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Citation: Zhang M, Yu Q (2024) The representation of abstract goals in working memory is supported by task-congruent neural geometry. PLoS Biol 22(12): e3002461. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3002461Academic Editor: Frank Tong, Vanderbilt University, UNITED STATES OF AMERICAReceived: November 28, 2023; Accepted: November 29, 2024; Published: December 19, 2024Copyright: © 2024 Zhang, Yu. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.Data Availability: All data files are available from the Science Data Bank database (https://doi.org/10.57760/sciencedb.16868).Funding: This work was supported…

A model for lifecycle simplification in Trypanosoma brucei. Credit: Nature Communications (2024). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-024-54555-w Parasites that cause the deadly illness known as sleeping sickness can spread beyond their native Africa as a result of mutations to key genes, a study shows. The findings reveal that climate change and measures to control populations of tsetse flies, which carry the disease, may drive molecular changes in the organisms that cause sleeping sickness—which can be fatal if left untreated. The parasites—known as African trypanosomes—are normally transmitted by tsetse flies in sub-Saharan Africa. However, they have evolved to enable them to cause infection without…

Spores of Ceratopteris richardii, the model fern used in the study. Credit: Phil Carella The capacity of bacteria to spread disease across the plant kingdom may be much more widespread than previously suspected, according to new analysis. John Innes Centre researchers took a comparative evolutionary approach, using the diversity of Pseudomonas syringae bacteria, to determine how this pathogen infects distantly related plants. In experiments, researchers in the team of Dr. Phil Carella, group leader, analyzed the toxin syringomycin produced by the most widely infectious P. syringae strains, and compared its effect on both non-flowering and flowering plants. The results showed…

Photo credit: Luis Tosta on Unsplash. I suspect the average person comes to accept modern evolutionary theory, not through a series of careful arguments, but through a near-constant drip of pro-evolution propaganda. The propaganda comes in many forms and from many directions. Here I want to focus on just one source, popular news stories about evolution, and specifically on a couple of parlor tricks often embedded in these articles. Bait-and-Switch Probably the most common trick begins with a news headline or lead sentence promising a new discovery of evolution in action. The article then highlights an actual, observed species changing…

Newsletter Signup – Under Article / In Page”*” indicates required fields Back in the 1980s, Japan was a global biopharma leader, responsible for almost 30% of all newly approved chemical entities (NCEs) approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Unfortunately, this is in stark contrast to how the country’s industry has performed in recent times; between 2011 and 2020, Japanese companies introduced just 7% of NCEs approved by the FDA. But what exactly is behind this decline, and could the country be set for an upswing to take it back to its golden days? Biopharma in Japan: Once a…

Ludwig van Beethoven began to lose his hearing at age 28 and was deaf by age 44. While the cause of his hearing loss remains a topic of scientific debate and ongoing revision, one thing is clear: Despite his hearing loss, Beethoven never ceased to compose music, likely because he was able to sense the vibrations of musical instruments and “hear” music through the sense of touch, researchers believe.Now a study by Harvard Medical School researchers could help explain what enabled Beethoven, and other musicians, to develop an exquisitely refined sense of touch after losing their hearing. The findings, based…

Antimicrobial peptides derived from a crab and a spider may provide the pathway to overcoming drug resistance in advanced melanoma. QUT researchers based at Brisbane’s Translational Research Institute (TRI) have modified the peptides from the Brazilian tarantula and the Japanese horseshoe crab and found they can kill samples of melanoma cells derived from a cancer model in mice that are resistant to other cancer therapies. The pre-clinical study, published in the prominent journal Pharmacological Research, found that the two very similar peptides not only kill resistant melanoma cells, but the cancer is incapable of developing resistance to the peptides. Study last…

Photo credit: Spencer Scott Pugh on Unsplash. We hear a lot from environmentalists, animal rights activists, and just plain caring people about the supposed evils of industrial farming. Neo-Luddites throw tantrums about GMOs, for example. And many commenters lament the conditions in which meat animals and egg-laying hens are raised. Those are certainly legitimate concerns worthy of investigation and debate. But we also need to focus on the tremendous good humans receive from having bountiful, affordable, and nutritious food supplies, which would seem to require at least some industrial methods to achieve. Indeed, until now, these and other benefits humans…

Image source: Discovery Institute/YouTube. In a new end-of-year video, Stephen Meyer offers his thoughts on the progress made by proponents of intelligent design in 2024 — and how you can join us in our work in 2025. One development, a very exciting one, he publicly discloses here for the first time. Watch it on YouTube now. And once you’ve done so, please take a moment to help advance the theory of intelligent design by giving to the Center for Science and Culture where Dr. Meyer is the Director. Thank you! Evolution NewsEvolution News & Science Today (EN) provides original reporting…

A rare and complex avian flu strain in a child traveler reveals how globally circulating viruses are reshaping local outbreaks—and highlights critical surveillance gaps in South Asia. Influenza A (H5N1/bird flu) virus particles (round and rod-shaped; red and yellow). Creative composition and colorization/effects by NIAID; transmission electron micrograph imagery is courtesy CDC. Scale has been modified/not to scale. Credit: CDC and NIAID. A team of Australian scientists has recently identified highly pathogenic avian influenza A(H5N1) virus clade 2.3.2.1a in a child who traveled back to Australia from India. They have characterized the virus and published a report in the Center…