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A gelatinous robot is capable of operating in abyssal trenches has been developed by a group of Chinese researchers from the Zhejiang Lab and the X mechanics center of Zhejiang University (ZJU).

To conceive the robot, capable of operating at depths of ten thousand meters below the surface, they have been inspired by the snail fish, an animal that is capable of surviving a pressure of almost 100 MPa thanks to its structure: bones distributed in tiny parts of its soft gelatinous body.

A robot snail fish

This new self-propelled soft robot is shaped like a fish, with a length of 22 centimeters and a wingspan of 28 centimeters. Hard components, including control circuitry and batteries, are distributed throughout the robot's gelatinous body.

Thanks to this mix of hard and soft components, as well as a new dielectric elastomer actuator that operates in cold, high-pressure deep-water environments, the new robot can withstand the hydrostatic pressure of deep water.

As explained Li Guorui, first author of the article, as well as a senior researcher at the ZJ Lab intelligent robot research center:

Compared with traditional high-pressure resistant deep-diving equipment, the deep-sea soft robot was developed with completely new technologies, which are expected to significantly reduce the difficulty and cost of deep-sea exploration.

In Xataka Science

Now soft robots can have super strength thanks to these muscles

In December 2019, the robot performed a constant flapping motion at a depth of 10,900 meters in the Mariana Trench.

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The first soft robot that can operate 10,000 meters below the ocean surface is created

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Xataka Science

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Sergio Parra

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As suggested this recent study, people are in a group that requires unanimous decisions, group members are more likely to ignore moral consequences to pursue group goal.

That is, a group environment facilitates lying, self-deception, and justification through the diffusion of responsibility.

Throw the dice

Participants in the study were asked to roll the dice and report the results. Participants also had the incentive to win extra money if the reported number was four, regardless of the truthfulness of the answer.

In Xataka Science

Partisanship doesn't just affect your vote: it influences memory, reasoning, and our perception of the truth

The results showed that participants overwhelmingly reported rolling a four, which statistically indicates that many chose to lie. Additionally, one of the two group conditions was shown to have significantly higher rates of reported lying than the individual condition.

This dynamic reveals that people in a group are willing to lie and engage in immoral behavior when other members of the group do so as well, resulting in a feeling of shared responsibility and guilt.

In Xataka Science

Education is not so much about transmitting values or culture as it is about transmitting doubt

Corollary: if you see a group of people very ideologically committed to a purpose (especially if they consider it very important and very based on their values), be on guard.

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If you are acting in a group, you are more likely to lie and engage in immoral behavior.

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Sergio Parra

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Blind people value members of the opposite sex in the same way as non-blind people, that is, men value the physical attractiveness of women and women, the status and material resources of man.

This is what it suggests this new study, still preprint, from researchers at the University of Aberdeen.

Blindness at different ages

The cross-cultural research has repeatedly demonstrated sexual differences in the characteristics of men and women when choosing a partner. Men tend to express higher preferences for younger, more physically attractive women, while women tend to place more importance on a man's status and resources.

In Xataka Science

Women search for forced or humiliating sex porn videos twice as often as men

As the evaluation of such mate characteristics often relies on visual cues, this raises the question of whether visual experience is necessary for sex-specific mate preferences to develop.

To this end, the study evaluated 94 sighted and blind participants with different ages of onset of blindness. The results replicated well-documented findings in sighted people, with men placing more importance on physical attractiveness and women placing more importance on status and resources. However, although physical attractiveness was less important for blind men, Blind women considered physical attractiveness as important as sighted women.

The importance of high status and a pleasant personality was not influenced by sight. Blind people considered auditory cues to be more important than visual cues, while sighted men showed the opposite pattern.

It is intriguing to consider what auditory or other cues, in addition to a pleasant voice, indicate a good physique. Can blind people distinguish step or weight when hearing footsteps? Do the less fit smell bad? Can you feel the quality, cleanliness, or musculature of your skin with handshakes or hugs?

In Xataka Science

The wage gap that no one talks about: the beauty gap

A blind person is also likely to rate a partner's specific visual traits if these traits are generally rated as more desirable within a society because having a more socially desirable partner can increase the value of the individual.

That is to say, the same dynamics continue to occur regarding the attractiveness of a potential partner: a mixture of biological predispositions + a desire to obtain what society considers valuable to increase status + the handicap theory (what is difficult to achieve becomes desirable ). That explains complex signs such as high heels or an expensive but uncomfortable car:

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Both blind men and women find the same characteristics attractive as sighted men.

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Sergio Parra

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He cerium, a 'rare earth' mineral, accelerates important reactions and plays other relevant roles in the interaction with copper, gold, silver and uranium.

He study where they have been published These conclusions have potentially broad implications for the sector and the materials industry.

rare earths

The research team found that cerium plays an active role during the replacement of magnetite by hematite: acts as a catalyst that speeds up the reaction; provides space for precipitation of valuable minerals; and promotes a positive feedback between the reaction and the fluid flow, which contributes to increasing the metal supply of the deposit.

According to the author of the study, Joel Brugger, from the Monash School of Earth, Atmosphere and Environment:

To discover new giant deposits and efficiently extract existing ones, we need a mechanistic understanding of the processes that form and transform minerals that host valuable metals. Although more recycling is an important part of the future of raw materials, we need more metals than the sum of those mined to date to facilitate the transition to a carbon-free economy. Giant deposits are attractive because they can produce for decades, providing long-term security of supply and justifying large investment to ensure sustainable mining.

In Xataka Science

Possible rare earth deposits discovered in the Pacific

Rare earth elements are made up of 17 chemical elements: scandium, yttrium and the 15 elements of the lanthanide group (lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium, promethium, samarium, europium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, holmium, erbium, thulium, ytterbium and lutetium). Although the name "rare earths" could lead to the conclusion that these are rare elements in the Earth's crust, some elements such as cerium, yttrium and neodymium are more abundant. They are called "rare" because it is very rare to find them in a pure form, although there are deposits of some of them throughout the world.

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The mineralization of copper, gold, silver and uranium is accelerated thanks to this rare earth mineral

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Xataka Science

by
Sergio Parra

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This is not the first time tiny brains have been grown for research, but it is the first time someone grow a hybrid of the human organ with an ancient human cousin.

These sesame seed-sized brains created from a mix of human and Neanderthal genes They survived briefly in Petri dishes, in a laboratory at the University of California in San Diego.

CRISPR

Human mini-brains tend to be smooth spheres, like small marbles. Neanderthals' brains were smaller and more irregular. Further analysis revealed that the partially Neanderthal minibrains were more chaotic in their neuronal activity and produced different sets of proteins than fully human.

In Xataka Science

Neanderthal excrement suggests they enjoyed a plant-rich diet

The study offers clues about how organs have evolved over millennia. Some of the brains were grown using standard human genes, and others were altered using the CRISPR gene editing tool to obtain a brain development gene taken from Neanderthal remains.

Specifically, the researchers replaced the gene NOVA1 human in some of the stem cells used to grow the mini brains with a NOVA1 gene reconstructed from genetic remains in the bones of long-dead Neanderthals. Researchers know that NOVA1 plays a role in brain development.

In Xataka Science

We are not the only species with the ability to speak

For now, researchers have taken the development of "mini-brains" to a point where they can detect electrical signals oscillating in tissues. According to Alysson Muotri, a geneticist at the University of California, San Diego, is reminiscent of things found in the brains of people with autism:

I don't want families to conclude that I'm comparing autistic children to Neanderthals, but it's an important observation. In modern humans, these types of changes are linked to defects in brain development that are necessary for socialization. If we believe that this is one of our advantages over the Neanderthals, it is something relevant.

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Tiny human-Neanderthal hybrid brains are grown

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Sergio Parra

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After studying the alchemical works of Isaac Newton, the Economist John Maynard Keynes He stated, in 1942, that "Newton was not the first researcher of the age of reason, he was the last of the magicians."

And, in addition to the first-class scientific discoveries he made, Newton also made references to biblical exegesis (particularly the Apocalypse), alchemy and other pseudosciences and superstitions.

Not in vain, Newton believed that metals vegetate, that the entire cosmos/matter is alive and that gravity is caused by the emissions of an alchemical principle.

In a manuscript from 1704, Newton also describes his attempts to extract scientific information from the Bible and estimates that the world would end no earlier than 2060. After making the prediction, he noted: "I mention it not to affirm when the time of the end will come, but to put an end to the hasty conjectures of fanciful men who frequently predict the time of the end." , and in so doing they discredit sacred prophecies as often as their predictions fail.

In fact, Newton considered himself to be one of a select group of people who were specially chosen by God to the task of understanding biblical scriptures.

In Xataka Science

Living in quarantine was a stimulus for Newton to change the history of Physics

Alchemy

Alchemy is closely linked to natural philosophy. It was part of the ancient proto-scientific tradition. Some of the basic principles of alchemy are found within the concept of immortality and transmutation. So, alchemists avidly researched to develop a recipe that could adhere to these concepts. Because transmutation would help convert a base metal into a noble metal. Apart from this, there were studies on an elixir of immortality.

Among the total of 10 million of his words surviving in fire, More than 1 million words written by Newton focused on the topic of alchemy.

In Xataka

Newton's (very famous, but imaginary) apple

His work on alchemy came to light when his 17th-century manuscripts were made public. The physicist was looking for the stone that contains the answer to many alchemical mysteries. Above all, his manuscript details the procedure for making one of the critical elements of this stone.

For Newton, the philosopher's stone also embodied the perfect morganatic marriage between theological and philosophical truths. As a man of science and religion, that is not surprising.

According to Newton, it was the philosopher's stone that kept the universe together and functioning. He believed it was omnipresent and without it, the universe would never have supported life. Furthermore, it was his obsession with this stone that helped him formulate one of the most popular theories in science: that of gravity. Newton related the matter that causes gravity to the philosopher's stone.

On the other hand, he was not the only fanatic pursuer of this coveted stone. Many eminent scientists of Newton's time worked to promote alchemy and find ways to solve this mystery.

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Alchemy, biblical interpretation and other strange studies carried out by Isaac Newton

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Sergio Parra

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Mental disorders have an environmental origin, but also a biological one, even inherent to the functioning of the brain, so it does not matter whether we visit a village lost in the forest or a big city: Mental disorders have existed, as far as we know, for as long as human beings have existed..

In this book of Jose Valenzuela, many of the facets of madness, of brain malfunction, can be explored, using as a common thread the plot of fifty films in the history of cinema. Its title: We are all born crazy. 50 essential titles about mental disorder.

cinematic madness

Some traits of madness or abnormalities are not always negative. “Fools open the paths that wise men will later follow,” he said. Carlo Dossi. and the philosopher Aristotle was more blunt more than two thousand years ago: “There was never a genius without a hint of madness.” Madness has also served to write some of the most interesting scripts in the history of cinema.

In Xataka Science

We're all crazy?

Madness has always lived on the dark side of our society. Our history witnesses times of confinement, rejection, fear or pure morbidity around people who have a mental disorder. Cinema, always interested in portraying the human soul in all its complexity, has opened a window to the lives of these crazy people, their families, the treatments they have been subjected to and the social context in which they have had to live. . Stories that reflect suffering and pain, but also overcoming and conciliation.

WE ARE ALL BORN CRAZY: 50 essential titles about mental disorder (Essential Filmographies)

Today on Amazon for €18.05

If you want to know more about the author, a true polymath, and also delve a little deeper into the ins and outs of this and other books he has published, I recommend the next interview:

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Books that inspire us: 'We are all born crazy' by Jose Valenzuela

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A new research shows that the human body uses between 30% and 50% less water per day than chimpanzees, gorillas, bonobos and orangutans.

For the first time, it has been precisely measured how much water humans lose and replace each day compared to our primate cousins.

Sweat glands

The study compared the water renewal of 309 people with a variety of lifestyles, from farmers and hunter-gatherers to office workers, with that of 72 apes. Water intake through food and drink, on the one hand, and water lost through sweat, urine and the gastrointestinal tract were calculated. The average person processes about three liters, or 12 cups, of water per day. A chimpanzee or gorilla living in a zoo suffers twice as much.

In Xataka Science

How much can we sweat before becoming dehydrated?

Our bodies are constantly losing water: when we sweat, we go to the bathroom, even when we breathe. That water must be replaced to maintain the volume of blood and other body fluids. But an ancient change in our body's ability to conserve water.

As the main author explains Herman Pontzer, associate professor of evolutionary anthropology at Duke University:

Even just being able to go a little longer without water would have been a huge advantage when early humans began making a living in the dry landscapes of the savannah.

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Does the sea water can quench thirst?

The next step, Pontzer says, is to pinpoint how this physiological change occurred. At the moment, only a few hypotheses are being considered,

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We know we need to drink less than other primates but we don't know why.

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Xataka Science

by
Sergio Parra

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