff can’t keep an eye on the system 24/7. So, what you need is a program that can automate the monitoring part for you so that the staff can go on with their tasks without worrying about network vulnerabilities and the top IoT cybersecurity risks. It’s better if the program creates regular reports and logs for your consideration.

Conclusion

If you have made it this far, then you know that networking monitoring is extremely important for running an enterprise successfully. You also know the factors that you need to consider for picking the right tools for your system. So, you can get to it as soon as possible, and good luck!

As we start 2020, there are the usual questions surrounding Bitcoin (BTC) that often follow the popular cryptocurrency. Such as, can BTC continue to bring value for users? Can it remain the de facto digital currency of choice? Will it face increased challenges from altcoin options that are available?

It seems Bitcoin’s reign as the leading cryptocurrency will continue into 2020 and beyond. That’s mostly because it has become so ingrained and integrated. Services are now embracing bitcoin, such casino games online for payment. Other cryptocurrency alternatives don’t have that backing. Bitcoin’s maturity is now vital to its success. 

There are still numerous competitive advantages bitcoin has and the currency will retain them through 2020. 

Fixed Supply

When comparing BTC to crypto currencies, its fixed availability is hugely important. It has become a relatively reliable source in terms of its model and production. For example, it is nearly impossible to manipulate Bitcoin’s supply. People know there are 21 million units, so the currency is unlikely to be diluted.

Why is it nearly impossible to enact changes in this way? Well, there is no current body that has the computing power that could harm the value of Bitcoin. The only way to do it would be to increase supply, and no group has the computational means to accomplish that. 

No Politics

Because Bitcoin is secure amongst cryptocurrencies, it has become a valuable denomination for anyone. As a financial means that is apolitical, the currency is even safer than hard currencies, which are often at the whim of socio-political situations. 

The politicization of traditional monetary systems is not new, but it has ramped up in recent years. Bitcoin is not affected by these changing economic tides simply because it is not controlled by any country or coalition power block. 

Technical

In terms of altcoins that could challenge BTC, Bitcoin is comfortably the most technical and technically sound. That comes with being a market leader in the crypto sector for many years. This technical prowess is exemplified by hash rate, which is better than rivals, even the popular Ethereum. 

Centralization is also important and has helped Bitcoin remain one step ahead of other networks. 

Security

Security remains a major benefit of trading in BTC because it is not centralized at all. Blockchains driven by corporations are bound by the regulations that parent organizations must adhere to. BTC does not have the problem and has no influence from political actors. 

We have seen how this will play out through the 2019 launch of Libra, a crypto developed and released by Facebook. Of course, Facebook has often been the target of regulatory clampdowns and CEO Mark Zuckerberg was forced to appear before lawmakers to defend Libra. 

The company was widely criticized for its entry into the cryptocurrency market. Most of the critiques centered on the company possibly looking to corner the crypto market through monopolization. 

Because Bitcoin is not bound to an organization, there’s no regulatory call to answer. There are no CEOs that will need to appear before regulators.