Futurity.org » Penn State

Slow quakes put ‘big wrinkle’ in rock theory

A'ndrea Elyse Messer-Penn State — Mon, 20 May 2013 18:07:36 +0000

PENN STATE (US) — When researchers duplicate slow earthquakes, they find that rocks at the fault get stronger when slippage begins, but suddenly weaken.

Earthquakes that last minutes rather than seconds are a relatively recent discovery, according to an international team of seismologists. Researchers have been aware of these slow earthquakes, only for the past five to ten years because of new tools and new observations, but these tools may explain the triggering of some normal earthquakes and could help in earthquake prediction.

Chats with mom may keep students healthy

Sara LaJeunesse-Penn State — Thu, 16 May 2013 15:46:00 +0000

PENN STATE (US) — College students eat better and get more exercise on days when they communicate more with their parents, according to researchers.

“Only a third of college students consume a diet that is consistent with national recommendations,” says Meg Small, research associate in the Prevention Research Center for the Promotion of Human Development at Penn State.

Carnivorous plant trims its tiny genome

Charlotte Hsu-Buffalo — Mon, 13 May 2013 14:08:13 +0000

U. BUFFALO (US) — A carnivorous plant is slowly deleting noncoding or “junk” DNA from its genome, report researchers.

Genes make up about 2 percent of the human genome. The rest consists of noncoding DNA, and scientists have spent years puzzling over why this material exists in such voluminous quantities.

The new study offers an unexpected insight: the large majority of noncoding DNA, which is abundant in many living things, may not actually be needed for complex life, according to research set to appear in Nature.

School obesity rate shifts pregnancy risk

Matthew Swayne-Penn State — Thu, 09 May 2013 16:31:41 +0000

PENN STATE (US) — As the prevalence of obesity rises in a high school, so does the risk of an obese female student bearing a child, according to new research.

“We did find that obese females are at lower risk of having a child while in high school,” says Jennifer Buher Kane, who received earned her PhD at Penn State and is now a postdoctoral fellow at Carolina Population Center at University of North Carolina. “But that relative risk depends a lot on the type of school they attend.”

Health officials tend to focus on the biological link between obesity and childbearing, but sociologists also recognize the stigma of obesity limits obese females choices in finding and establishing relationships and sexual partnerships, says Michelle Frisco, associate professor of sociology and demography at Penn State.

Bonding with avatar can shift perception

Matthew Swayne-Penn State — Thu, 02 May 2013 16:26:15 +0000

PENN STATE / U. MICHIGAN (US) — People who customized an avatar and saw it wearing a backpack overestimated the heights of virtual hills, just as people in real life tend to overestimate heights and distances while carrying extra weight.

“You exert more of your agency through an avatar when you design it yourself,” says S. Shyam Sundar, professor of communications and co-director of the Media Effects Research Laboratory at Penn State, who worked with University of Michigan doctoral student Sangseok You.

Workplace ethics rub off on employees

Greta Guest-Michigan — Wed, 01 May 2013 19:51:17 +0000

U. MICHIGAN (US) — Your boss and co-workers may be more important than your morals in deciding whether or not you report unethical behavior at work.

The harsh reality, researchers say, is that those who speak up about unethical conduct are often ignored, or worse, retaliated against. So given the risks associated with blowing the whistle, when an employee witnesses unethical behavior will he or she report it?

Happy heads may get better sleep

Karene Booker-Cornell — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 14:41:50 +0000

CORNELL (US) — When a person’s happiness swings widely in reaction to the good and bad things that happen during the day, sleep can suffer.

Researchers analyzed data from 100 middle-aged participants in a longitudinal study of midlife in the United States that included telephone interviews about participants’ daily experience as well as subjective and objective measures of sleeping habits.

Published in the Annals of Behavioral Medicine, the study looked at the overall levels of positive emotion that the participants experienced in their lives—those associated with more stable personality traits, as well as daily fluctuations in positive emotions in reaction to daily events.

No ‘quick fix’ to reduce hospital readmissions

Sara LaJeunesse-Penn State — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 07:52:53 +0000

PENN STATE (US) — Medical providers need to create networks of collaboration in order to lower patients’ risk of being readmitted to the hospital, researchers say.

But achieving widespread reductions in preventable hospital readmissions among Medicare beneficiaries could take longer than many health care professionals originally anticipated, according to a study that appears in the journal Population Health Management.

Tweets against flu shots go ‘viral’

Katrina Voss-Penn State — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 15:21:12 +0000

PENN STATE (US) — Negative tweets about H1N1 vaccinations spread more readily than positive tweets do, and if positive tweets add up, they may backfire and go negative, as well.

The team tracked the pro-vaccine and anti-vaccine messages to which Twitter users were exposed and then observed how those users expressed their own sentiments about a new vaccine for combating influenza H1N1—a virus strain responsible for swine flu.

Bump in ozone bewilders bugs

A'ndrea Elyse Messer-Penn State — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 19:14:22 +0000

PENN STATE (US) — Increases in ground-level ozone, especially in rural areas, not only interfere with the ability of predator insects to find host plants but also with pollinators to find flowers.

For a new study, researchers tested the striped cucumber beetle, a predator of cucurbits—cucumber, squash, pumpkin, and melons. These insects dine on the plants from the moment they emerge from the ground and when fruit forms, they eat that, too.