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Telescopes had previously spotted water in Jupiter’s upper atmosphere, some 100 kilometers above the planet’s ammonia cloud tops, but those surveys could not determine where the water came from

create a high-resolution map of water vapor distribution throughout Jupiter’s atmosphere

used the E

astronomers

researchers

found that the concentration of water peaked in the planet’s southern hemisphere, right in the region where the comet struck

More water also appeared at higher altitudes around the planet, which

supports the comet as its origin.

Water from other sources such as Jupiter’s icy moons would likely spread out more evenly around the planet and would gradually filter down to lower altitudes

The new beta cells only produce insulin when called for by the body, offering the potential for the natural regulation of insulin

The researchers who discovered betatrophin

caution that much work remains to be done before it could be used as a treatment in humans

the results of their work, which was supported in large part by a federal research grant, already have attracted the attention of drug manufacturers.

could eventually mean that instead of taking insulin injections three times a day, you might take an injection of this hormone once a week or once a month, or in the best case maybe even once a year

Type 2 diabetes,

usually caused by a combination of excess weight and lack of exercise

causes patients to slowly lose beta cells and the ability to produce adequate insulin

provide this hormone, the type 2 diabetic will make more of their own insulin-producing cells, and this will slow down, if not stop, the progression of their diabetes

betatrophin primarily as a treatment for type 2 diabetes, he believes it might play a role in the treatment of type 1 diabetes as well

perhaps boosting the number of beta cells and slowing the progression of that autoimmune disease when it's first diagnosed

betatrophin could be in human clinical trials within three to five years, an extremely short time in the normal course of drug discovery and development

not for the federal funding of basic science research, there would be no betatrophin

impressed National Institutes of Health grant reviewers, and received federal funding for 80 percent of the work leading to the discovery of betatrophin

just wondering what happens when an animal doesn't have enough insulin. We were lucky to find this new gene that had largely gone unnoticed before

Another hint came from studying

What happens during pregnancy

During pregnancy, there are more beta cells needed, and it turns out that this hormone goes up during pregnancy

in pregnant mice

when the animal becomes pregnant this hormone is turned on to make more beta cells

not interested in curing mice of diabetes, and we now know the gene is a human gene

know that the hormone exists in human plasma; betatrophin definitely exists in humans

, workers began carefully cutting back the 16,000 square feet (1,486 square meters) of shrink wrap that protected Atlantis as its $100 million exhibition building was completed around it

By the end of the first day, the shuttle's nose, tail, aft engines and left wing were exposed.

the workers completed the process, revealing Atlantis' right wing and its 60-foot-long (18 meter) payload bay

Opening the payload bay is

set to begin in May, will take about two weeks, as the doors are very slowly hoisted open, one by one.

Atlantis has been mounted. Thirty feet (9 meters) in the air, the space shuttle has been tilted 43.21 degrees, such that its left wing extends toward the ground.

Atlantis will appear to be back in space — an effect that will be enhanced by lighting and a mural-size digital screen that will project the Earth's horizon behind the shuttle

When injected into mice, the tiny decoys protect mice against lethal doses of a toxin produced by methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA.

Follow-up studies need to be done in humans

One of the mainstay strategies of bacteria and poison is to poke holes in cells, disrupting their internal chemical balance and causing them to burst

far, researchers haven't had much success creating all-purpose treatments to exploit this vulnerability

researchers created a tiny spherical core of a lactic acid byproduct, which forms naturally during metabolism in the human body

They then wrapped the cores in the outer surface of red blood cells. (To get the outer skin of red blood cells, they used a difference in particle concentration inside and outside the cells to cause them to burst, and then collected their outer membranes

The entire ensemble became a tiny nanosponge, which was about 85 nanometers in diameter, or 100 times smaller than a human hair

In cell cultures, the camouflaged sponges act as decoys, luring the toxins from

the bacteria that causes strep throat) and bee venom

then binding to the structure the "poisons" normally use to poke through cells

When they stick onto the nanosponge, that particular damaging structure gets preoccupied, and then the body can digest the entire particle

the team injected 18 mice with a lethal dose of a MRSA toxin. Half the mice then got a dose of the nanosponges

Whereas all the mice in the control group died, all but one that received the treatment survived

Because so many bacteria use the same pore-forming strategy, the nanosponges could be used as a universal treatment option when doctors don't know exactly what is causing an illness

The sponges' tiny size means a small amount of blood, for camouflage, can be used to make an effective dose

also allows them to circulate freely through blood vessels, lure enough of the toxins to have an impact and still be degraded safely

the researchers want to see whether the method works in human blood, and against other toxic chemicals, such as scorpion venom and anthrax, which use similar attack strategies

these findings show that reading picture storybooks with kids exposes them to the kind of talk that is really important for children to hear, especially as they transition to school

a graduate student, recorded 25 mothers while they read to their toddlers both a wordless picture storybook and a vocabulary book with pictures

moms in our study significantly more frequently used forms of complex talk when reading the picture storybook to their child than the picture vocabulary book

especially interested in looking at the language mothers use when reading both wordless picture storybooks and picture vocabulary books

to see if parents provided extra information to children like relating the events of the story to the child's own experiences or asking their child to make predictions.

The results of the study are significant for both parents and educators because vocabulary books are often marketed as being more educationa

even short wordless picture books provide children with exposure to the kinds of

language that they will encounter at school

lay the foundation for later reading developmen

Opportunity's controllers prepared a new set of commands on April 29 designed to get things back to normal, and the fix has apparently worked

Previously, researchers have suggested some strategies

That typically happens between a 2D sheet of electronics and a surface of the tissue

our work suggests a new approach—to build and grow the biology up with the electronics synergistically and in a 3D interwoven format

Last year, a research effort

resulted in the development of a "tattoo" made up of a biological sensor and antenna that can be affixed to the surface of a tooth

This project, however, is the team's first effort to create a fully functional organ: one that not only replicates a human ability, but extends it using embedded electronics

Creating organs using 3D printers is a recent advance; several groups have reported using the technology for this purpose in the past few months

this is the first time that researchers have demonstrated that 3D printing is a convenient strategy to interweave tissue with electronics

Ear reconstruction "remains one of the most difficult problems in the field of plastic and reconstructive surgery

the team turned to a manufacturing approach called 3D printing

The finished ear consists of a coiled antenna inside a cartilage structure

Two wires lead from the base of the ear and wind around a helical "cochlea" – the part of the ear that senses sound – which can connect to electrodes

further work and extensive testing would need to be done before the technology could be used on a patient

the ear in principle could be used to restore or enhance human hearing.

electrical signals produced by the ear could be connected to a patient's nerve endings, similar to a hearing aid

The current system receives radio waves, but he said the research team plans to incorporate other materials, such as pressure-sensitive electronic sensors, to enable the ear to register acoustic sounds

researchers used an ordinary 3D printer to combine a matrix of hydrogel and calf cells with silver nanoparticles that form an antenna. The calf cells later develop into cartilage

This movie is a fun way to share the atomic-scale world while opening up a dialogue with students and others on the new frontiers of math and science

In order to make the movie, the atoms were moved with an IBM-invented scanning tunneling microscope

weighs two tons, operates at a temperature of negative 268 degrees Celsius and magnifies the atomic surface over 100 million times

IBM Research lab one of the few places in the world where atoms can be moved with such precision.

Remotely operated on a standard computer, IBM researchers used the microscope to control a super-sharp needle along a copper surface to "feel" atoms

Only 1 nanometer away from the surface, which is a billionth of a meter in distance, the needle can physically attract atoms and molecules on the surface and thus pull them to a precisely specified location on the surface

moving atom makes a unique sound that is critical feedback in determining how many positions it's actually moved

scientists rendered still images of the individually arranged atoms, resulting in 242 single frames

the same team of IBM researchers who made this movie also recently created the world's smallest magnetic bit. They were the first to answer the question of how many atoms it takes to reliably store one bit of magnetic information: 12.

it takes roughly 1 million atoms to store a bit of data on a modern computer or electronic device

atomic memory could one day store all of the movies ever made in a device the size of a fingernail.

NASA's MAVEN mission will be the first mission devoted to studying the Martian upper atmosphere

gather information that should help scientists figure out what happened to the atmosphere and water that once existed on Mars