Tag Archives: Persistent

Uncommon Aerobic Bacterium Discovered Capable of Degrading Persistent “Forever Chemicals”

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Labris Portucalensis F11A Strain of Aerobic Bacterium From the Xanthobactereae Family, Can Break Down and Transform at ThreeS of-and PolyFluoroarkyl Substances (PFAS) C Byprodusts, According to New Research.

Labris Portucalensis F11 CAN BE POTENTIALLY USED FOR PFAS BIODEGRADADATION in CONTAMINATED ENVIRONMENTS. Image Credit: Wijayahena et alDOI: 10.1016/J.SCITOTOTENV.2024.178348.

“The Bond Between Carbon and Fluorine Atoms IS IS STRONG, SO MOST MICROBES CANNOT Use IT AN ENERGY SOURCE,” ER at the University at buffalo and suny.

“THE Labris Portucalensis F11 Bacterial Strain Developed The Ability to CHOP AWAY THE FLUORINE AND EAT THE CARBON.

Labris Portucalensis F11 Was Isolated from the SOIL OF ANDUSTRIAL SITE in PORTUGAL AND HAD Utical Contaminants. However, it Had Never BeeN Tested on Pfas.

In The New Study, Professor AGA and HER COLLEAGUES FOUND THAT Labris Portucalensis F11 METABOLIZED OVER 90% of OF Perfluorooctane Sulfonic Acid (PFOS) Following An Exposit of 100 Days.

PFOS Is ONE OF THE TYQUENTLY DETECTED TYPES OF PFAS AND WAS DESIGNATED HAZARDOUS BY THE US ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCYT Year.

Labris Portucalensis F11 ALSO BROKE down LOMER SULFONATE.

UNLIKE MANY PRIOR STUDIES ON PFAS-DEGRADING BACTERIA, The New Study Accounted for Shorter-Chain Breain Breakdown Products-or Metabolites.

In some case, Labris Portucalensis F11 EVEN REMOVED FLUORINE FROM The Metabolites or Broke Them Down to Minute, Undetector Levels.

“Many Previbility Studies Have Only Degradation of Pfas, But Not the Formation of Metabolites,“ SAID MINDULA WIJAYAHENA E University at Buffalo and Suny.

“WE Not ONLY ACCOUNTED FOR PFAS Byprodusts But Found some of Them Continued to Be Further Degradeded by The Bactteria.”

PFAS ARE A GROUP OF UBIQUITOUS CHEMICALS WIDELY USED SINCE THE THE 1950S in EVERYTHING from Nonstick Pans to Fire-Fighting Materials.

THEY'RE At the Can USE THEIR CARBON as an enERGY SOURCE.

“IF BACTERIA SURVIVE IN A HARSH, POLLUTED ENVIRONMENT, It's Probable Vecause THEY HAVE ADAPTED TO USE SURROUNDING CHEMICAL POLLUTANTS AS AS AS ASO RCE SO THEY DON'T Starve, “Professor AGA SAID.

“Through Evolution, SOME BACTERIA CAN DEVELOP EFFECTIVE MECHANISMS to USE Chemical Contaminants to Help Them Grow.”

THE Findings Were publiced ​​in the journal Science of the total Environment.

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Mindula K. Wijayahena et al2025. PFAS BIODEGRADATION by Labris Portucalensis F11: Evidence of Chain Shortening and Identification of Metabolites of PFOS, 6: 2 FTS, and 5: 3 FTCA. Science of the total Environment 959: 178348; Doi: 10.1016/J.SCITOTENV.2024.178348

Source: www.sci.news

Webb verifies persistent temperature contrast on WASP-39b between morning and evening

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Astronomers used the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope to obtain and analyze morning and evening transmission spectra of the hot Saturn exoplanet WASP-39b, which orbits a star about 700 light-years away in the constellation Virgo. The spectrum is best explained by a model in which the evening boundary is 177 K hotter than the morning boundary.

This diagram shows what WASP-39b might look like, based on our current understanding of planets. Image credit: NASA/ESA/CSA/Webb/J. Olmsted, STScI.

WASP-39b is a hot gas giant that orbits the G7 type star WASP-39 every 4.1 days.

First discovered in 2011, this alien world has roughly the same mass as Saturn, but is 50% larger.

The planet's extreme expansion is due in part to its high temperature (about 900 degrees Celsius or 1,652 degrees Fahrenheit).

“WASP-39b has become a kind of benchmark planet for the Webb mission's exoplanet atmospheric studies,” said Dr. Nestor Espinoza, an astronomer at the Space Telescope Science Institute.

“The planet has a bulging, puffy atmosphere, so the signal coming from the starlight passing through the planet's atmosphere is quite strong.”

Webb spectra of WASP-39b's atmosphere released so far have revealed the presence of carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, water vapor, and sodium, and show the entire day/night boundary, without any detailed attempt to distinguish one from the other.

Now, the new analysis constructs two different spectra from the terminator region, essentially splitting the day/night boundary into two semicircles: one from the evening and one from the morning.

According to Webb's data, evenings will be much hotter, reaching a scorching 800 degrees Celsius (1,450 degrees Fahrenheit), before easing into a cooler 600 degrees Celsius (1,150 degrees Fahrenheit) in the morning.

“It's really amazing that we were able to resolve this small difference, and this is thanks to Webb's sensitivity to near-infrared wavelengths and its extremely stable photometric sensor,” said Dr. Espinoza.

“Any movement of the instrument or the observatory while collecting data would severely limit our ability to make this detection. This has to be exceptionally precise, and Webb is just that precise.”

“We don't have a planet like this in our solar system, but most of the planets we observe orbiting distant stars have shorter orbits and are closer to us, like WASP-39b,” said Dr James Kirk, astronomer at Imperial College London.

“Now we can test theories about these planets and, for the first time, directly measure the morning and evening sides of an exoplanet across a wide range of wavelengths.”

This transmission spectrum, taken with Webb's NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrometer) PRISM in Bright Object Time Series mode, shows the amount of different wavelengths (colors) of near-infrared stellar light blocked by WASP-39b's atmosphere. The spectrum shows clear evidence of water and carbon dioxide on the exoplanet, as well as morning and evening temperature variations. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Webb / R. Crawford, STScI.

Extensive modeling of the resulting data will also allow researchers to investigate the structure of WASP-39b's atmosphere, its cloud cover, and why it's hotter in the evenings.

While the team plans to next investigate how cloud cover affects temperature, and vice versa, the astronomers confirmed that the main cause of WASP-39b's temperature difference is the circulation of gas around the planet.

For highly irradiated exoplanets that orbit relatively close to their stars, like WASP-39b, researchers typically expect gas to shift as the planet rotates around the star: a strong equatorial jet stream should move hotter gas on the dayside from the evening to the nightside.

Because the temperature difference is so large, the pressure difference is also large, resulting in faster wind speeds.

Using the General Circulation Model, a 3-D model similar to those used to predict weather patterns on Earth, the astronomers found that on WASP-39b, prevailing winds tend to move from the nightside across the morning boundary, around the dayside, across the evening boundary, and then back around the nightside.

As a result, the morning side of the boundary is cooler than the evening side.

In other words, the morning side is hit by winds of air cooled by the night side, and in the evening it is hit by winds of air heated by the day side.

The study suggests that wind speeds on WASP-39b could reach thousands of kilometers per hour.

“This analysis is particularly interesting because it provides previously unavailable 3D information about the planet,” Dr Espinoza said.

“The fact that it's hotter on the evening edge means that it's a bit bulging, which means that in theory there's a little swell at the boundary approaching the night side of the planet.”

of study Published in this week's journal Nature.

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N. Espinosa othersThe uneven boundary surface of exoplanet WASP-39b. NaturePublished online July 15, 2024; doi: 10.1038/s41586-024-07768-4

This article is based on press releases from NASA and Imperial College London.

Source: www.sci.news

PFAS – The Persistent Chemicals – Are Becoming Common in Food Packaging

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Potentially dangerous chemicals may be present in food packaging

Pirin Petunia/Getty Images

Food packaging and utensils commonly contain up to 68 “forever chemicals” that can pose health risks, many of which regulators are potentially unaware of. There is a gender.

Perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a type of synthetic chemical used to make products such as nonstick cookware and waterproof clothing. The bonds between carbon and fluorine atoms in PFAS are so strong that it can take hundreds to thousands of years for the bonds to break down.

Many of these chemicals are associated with adverse health outcomes, including: cancer and reproduction and immunity problem.

“There are thousands of these chemicals,” he says. Birgit Geueke At the Swiss Food Packaging Forum organization. “We wanted to understand what information is known about the presence of PFAS in food packaging.”

Geweke and his colleagues analyzed 1,312 studies conducted around the world that looked in detail at chemicals that come into contact with food that can be generated during manufacturing, packaging, and cooking. He then cross-referenced these chemicals with his list of known PFAS.

The research team found that 68 types of PFAS are commonly present across food-contact materials, such as packaging and utensils. Of these, 61 were not included in the regulatory list mandating the use of PFAS because they were not previously known to be present in such substances.

Of the 68 PFAS, only 39 have been tested for toxicity. One of the substances analyzed was perfluorooctanoic acid, which has been shown to have the potential to cause cancer in humans, based on limited evidence that it can cause testicular and kidney cancer. It is classified, Geueke said.

“I think it’s the manufacturer’s responsibility to minimize the use of PFAS,” she says. Regulators around the world are working in the right direction, she says. For example, the European Union recently proposed banning most PFAS.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Nerve cell overgrowth may be the cause of persistent pain following a UTI

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Urinary tract infections often cause you to need to urinate more often than usual

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Pain that persists even after a urinary tract infection appears to be cured may be caused by an overgrowth of nerve cells in the bladder.

Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are most commonly caused by bacteria. Escherichia coli From the feces, it reaches the urethra, bladder, and kidneys. Common symptoms include pain when urinating and an urge to urinate more frequently than usual. These infections primarily affect women, but About half of them will develop a urinary tract infection at some point in their lives.

“One of the big problems with urinary tract infections is that the recurrence rate is very high,” he says. Soman Abraham At Duke University, North Carolina. “However, after treatment, some people may experience the same symptoms of a urinary tract infection even if the infection is gone.”

To understand the root of the ongoing symptoms, Abraham and his colleagues reported persistent pelvic pain due to recurrent urinary tract infections, even though examination revealed no pain.8 analyzed bladder tissue biopsies taken from human women. Escherichia coli in their urine. They also collected biopsies from three women who were not known to have had urinary tract infections. The study did not include transgender people.

The researchers found that women with persistent UTI symptoms had an abnormal overgrowth of nerve cells in their bladders compared to other women. These nerve cells also contained high levels of a peptide called substance p, which causes pain and inflammation.

The researchers then gave the mice recurring urinary tract infections and found that they showed similar persistent signs of pain even after the infection had subsided. When the researchers looked closely at the mouse bladders, they found that immune cells called mast cells, which are located near nerve cells, were highly activated. Mast cells produce so-called nerve growth factors, which stimulate the production of nerve cells.

Antibiotics used to treat UTIs are often less selective for the bacteria they target, affecting beneficial bacterial strains around nerve cells. This damages nerve cells, causing mast cells to work overtime to help replace them, Abraham says.

In the final part of the experiment, the researchers induced urinary tract infections in another set of mice before treating them with a compound that suppresses the production of nerve growth factor. He then induced two more urinary tract infections and found that the mice showed no signs of lingering pain.

The research team hopes the results will help develop effective treatments to prevent ongoing symptoms in people. “You can actually prevent these nerves from growing, which can prevent pain and urinary frequency,” Abraham says.

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Source: www.newscientist.com