The Wolverine Wake-Up Issue 77
3-3-23
The Switch Made from a Single Molecule
Researchers have demonstrated a switch, analogous to a transistor, made from a single molecule called fullerene. By using a carefully tuned laser pulse, the researchers are able to use fullerene to switch the path of an incoming electron in a predictable way. This switching process can be three to six orders of magnitude faster than switches in microchips, depending on the laser pulses used. Fullerene switches in a network could produce a computer beyond what is possible with electronic transistors. They could also lead to unprecedented levels of resolution in microscopic imaging devices. Over 70 years ago, physicists discovered that molecules emit electrons in the presence of electric fields, and later on, certain wavelengths of light. The electron emissions created patterns that enticed curiosity but eluded explanation. But this has changed thanks to a new theoretical analysis, the ramification of which could not only lead to new high-tech applications. But it also improve our ability to scrutinize the physical world itself. Project Researcher Hirofumi Yanagisawa and his team theorized how the emission of electrons from excited molecules of fullerene should behave when exposed to specific kinds of laser light, and when testing their predictions, found they were correct.
-Oliver McKeon
Migraines During Menstruation
The study involved three groups of female participants with episodic migraine. All had at least three days with migraine in the month before the study. The groups were those with a regular menstrual cycle, those taking oral contraceptives, and those who had gone through menopause. Each group had 30 people. Researchers collected blood and tear fluid to determine CGRP levels. The samples were taken during menstruation when estrogen levels are low and around the time of ovulation, when levels are the highest. The study found that female participants with migraine and a regular menstrual cycle had higher CGRP concentrations during menstruation than those without migraine. In contrast, female participants taking oral contraceptives and in postmenopause had similar CGRP levels in the migraine and non-migraine groups. The study also suggests that measuring CGRP levels through tear fluid is feasible and warrants further investigation, as accurate measurement in the blood is challenging due to its very short half-life. This method is still exploratory, but it is non-invasive. Hormone levels were taken around the time of ovulation, they may not have been taken exactly on the day of ovulation.
-Leatta McKeon
Insomnia Tied to Greater Risk of Heart Attack, Especially in Women
"Our study showed that people with insomnia are more likely to have a heart attack regardless of age, and heart attacks occurred more often in women with insomnia.""Based on our pooled data, insomnia should be considered a risk factor for developing a heart attack, and we need to do a better job of educating people about how dangerous [lack of good sleep] can be," Dean said.Based on the pooled data, there was a statistically significant association between insomnia and having a heart attack after controlling for other factors that could make a heart attack more likely such as age, gender, comorbidities and smoking.There was no difference in the risk of heart attack between those getting five or less or nine or more hours of sleep a night, Dean said, which supports findings from previous studies that have shown that getting too little or too much sleep can be harmful to heart health.Non-restorative sleep and daytime dysfunction, however, were not associated with heart attack, suggesting that those who only complain of feeling unrefreshed upon waking up without any lack of sleep aren't at an increased risk of heart attacks, Dean said.
-Nathan Dewald
James Webb Spots Super Old, Massive Galaxies that Shouldn't Exist
Each of the candidate galaxies may have existed at the dawn of the universe roughly 500 to 700 million years after the Big Bang, or more than 13 billion years ago. They’re also gigantic, containing almost as many stars as the modern-day Milky Way Galaxy. You just don’t expect the early universe to be able to organize itself that quickly. These galaxies should not have had time to form. The latest finds aren’t the earliest galaxies observed by James Webb, which launched in December 2021 and is the most powerful telescope ever sent into space. James Webb could rewrite astronomy textbooks. These images look deep into a patch of sky close to the Big Dipper relatively boring, at least at first glance, region of space that the Hubble Space Telescope first observed in the 1990s. Nelson was peering at a postage stamp-sized section of one image when she spotted something strange a few fuzzy dots of light that looked way too bright to be real. They were so red and so bright, Nelson said. We weren't expecting to see them. She explained that in astronomy, red light usually equals old light. The universe, Nelson said, has been expanding since the dawn of time. As it expands, galaxies and other celestial objects move farther apart, and the light they emit stretches outthink of it like the cosmic equivalent of saltwater taffy.
-Carson Ososki