scientificamerican--2020-09-24--What Research in Antarctica Tells Us about the Science of Isolation

Over the past few months , the phrase “ social distancing ” has entered our lexicon .
Many of us have found ourselves separated from family and friends—or at least from our normal social lives .
As humans grapple with pandemic-induced isolation , science is starting to offer insight into what may be happening in our brains when our social contact with others is dramatically reduced .
That insight happens to come from a place with more penguins than people .
Tim Heitland of the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Center for Polar and Marine Research in Germany spent 14 months @ @ @ @ @ @ @ When he returned , daily life felt overwhelming—everything from the colors and vegetation to all the other people .
Part of the shock may have come from returning with a different brain than the one he left with .
While the members of Heitland ’ s crew conducted research on the earth ’ s iciest continent , they themselves were also being studied by researchers interested in how extreme work environments trigger neurological changes .
The investigation showed that most of the people in Heitland ’ s team lost volume in parts of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in spatial navigation , learning and emotional processing .
The phenomenon is similar to what scientists believe happens to prisoners in solitary confinement , where social isolation and sensory deprivation can lead to post-traumatic stress disorder .
This research appears particularly relevant now , when vast numbers of people are spending more and more time alone .
Some scientists hope the work will lead to interventions that counteract the damage of isolation before it causes long-term problems .

Over the past few months, the phrase “social distancing” has entered our lexicon. Many of us have found ourselves separated from family and friends—or at least from our normal social lives. As humans grapple with pandemic-induced isolation, science is starting to offer insight into what may be happening in our brains when our social contact with others is dramatically reduced.
That insight happens to come from a place with more penguins than people.
Tim Heitland of the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Center for Polar and Marine Research in Germany spent 14 months in Antarctica between 2016 and 2018. When he returned, daily life felt overwhelming—everything from the colors and vegetation to all the other people. Part of the shock may have come from returning with a different brain than the one he left with.
While the members of Heitland’s crew conducted research on the earth’s iciest continent, they themselves were also being studied by researchers interested in how extreme work environments trigger neurological changes. The investigation showed that most of the people in Heitland’s team lost volume in parts of their hippocampus, a brain region involved in spatial navigation, learning and emotional processing. The phenomenon is similar to what scientists believe happens to prisoners in solitary confinement, where social isolation and sensory deprivation can lead to post-traumatic stress disorder.
This research appears particularly relevant now, when vast numbers of people are spending more and more time alone. Some scientists hope the work will lead to interventions that counteract the damage of isolation before it causes long-term problems.


scientificamerican--2020-09-24--Does 'Brain Training' Actually Work?

Does 'Brain Training' Actually Work?

If there were an app on your phone that could improve your memory , would you try it ?
Who wouldn ’ t want a better memory ?
After all , our recollections are fragile and can be impaired by diseases , injuries , mental health conditions and , most acutely for all of us , aging .
A multibillion-dollar industry for brain training already capitalizes on this perceived need by providing an abundance of apps for phones and tablets that provide mental challenges that are easily accessible and relatively inexpensive .
The three of us , and many others @ @ @ @ @ @ @ exercises can improve basic cognitive skills and even lead to better scores on standard IQ tests .
At the same time , brain training has become a profoundly controversial endeavor .
Some researchers , including one of us , have expressed deep reservations about both its reliability and its validity .
There was even a consensus statement issued calling brain training into question , which , in turn , resulted in a counterresponse from researchers who defended it .
In the case of memory training , for instance , study results have been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ combine data across studies come to differing conclusions .
Undoubtedly , there is an enormous amount of hyperbole surrounding the field with many companies exaggerating the potential benefits of using their apps .
The main controversies center around the extent to which the practice of these skills results in actual benefits that are consequential for your daily life .
Does recalling an increasing number of digits help you remember to take your medication , do better on a school exam , remember the name of the person whom you met yesterday or even @ @ @ @ @ @ @ question whether this is even possible .
Others argue that we should consider the brain like our muscles , which can be exercised and toned .
In this analogy , daily challenges , even demanding ones such as reading a detailed newspaper article or solving an algebra problem , might not be sufficiently challenging to furnish an adequate work-out for the brain .
Just as athletes engage in strength and conditioning by repeatedly exercising certain muscle groups and their respiratory and cardiovascular systems , targeted repetition of memory exercises may be the key @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Memory training apps require tracking a large number of objects while one is distracted with a secondary task ( such as making mental calculations or navigating the landscape of a game ) .
That degree of difficulty and repetition , however , may be rare in daily life , which is the gap that memory apps aim to fill .
If brain training works , the field holds enormous promise to help people with cognitive impairments , and to aid individuals who are recovering from cancer or perhaps even COVID-19 .
Some @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could be seen in the FDA ’ s recent approval of a brain training game to treat ADHD .
Critics , however argue that while the concept is appealing , the overall evidence does not suffice to demonstrate that core brain processes can be truly improved .
Despite what many apps and brain training companies will tell their customers , scientists have not uncovered the key ingredients that make an intervention effective , nor the recipes that would best address the diverse needs of those seeking help .
Furthermore , most apps available @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at all .
So how do we reconcile the mixed evidence in the field and at the same time cut through the hype ?
We suggest that some of the confusion may result from the fact that little consideration has been given to who would benefit most from the brain training apps that are supported by research studies .
Will it only be those who have some form of memory impairment , or can it also help those eager for self-improvement even though they are already functioning relatively well ?
Although the jury @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that short-term working memory training can provide benefits to relatively high functioning individuals , such as college students .
For vision training , there are suggestions that even elite athletes can benefit .
Still , whether one has a memory impairment or not , it is likely that , similar to diet or exercise , brain training does not benefit everyone in the same way .
We suggest that much of the debate , and the lack of consensus , revolves around the wrong scientific questions being asked .
Specifically , the current @ @ @ @ @ @ @ research methods devoted towards group averages , when what most of us want to know is whether something is right for us .
To illustrate the problem , consider the hypothetical situation in which one person in 10 gains a profound benefit from a particular memory training app .
In the population health model , outcomes are averaged across all individuals who received the intervention , and thus the profound benefit experienced by the few will be washed out by the lack of an effect in the many .
Repeat this experiment across @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , each potentially providing positive effects for different subgroups , and the collection of benefits experienced by some individuals will be hidden by the inappropriate research methods applied .
The population health model , while highly appropriate when its assumptions are upheld , simply does not apply well in a diverse population where different people may interact with the training app in distinct ways and therefore show a range of benefits .
To overcome these limitations , our team is currently leveraging the power of citizen science .
Similar to a large-scale study @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Britain , promoted by Cambridge University and the BBC ) , we are seeking to recruit thousands of participants to help us uncover the potential merits of memory training .
But unlike Brain Test Britain ’ s simple question of whether brain training works , we are looking to engage the U.S. population in a new challenge to test why and for whom brain training works , and under which conditions .
To accomplish our goal , we have launched a new study funded by the National Institutes of Health that aims to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ memory training study that compares multiple approaches to train working memory .
The study will use a common set of assessment measures to evaluate potential training gains , and it will focus on individual differences .
Anyone older than 18 can join our study and help generate the data required to change the debate and move forward with a new paradigm of precision brain training .
If you might be interested in joining our trial , go to the registration site at the University of California , Riverside .
Only by including a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ how different training approaches and their outcomes relate to particular individuals can we address these controversies once and for all .
It may be the case that most of the benefits will be found in those who have a condition that impairs their cognitive abilities , or we may find that high-functioning individuals may benefit from training .
We will attempt to solve this riddle by applying statistical models to examine how baseline responses on questionnaires and assessments predict what gains each participant may receive from the different training types .
If successful @ @ @ @ @ @ @ what factors may be most revealing of a given individual ’ s likelihood of gaining from memory training , as well as which form of training may be best for that person .
Our goal is to avoid a one-size-fits-all approach .
Instead , we want to advance a new model based upon the premise that people are diverse in their cognitive strengths and needs , and therefore require the type of interventions that would serve them best .

If there were an app on your phone that could improve your memory, would you try it? Who wouldn’t want a better memory? After all, our recollections are fragile and can be impaired by diseases, injuries, mental health conditions and, most acutely for all of us, aging.
A multibillion-dollar industry for brain training already capitalizes on this perceived need by providing an abundance of apps for phones and tablets that provide mental challenges that are easily accessible and relatively inexpensive.
The three of us, and many others, have provided evidence that carefully formulated exercises can improve basic cognitive skills and even lead to better scores on standard IQ tests. At the same time, brain training has become a profoundly controversial endeavor. Some researchers, including one of us, have expressed deep reservations about both its reliability and its validity. There was even a consensus statement issued calling brain training into question, which, in turn, resulted in a counterresponse from researchers who defended it.
In the case of memory training, for instance, study results have been inconsistent, and even meta-analytic approaches that combine data across studies come to differing conclusions. Undoubtedly, there is an enormous amount of hyperbole surrounding the field with many companies exaggerating the potential benefits of using their apps.
The main controversies center around the extent to which the practice of these skills results in actual benefits that are consequential for your daily life. Does recalling an increasing number of digits help you remember to take your medication, do better on a school exam, remember the name of the person whom you met yesterday or even make better life choices?
Some scientists question whether this is even possible. Others argue that we should consider the brain like our muscles, which can be exercised and toned. In this analogy, daily challenges, even demanding ones such as reading a detailed newspaper article or solving an algebra problem, might not be sufficiently challenging to furnish an adequate work-out for the brain.
Just as athletes engage in strength and conditioning by repeatedly exercising certain muscle groups and their respiratory and cardiovascular systems, targeted repetition of memory exercises may be the key to strengthening and conditioning our memory processes. Memory training apps require tracking a large number of objects while one is distracted with a secondary task (such as making mental calculations or navigating the landscape of a game). That degree of difficulty and repetition, however, may be rare in daily life, which is the gap that memory apps aim to fill.
If brain training works, the field holds enormous promise to help people with cognitive impairments, and to aid individuals who are recovering from cancer or perhaps even COVID-19. Some affirmation of the potential for cognitive training could be seen in the FDA’s recent approval of a brain training game to treat ADHD.
Critics, however argue that while the concept is appealing, the overall evidence does not suffice to demonstrate that core brain processes can be truly improved. Despite what many apps and brain training companies will tell their customers, scientists have not uncovered the key ingredients that make an intervention effective, nor the recipes that would best address the diverse needs of those seeking help. Furthermore, most apps available to consumers have not undergone scientific validation at all.
So how do we reconcile the mixed evidence in the field and at the same time cut through the hype? We suggest that some of the confusion may result from the fact that little consideration has been given to who would benefit most from the brain training apps that are supported by research studies. Will it only be those who have some form of memory impairment, or can it also help those eager for self-improvement even though they are already functioning relatively well?
Although the jury is still out, there is evidence that short-term working memory training can provide benefits to relatively high functioning individuals, such as college students. For vision training, there are suggestions that even elite athletes can benefit. Still, whether one has a memory impairment or not, it is likely that, similar to diet or exercise, brain training does not benefit everyone in the same way.
We suggest that much of the debate, and the lack of consensus, revolves around the wrong scientific questions being asked. Specifically, the current paradigm is dominated by population health and research methods devoted towards group averages, when what most of us want to know is whether something is right for us.
To illustrate the problem, consider the hypothetical situation in which one person in 10 gains a profound benefit from a particular memory training app. In the population health model, outcomes are averaged across all individuals who received the intervention, and thus the profound benefit experienced by the few will be washed out by the lack of an effect in the many.
Repeat this experiment across a number of different memory training apps, each potentially providing positive effects for different subgroups, and the collection of benefits experienced by some individuals will be hidden by the inappropriate research methods applied. The population health model, while highly appropriate when its assumptions are upheld, simply does not apply well in a diverse population where different people may interact with the training app in distinct ways and therefore show a range of benefits.
To overcome these limitations, our team is currently leveraging the power of citizen science. Similar to a large-scale study in the United Kingdom (Brain Test Britain, promoted by Cambridge University and the BBC), we are seeking to recruit thousands of participants to help us uncover the potential merits of memory training. But unlike Brain Test Britain’s simple question of whether brain training works, we are looking to engage the U.S. population in a new challenge to test why and for whom brain training works, and under which conditions.
To accomplish our goal, we have launched a new study funded by the National Institutes of Health that aims to recruit 30,000 volunteers to participate in a memory training study that compares multiple approaches to train working memory. The study will use a common set of assessment measures to evaluate potential training gains, and it will focus on individual differences. Anyone older than 18 can join our study and help generate the data required to change the debate and move forward with a new paradigm of precision brain training. If you might be interested in joining our trial, go to the registration site at the University of California, Riverside.
Only by including a very large number of participants and evaluating how different training approaches and their outcomes relate to particular individuals can we address these controversies once and for all. It may be the case that most of the benefits will be found in those who have a condition that impairs their cognitive abilities, or we may find that high-functioning individuals may benefit from training.
We will attempt to solve this riddle by applying statistical models to examine how baseline responses on questionnaires and assessments predict what gains each participant may receive from the different training types. If successful, the study will help us determine what factors may be most revealing of a given individual’s likelihood of gaining from memory training, as well as which form of training may be best for that person.
Our goal is to avoid a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, we want to advance a new model based upon the premise that people are diverse in their cognitive strengths and needs, and therefore require the type of interventions that would serve them best.


scientificamerican--2020-09-24--When and Why You Should Get a Flu Shot

When and Why You Should Get a Flu Shot

As the U.S. continues to grapple with the novel coronavirus pandemic , another infectious respiratory disease is already looming : influenza .
Flu season typically begins around November in the northern hemisphere , and the combined burden of the illness and COVID-19 could overwhelm hospitals and testing sites .
The good news is that a safe and effective flu vaccine is already available to everyone aged six months and older .
“ The answer to the question ‘ Why should you get a flu vaccine ?
’ is the same this year as it is every year .
But there @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s extra beneficial to get [ it ] this year , ” says Emily Landon , executive medical director of infection prevention and control at the University of Chicago Medicine .
She explains that influenza can have dire consequences ranging from loss of productivity to death .
“ You should do everything you can to prevent the flu , and the shot is the best way we can do that , ” Landon says .
In addition to protecting yourself , a flu shot also helps protect other family members who may be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ notes .
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated that in the 2018–2019 season , some 35.5 million Americans came down with the flu and that about 34,000 of them died from it .
Flu shots prevented another 4.4 million cases and about 3,500 deaths .
In 2020 vaccinating as many people as possible against influenza could be critical to preventing a dual-epidemic scenario .
But getting a flu shot is good policy in any year , experts say .
“ In this COVID flu season that ’ s coming , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ get a flu shot because it ’ s going to be hard to tell the difference between flu and COVID , ” considering that the two diseases have similar symptoms , Landon says .
Because of that problem , people who get the flu might needlessly stay quarantined or get tested for COVID-19 as a precaution .
Therefore , widely vaccinating against influenza can reduce unnecessary COVID-19 testing and protect vulnerable people : those whose immune symptoms have been compromised by either of the two illnesses are at greater risk of contracting a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ Anything to do with reducing the risk of respiratory disease is going to be important , ” Landon says .
In the global south , the peak of each flu season occurs during winter , which allows epidemiologists to predict the disease ’ s severity during the northern hemisphere ’ s upcoming winter .
This year the flu season in the southern hemisphere was relatively mild—possibly as a result of COVID-19 precautions , says James Cherry , a pediatric infectious disease physician at the University of California , Los Angeles .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ year , ” likely because social distancing and mask-wearing kept influenza from gaining a “ foothold , ” he says .
“ That may well happen here , so we can probably expect a mild flu season .
But nevertheless , we should all get our vaccine.
” Is there an optimal time to get a flu shot ?
Stuart Ray , an infectious disease physician at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine , says everyone aged six months and older should get a vaccine every flu season , preferably before Halloween @ @ @ @ @ @ @ your immune system to recognize and respond to the vaccine , and those responses last for a long time , ” he says .
On average , the antibodies produced by an individual ’ s immune response to a flu shot take two weeks to develop and , though there is no definitive timeline , can last for about four to six months , given that an individual ’ s immunity depends on many factors , from their own immune system function to the virulence of the flu strain .
And the immune @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the vaccine for more than a year that can “ reawaken and contribute to protection against a severe infection , ” Ray adds .
Landon agrees that there is no reason to put off getting vaccinated for influenza .
“ Wherever it ’ s convenient to you to get a flu shot , you should absolutely get a flu shot , ” she says .
“ If you have a doctor ’ s visit or if your kids have a well-child visit coming up , now ’ s the time to get @ @ @ @ @ @ @ distancing and reductions in holiday travel could make this year ’ s flu season peak slightly later than usual .
“ It may be after we start getting people vaccines for COVID that we see more resurgence of influenza ” because of resulting declines in social distancing , she says .
“ You may want your flu vaccine to last more into the spring .
And if you want peak effectiveness in February , March and April , then you probably shouldn ’ t get it until October or November.
” If COVID-19 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , would it be a good idea to start wearing masks every flu season ?
The answer is maybe .
“ I think a more important thing is to see that everybody gets vaccinated , ” Cherry says .
Landon notes that since the 2003 SARS epidemic struck Asia , mask wearing has become far more commonplace there .
The same trend might catch on elsewhere—which would be wise , she says .
“ That ’ s something medical science has been pushing for a long time , but it ’ s not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ States , ” Landon says .
“ But I think it should be.
” All three experts agree on the bottom line : make a plan to get a flu shot to protect yourself and those around you .
“ While we don ’ t have a vaccine for SARS-CoV-2 , we do have tools to limit the impact of influenza , ” Ray says .
“ And we all need one less thing to worry about in 2020 .
”

As the U.S. continues to grapple with the novel coronavirus pandemic, another infectious respiratory disease is already looming: influenza. Flu season typically begins around November in the northern hemisphere, and the combined burden of the illness and COVID-19 could overwhelm hospitals and testing sites. The good news is that a safe and effective flu vaccine is already available to everyone aged six months and older.
“The answer to the question ‘Why should you get a flu vaccine?’ is the same this year as it is every year. But there are some additional reasons why it’s extra beneficial to get [it] this year,” says Emily Landon, executive medical director of infection prevention and control at the University of Chicago Medicine. She explains that influenza can have dire consequences ranging from loss of productivity to death. “You should do everything you can to prevent the flu, and the shot is the best way we can do that,” Landon says. In addition to protecting yourself, a flu shot also helps protect other family members who may be more vulnerable to respiratory disease, she notes.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated that in the 2018–2019 season, some 35.5 million Americans came down with the flu and that about 34,000 of them died from it. Flu shots prevented another 4.4 million cases and about 3,500 deaths. In 2020 vaccinating as many people as possible against influenza could be critical to preventing a dual-epidemic scenario. But getting a flu shot is good policy in any year, experts say.
“In this COVID flu season that’s coming, it’s even more important to get a flu shot because it’s going to be hard to tell the difference between flu and COVID,” considering that the two diseases have similar symptoms, Landon says. Because of that problem, people who get the flu might needlessly stay quarantined or get tested for COVID-19 as a precaution. Therefore, widely vaccinating against influenza can reduce unnecessary COVID-19 testing and protect vulnerable people: those whose immune symptoms have been compromised by either of the two illnesses are at greater risk of contracting a more severe case of the other one. “Anything to do with reducing the risk of respiratory disease is going to be important,” Landon says.
In the global south, the peak of each flu season occurs during winter, which allows epidemiologists to predict the disease’s severity during the northern hemisphere’s upcoming winter. This year the flu season in the southern hemisphere was relatively mild—possibly as a result of COVID-19 precautions, says James Cherry, a pediatric infectious disease physician at the University of California, Los Angeles. “This year was an incredibly light year,” likely because social distancing and mask-wearing kept influenza from gaining a “foothold,” he says. “That may well happen here, so we can probably expect a mild flu season. But nevertheless, we should all get our vaccine.”
Is there an optimal time to get a flu shot? Stuart Ray, an infectious disease physician at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, says everyone aged six months and older should get a vaccine every flu season, preferably before Halloween. “It takes some time for your immune system to recognize and respond to the vaccine, and those responses last for a long time,” he says. On average, the antibodies produced by an individual’s immune response to a flu shot take two weeks to develop and, though there is no definitive time line, can last for about four to six months—given that a person’s immunity depends on many factors, from their own immune system function to the virulence of the flu strain. And the immune system can maintain a “memory” of the vaccine for more than a year that can “reawaken and contribute to protection against a severe infection,” Ray adds.
Landon agrees that there is no reason to put off getting vaccinated for influenza. “Wherever it’s convenient to you to get a flu shot, you should absolutely get a flu shot,” she says. “If you have a doctor’s visit or if your kids have a well-child visit coming up, now’s the time to get it.” But Landon adds that social distancing and reductions in holiday travel could make this year’s flu season peak slightly later than usual. “It may be after we start getting people vaccines for COVID that we see more resurgence of influenza” because of resulting declines in social distancing, she says. “You may want your flu vaccine to last more into the spring. And if you want peak effectiveness in February, March and April, then you probably shouldn’t get it until October or November.”
If COVID-19 precautions also dampen the spread of influenza, would it be a good idea to start wearing masks every flu season? The answer is maybe. “I think a more important thing is to see that everybody gets vaccinated,” Cherry says. Landon notes that since the 2003 SARS epidemic struck Asia, mask wearing has become far more commonplace there. The same trend might catch on elsewhere—which would be wise, she says. “That’s something medical science has been pushing for a long time, but it’s not been culturally a thing in the United States,” Landon says. “But I think it should be.”
All three experts agree on the bottom line: make a plan to get a flu shot to protect yourself and those around you. “While we don’t have a vaccine for SARS-CoV-2, we do have tools to limit the impact of influenza,” Ray says. “And we all need one less thing to worry about in 2020.”


scientificamerican--2020-09-24--Bird Brains Are Far More Humanlike Than Once Thought

With enough training , pigeons can distinguish between the works of Picasso and Monet .
Ravens can identify themselves in a mirror .
And on a university campus in Japan , crows are known to intentionally leave walnuts in a crosswalk and let passing traffic do their nut cracking .
Many bird species are incredibly smart .
Yet among intelligent animals , the “ bird brain ” often doesn ’ t get much respect .
Two papers published today in Science find birds actually have a brain that is much more similar to our complex primate organ than previously thought @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the avian brain was limited in function because it lacked a neocortex .
In mammals , the neocortex is the hulking , evolutionarily modern outer layer of the brain that allows for complex cognition and creativity and that makes up most of what , in vertebrates as a whole , is called the pallium .
The new findings show that birds ’ do , in fact , have a brain structure that is comparable to the neocortex despite taking a different shape .
It turns out that at a cellular level , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the mammal cortex , explaining why many birds exhibit advanced behaviors and abilities that have long befuddled scientists .
The new work even suggests that certain birds demonstrate some degree of consciousness .
The mammalian cortex is organized into six layers containing vertical columns of neurons that communicate with one another both horizontally and vertically .
The avian brain , on the other hand , was thought to be arranged into discrete collections of neurons called nuclei , including a region called the dorsal ventricular ridge , or DVR , and a single @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the new papers , senior author Onur Güntürkün , a neuroscientist at Ruhr University Bochum in Germany , and his colleagues analyzed regions of the DVR and wulst involved in sound and vision processing .
To do so , they used a technology called three-dimensional polarized light imaging , or 3D-PLI—a light-based microscopy technique that can be employed to visualize nerve fibers in brain samples .
The researchers found that in both pigeons and barn owls , these brain regions are constructed much like our neocortex , with both layerlike and columnar @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
They confirmed the 3D-PLI findings using biocytin tracing , a technique for staining nerve cells .
[ In a Scientific American article , Güntürkün describes how the avian brain demonstrates surprising cognitive abilities . ]
“ We can now claim that this layered , corticallike organization is indeed a feature of the whole sensory forebrain in most , if not all , birds , ” says Martin Stacho , co-lead author of the study and Güntürkün ’ s colleague at Ruhr University Bochum .
“ It ’ s not that the DVR @ @ @ @ @ @ @ University neuroscientist Suzana Herculano-Houzel , who wrote a commentary accompanying the two new papers and was not involved in either of them , “ but rather that the whole of the pallium in mammals and in birds has similar developmental origins and connectivity , and therefore [ the pallia of both classes ] should be considered equivalent structures .
Stacho shows that settling for what the naked eye sees can be misleading.
” The idea that the DVR was somehow related to the neocortex was proposed in the 1960s by neuroscientist Harvey Karten @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Others subsequently claimed the DVR actually corresponded with other mammalian brain regions , including the amygdala , which , among other tasks , carries out the processing of emotion .
“ The theory about a DVR [ correlation ] has been possibly one of the biggest disputes in the field of comparative neurobiology , ” Stacho says .
But his new work lends credibility to Karten ’ s original hypothesis .
Stacho and his colleagues think the findings also represent a glimpse into ancient animal brain evolution .
The last common ancestor @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that roamed the earth around 320 million years ago .
And its brain , the team believes , was probably a precursor to that of the two lineages that diverged through evolution .
“ Nobody knows how exactly the brain of the last common ancestor looked like , ” Stacho says .
“ Most likely , it wasn ’ t like the neocortex or the DVR .
It was probably something in between that , in mammals , developed to a six-layered neocortex and , in birds , to the wulst and DVR.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ a group at the University of Tübingen in Germany , lends still more insight into the avian brain , suggesting that birds have some ability for sensory consciousness—subjective experiences in which they recall sensory experiences .
Consciousness has long been thought to be localized in the cerebral cortex of smart primates—namely , chimps , bonobos and us humans .
Yet crows appear to have at least a rudimentary form of sensory consciousness .
In the Tübingen group ’ s experiment , two carrion crows were trained to recall a previous experience to guide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ completed , they went through a testing phase in which a gray square might appear followed by either a red or blue square 2.5 seconds later .
In this exercise , the crows were trained to move their head if they saw a gray square and then a red one .
And they learned to keep their head still if they saw a gray square and then a blue one .
When the birds saw no stimulus followed by the appearance of a colored square , the sequence was reversed : blue signaled @ @ @ @ @ @ @ red told them not to .
So to correctly respond to the colored squares , the crows had to recall whether or not they had seen a gray one first—equating to a past subjective experience .
It was crucial to the experiment to present the gray square in six different intensities , including at the threshold of the birds ’ perception .
This way , lead author and neurobiologist Andreas Nieder and his colleagues could confirm that the crows were not simply carrying out conditioned responses to stimuli but instead drawing on a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ electrodes in an avian brain region called the nidopallium caudolaterale ( NCL ) , the researchers were able to monitor activity of individual neurons in response to the stimuli .
When the crows viewed a dim gray square at their perceptual threshold , NCL neurons became active in the period between that stimulus and the presentation of a colored square—but only if the crows reported seeing the gray one .
If they could not detect that square , the neurons remained silent .
This result suggests a unique subjective experience was being manifested @ @ @ @ @ @ @ claim crows have the self-conscious existence and self-awareness of apes but simply that the birds can partake in a unique , multipart sensory experience in response to a stimulus .
“ I am generally not a big fan of ascribing complex humanlike cognitive states to animals and prefer to maintain a conservative attitude , ” he says .
“ Humans easily start to project their own mental states to other living ( or even nonliving ) beings .
But in terms of sensory consciousness in other species , it is probably fair to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mammals and birds , possess it.
” Nieder ’ s team ’ s findings suggest that the neural underpinnings of sensory consciousness either were in place before mammals evolved or developed independently in both lineages—with the avian line showing that being conscious does not necessarily depend on a bulky cerebral cortex .
Work by Herculano-Houzel demonstrates that the brains of corvids—members of a family of so-called “ smart birds ” such as crows , ravens and magpies—are very densely populated with interconnected neurons .
Her studies jibe with the new Science papers .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ pallium connectivity is indeed very similar between birds and mammals ... , it all comes together very nicely , ” she says , pointing out that the corvid pallium holds about as many neurons as you ’ d find in primates with a much larger brain .
This latest research also undercuts primate exceptionalism .
“ I hope that more people will be tempted to drop the notion that there is something very unique and exclusive about the human brain , ” Herculano-Houzel says .

With enough training, pigeons can distinguish between the works of Picasso and Monet. Ravens can identify themselves in a mirror. And on a university campus in Japan, crows are known to intentionally leave walnuts in a crosswalk and let passing traffic do their nut cracking. Many bird species are incredibly smart. Yet among intelligent animals, the “bird brain” often doesn’t get much respect.
Two papers published today in Science find birds actually have a brain that is much more similar to our complex primate organ than previously thought. For years it was assumed that the avian brain was limited in function because it lacked a neocortex. In mammals, the neocortex is the hulking, evolutionarily modern outer layer of the brain that allows for complex cognition and creativity and that makes up most of what, in vertebrates as a whole, is called the pallium. The new findings show that birds’ do, in fact, have a brain structure that is comparable to the neocortex despite taking a different shape. It turns out that at a cellular level, the brain region is laid out much like the mammal cortex, explaining why many birds exhibit advanced behaviors and abilities that have long befuddled scientists. The new work even suggests that certain birds demonstrate some degree of consciousness.
The mammalian cortex is organized into six layers containing vertical columns of neurons that communicate with one another both horizontally and vertically. The avian brain, on the other hand, was thought to be arranged into discrete collections of neurons called nuclei, including a region called the dorsal ventricular ridge, or DVR, and a single nucleus named the wulst.
In one of the new papers, senior author Onur Güntürkün, a neuroscientist at Ruhr University Bochum in Germany, and his colleagues analyzed regions of the DVR and wulst involved in sound and vision processing. To do so, they used a technology called three-dimensional polarized light imaging, or 3D-PLI—a light-based microscopy technique that can be employed to visualize nerve fibers in brain samples. The researchers found that in both pigeons and barn owls, these brain regions are constructed much like our neocortex, with both layerlike and columnar organization—and with both horizontal and vertical circuitry. They confirmed the 3D-PLI findings using biocytin tracing, a technique for staining nerve cells.
[In a Scientific American article, Güntürkün describes how the avian brain demonstrates surprising cognitive abilities.]
“We can now claim that this layered, corticallike organization is indeed a feature of the whole sensory forebrain in most, if not all, birds,” says Martin Stacho, co-lead author of the study and Güntürkün’s colleague at Ruhr University Bochum.
“It’s not that the DVR is the neocortex,” says Vanderbilt University neuroscientist Suzana Herculano-Houzel, who wrote a commentary accompanying the two new papers and was not involved in either of them, “but rather that the whole of the pallium in mammals and in birds has similar developmental origins and connectivity, and therefore [the pallia of both classes] should be considered equivalent structures. Stacho shows that settling for what the naked eye sees can be misleading.”
The idea that the DVR was somehow related to the neocortex was proposed in the 1960s by neuroscientist Harvey Karten. Yet it didn’t stick. Others subsequently claimed the DVR actually corresponded with other mammalian brain regions, including the amygdala, which, among other tasks, carries out the processing of emotion. “The theory about a DVR [correlation] has been possibly one of the biggest disputes in the field of comparative neurobiology,” Stacho says. But his new work lends credibility to Karten’s original hypothesis.
Stacho and his colleagues think the findings also represent a glimpse into ancient animal brain evolution. The last common ancestor of birds and mammals was a reptile that roamed the earth around 320 million years ago. And its brain, the team believes, was probably a precursor to that of the two lineages that diverged through evolution. “Nobody knows how exactly the brain of the last common ancestor looked like,” Stacho says. “Most likely, it wasn’t like the neocortex or the DVR. It was probably something in between that, in mammals, developed to a six-layered neocortex and, in birds, to the wulst and DVR.”
The other new paper, by a group at the University of Tübingen in Germany, lends still more insight into the avian brain, suggesting that birds have some ability for sensory consciousness—subjective experiences in which they recall sensory experiences. Consciousness has long been thought to be localized in the cerebral cortex of smart primates—namely, chimps, bonobos and us humans. Yet crows appear to have at least a rudimentary form of sensory consciousness.
In the Tübingen group’s experiment, two carrion crows were trained to recall a previous experience to guide their behavior. When their training was completed, they went through a testing phase in which a gray square might appear followed by either a red or blue square 2.5 seconds later. In this exercise, the crows were trained to move their head if they saw a gray square and then a red one. And they learned to keep their head still if they saw a gray square and then a blue one. When the birds saw no stimulus followed by the appearance of a colored square, the sequence was reversed: blue signaled them to move their head, and red told them not to. So to correctly respond to the colored squares, the crows had to recall whether or not they had seen a gray one first—equating to a past subjective experience.
It was crucial to the experiment to present the gray square in six different intensities, including at the threshold of the birds’ perception. This way, lead author and neurobiologist Andreas Nieder and his colleagues could confirm that the crows were not simply carrying out conditioned responses to stimuli but instead drawing on a subjective experience.
Further, by implanting electrodes in an avian brain region called the nidopallium caudolaterale (NCL), the researchers were able to monitor activity of individual neurons in response to the stimuli. When the crows viewed a dim gray square at their perceptual threshold, NCL neurons became active in the period between that stimulus and the presentation of a colored square—but only if the crows reported seeing the gray one. If they could not detect that square, the neurons remained silent. This result suggests a unique subjective experience was being manifested through neuronal activity.
Nieder does not claim crows have the self-conscious existence and self-awareness of apes but simply that the birds can partake in a unique, multipart sensory experience in response to a stimulus. “I am generally not a big fan of ascribing complex humanlike cognitive states to animals and prefer to maintain a conservative attitude,” he says. “Humans easily start to project their own mental states to other living (or even nonliving) beings. But in terms of sensory consciousness in other species, it is probably fair to assume that advanced vertebrates, such as mammals and birds, possess it.”
Nieder’s team’s findings suggest that the neural underpinnings of sensory consciousness either were in place before mammals evolved or developed independently in both lineages—with the avian line showing that being conscious does not necessarily depend on a bulky cerebral cortex.
Work by Herculano-Houzel demonstrates that the brains of corvids—members of a family of so-called “smart birds” such as crows, ravens and magpies—are very densely populated with interconnected neurons. Her studies jibe with the new Science papers. “With Güntürkün’s findings that pallium connectivity is indeed very similar between birds and mammals..., it all comes together very nicely,” she says, pointing out that the corvid pallium holds about as many neurons as you’d find in primates with a much larger brain.
This latest research also undercuts primate exceptionalism. “I hope that more people will be tempted to drop the notion that there is something very unique and exclusive about the human brain,” Herculano-Houzel says.


scientificamerican--2020-09-24--Migrating Tornadoes Bring Heightened Danger to the Southeast

In March 2019 , a violent tornado plowed through eastern Alabama , flattening houses and demolishing mobile homes .
Twenty-three people were killed including four children , ages 10 , 9 , 8 and 6 .
Exactly one year later , on March 3 , 2020 , a tornado gusting at 170 mph ripped through central Tennessee , killing 19 people .
Four of the victims were children between the ages of 2 and 7 .
The twisters spiraled along the ground for only minutes , but they are the two deadliest natural disasters in the United States since the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ national attention .
The mortal storms illustrate an alarming trend that is overlooked amid concern about hurricanes , wildfires and floods : Tornadoes are increasingly occurring in the Southeast , where they are twice as deadly as tornadoes elsewhere in the United States , according to an E & E News analysis .
A shift of tornado activity from the Great Plains to the Southeast has brought heightened danger by concentrating twisters in a far more perilous landscape—one covered by forest that conceals tornadoes and is filled with mobile homes that are easily @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , 19 of 23 victims were killed in mobile homes .
The state has the most recorded tornado deaths than every other state .
It also has one of the nation ’ s highest concentrations of people living in mobile homes .
NOAA records dating to 1950 show that tornado activity has increased in the Southeast since the late 1990s and that the trend—and death toll—has accelerated in recent years .
“ The number of killer tornadoes in the Southeastern U.S. is disproportionately large when compared to the overall number of tornadoes throughout @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Since January 2019 , 99 of the nation ’ s 120 tornado-related deaths occurred in the Southeast , NOAA records show .
That ’ s 83 % .
In the 2010s , 54 % of tornado deaths occurred in the Southeast .
In the 1980s , 25 % of the deaths were in the Southeast .
The Southeast includes Alabama , Arkansas , Georgia , Louisiana , Mississippi and Tennessee—an area some tornado analysts call “ Dixie Alley.
” West of the Mississippi River , the Great Plains region known as “ Tornado @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kansas , once the epicenter of tornado activity and home to the most famous tornado survivor in fiction , Dorothy Gale , has not had a tornado death since Feb. 28 , 2012 .
Nebraska hasn ’ t had a tornado death since June 16 , 2014 , and has had only five tornado deaths in the past 32 years .
Iowa has had only three tornado deaths since June 2008 .
Throughout Tornado Alley , there have been only 24 tornado deaths since the start of 2016 , NOAA records show .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Missouri , Nebraska , Oklahoma , South Dakota and Texas .
“ There ’ s definitely been a spatial redistribution of tornadoes , ” said Purdue University climate scientist Ernest Agee .
Agee ’ s 2016 study in the Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology concluded that Alabama and Tennessee had replaced Oklahoma as “ the modern-day center for annual tornado activity.
” The shift has raised scientific questions , particularly about the influence of climate change and whether tornadoes in the Southeast have unique traits that make them more perilous , such @ @ @ @ @ @ @ middle of the night .
Studies have suggested possible links between global ocean temperatures and U.S. tornadoes but are inconclusive about the effect of climate change .
Tornado activity is difficult to link to climate change because tornadoes are small and spontaneous compared with hurricanes and can not generally be produced in large-scale climate models .
“ Whether tornadoes are driven by trends in climate still needs more research , ” said Christopher Nowotarski , a tornado researcher at Texas A & M University .
Yet as tornado deaths shift to the Southeast @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the reasons for their redistribution .
They say research should instead focus on social science—finding ways to protect people through measures such as stronger building codes and public education about tornado danger .
“ The shift is interesting from a scientific perspective .
But the cause does not matter , ” said Northern Illinois University professor Victor Gensini , a leading tornado researcher .
“ The reality is , we have people in these [ Southeastern ] regions who are way more vulnerable .
The shift is real , and it ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” The hard-science-versus-social-science split mirrors a divide in climate research between experts focused on slowing climate change and advocates of adaptation strategies such as coastal retreat to protect people from rising sea levels .
The shift of deadly tornadoes prompted NOAA to launch a research program in 2016 to study how the Southeast ’ s environmental factors affect tornadoes and their formation , intensity and paths .
The program , called VORTEX-SE , is an offshoot of a program NOAA began in 1994 to determine how tornadoes form .
One goal of VORTEX-SE @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which are notoriously problematic .
Tornado warnings typically go out just 15 minutes before a strike , and many turn out to be false alarms .
In the Southeast , extra warning time is crucial because homes generally do not have basements where people can take shelter , prompting some residents to leave home and seek safety elsewhere .
“ If you can give people a half-hour instead of 15 minutes , that makes a big difference , ” said Nowotarski , who has done research for VORTEX-SE .
“ If you think @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be enough time to get everybody to safety .
But 30 minutes would definitely be enough time.
” The National Institute of Standards and Technology found that 75 % of the nation ’ s tornado warnings issued from 2007 to 2012 were false alarms—a rate that “ can lead to public complacency.
” NIST found that in Joplin , Mo.
, where one of the deadliest tornadoes in U.S. history killed 158 people in 2011 , a prevalence of false alarms “ fed the notion that tornadoes would not strike the city.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the false-alarm ratio .
People get complacent and don ’ t follow warnings if we have too many of them , ” Nowotarski said .
“ If we learn more about the tornadoes , we can better predict them and forecast them.
” Gensini of Northern Illinois University says some VORTEX-SE research is misguided by focusing on tornado behavior instead of human behavior .
“ There is a unique problem in the Southeast , but it ’ s not related to the storms or how they form , which has been unfortunately where @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” Gensini said .
“ It ’ s quite silly to think we ’ re going to find something different about the storms in the Southeast .
I don ’ t think we should have wasted any money on the physical science .
If you want to solve the problems of the storms in the Southeast , you have to solve the social vulnerabilities , ” Gensini added .
A starting point is educating Southeastern residents about the danger they face from tornadoes .
“ It ’ s going to take a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ what ’ s happening around them , ” Gensini said .
They come when you ’ re sleeping The shift in tornadoes and tornado deaths from the Great Plains to the Southeast is clear , according to NOAA records , though the trend has received little attention .
E & E News analyzed NOAA data for the 38,000 tornadoes that occurred in the 70 years from 1950 to 2019 and found clear shifts from the first half of the 70-year period to the second half .
The analysis covers every tornado rated EF1 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ EF0 , which have winds between 65 and 85 mph and are considered insignificant .
• Tornado activity nationwide was almost identical in the two 35-year periods—there were 18,992 tornadoes from 1950 to 1984 , and 19,418 tornadoes from 1985 to 2019 .
But in the Southeast , the number of tornadoes increased by 42 % .
In the Great Plains , the number of tornadoes decreased by 20 % .
• The number of tornado-related deaths nationwide fell by 37 % —from 3,629 in the period between 1950 and 1984 to 2,281 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The decline is attributed to better warnings and safety measures .
But the decline was much steeper in the Great Plains than in the Southeast .
As a result , the Southeast accounted for 46 % of tornado deaths from 1985 to 2019 .
The Great Plains accounted for only 28 % of the tornado deaths in that period .
• There was no difference in the intensity of the tornadoes in the two regions .
The average tornado in the Southeast had an EF rating of 1.59 .
In the Great @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The EF rating is derived from the Enhanced Fujita scale and measures wind speeds .
Although the intensity was roughly the same in the two regions , tornadoes in the Southeast have proved to be much more deadly than those in the Great Plains , the E & E News analysis shows .
The average tornado in the Southeast caused 0.24 deaths .
The average tornado in the Great Plains caused 0.12 deaths .
That disparity explains why since the 1950s the Southeast has had far more deaths from tornadoes despite experiencing far @ @ @ @ @ @ @ versus 14,000 .
Tornadoes have killed 2,345 people in the Southeast and 1,721 in the Great Plains .
The two regions account for 62 % of all U.S. tornadoes since 1950 and 67 % of all tornado deaths .
The Great Plains in some ways is an ideal place for tornadoes to strike .
The flat , open landscape makes tornadoes easy to spot and warn against .
The sparse population minimizes the chances that a tornado will strike a person .
Homes often have basements that provide shelter .
The Southeast differs @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tornadoes—perhaps the most vulnerable region in the country .
The Southeast ’ s rolling hills and thick forests conceal tornadoes from spotters and the public .
In the six Southeastern states , 61 % of the land is forested , according to an E & E News analysis of Forest Service data .
In the seven Great Plains states , 23 % of the land is forested .
The Southeast has a far greater population density—110 people per square mile compared with 68 people per square mile in the Great Plains .
Few @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people can take shelter because soil conditions limit underground construction .
And tornado patterns are different in the Southeast .
Tornado activity is spread more evenly throughout the year in the Southeast compared with the Great Plains , where two-thirds of tornadoes occur between April and June .
The short season helps residents prepare for the storms and be on alert .
Then there ’ s this grim data point : Tornadoes in the Southeast are much more likely to strike in the middle of the night , when people are asleep and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The March 2020 tornado that killed 19 people in Tennessee struck at 1:48 a.m. Twenty-one percent of tornadoes in the Southeast struck between 11 p.m. and 6:59 a.m. , according to E & E News ’ analysis .
Just 12 % of tornadoes in the Great Plains hit during those hours .
“ You have a pretty similar tornado risk for each region , but the Southeast has greater population density mixed with all those vulnerabilities , ” said Stephen Strader , an atmospheric scientist at Villanova University .
“ It ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tornadoes in the Southeast or that people aren ’ t getting a tornado warning or all these little factors .
It ’ s the additive effect of all of them , ” Strader added .
“ In the Southeast , the built environment—the exposure—is so much greater than in any other tornado-prone region.
” The condition in the Southeast that has drawn the most scrutiny is its concentration of mobile homes , which are notoriously vulnerable to powerful winds .
Since 1995 , 42 % of the nation ’ s tornado deaths have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an E & E News analysis of NOAA data , which in 1995 began recording the setting of tornado deaths .
The mobile home death rate is high even during weaker tornadoes—64 % of the people killed in EF1 and EF2 tornadoes were in a mobile home , E & E News found .
EF1 tornadoes have gusts from 86 mph to 110 mph and are considered “ moderate ” by the National Weather Service .
EF2 tornadoes , with gusts up to 135 mph , are considered “ significant.
” Stronger EF3-EF5 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ devastating ” and “ incredible.
” Just 5.5 % of the U.S. population lives in a mobile home , according to the latest Census Bureau figures .
In the Southeast , that number climbs to 10 % .
“ They ’ re a small fraction of housing types that are responsible for a majority of these deaths , ” said Strader , the Villanova scientist .
His 2018 study in Weather , Climate and Society says that someone in a mobile home is 15 to 20 times more likely to be killed during @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with a foundation .
The vulnerability arises from both mobile home construction and the maintenance and location of the homes .
“ Even if it has the best tie-downs , if they ’ re steel and in the Southeast , they ’ re going to corrode , ” Strader said .
“ A lot of times , we see fatalities in mobile homes where anchoring was sufficient , but it ’ s corroded and it ’ s broken , so it failed.
” Mobile homes in the Southeast are spread across the landscape @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that often have community tornado shelters .
“ Everywhere else in the U.S. , when we have a mobile home , it ’ s in a park .
Zoning requires them to be built in a designated park .
That ’ s not the case in the Southeast , ” Strader said .
“ A lot of mobile homes are 20 minutes from a city.
” The concentration of tornado damage in mobile homes helps minimize the cost of tornado disasters because mobile homes are relatively inexpensive .
Tornadoes are notoriously deadly but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ other disasters .
Tornado damage is often a pinprick—homes on one side of a street are demolished , while the other side is untouched—unlike hurricanes and floods , which wipe out communities .
Tornadoes killed 5,910 people from 1950 through 2019—an average of 84 people a year .
But the combined property damage of every recorded tornado from 1950 through 2019 is just $ 176 billion , according to E & E News ’ analysis , which adjusts for inflation and excludes crop damage .
That ’ s roughly the same as the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the most damaging disaster in U.S. history , according to NOAA ’ s estimate .
The relatively minor property damage is one reason tornadoes have received less attention than other disasters from researchers and insurance companies .
“ Mobile homes are not a huge loss for insurers , so there ’ s not much incentive for insurance companies to get involved unless they want to save lives , ” Strader said , referring to incentives that insurers offer policyholders for making homes more resilient .
“ Most people in mobile homes aren @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to make big changes to their homes , ” he added .
Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from E & E News .
E & E provides daily coverage of essential energy and environmental news at www.eenews.net .

In March 2019, a violent tornado plowed through eastern Alabama, flattening houses and demolishing mobile homes. Twenty-three people were killed including four children, ages 10, 9, 8 and 6.
Exactly one year later, on March 3, 2020, a tornado gusting at 170 mph ripped through central Tennessee, killing 19 people. Four of the victims were children between the ages of 2 and 7.
The twisters spiraled along the ground for only minutes, but they are the two deadliest natural disasters in the United States since the start of 2019. They received fleeting national attention.
The mortal storms illustrate an alarming trend that is overlooked amid concern about hurricanes, wildfires and floods: Tornadoes are increasingly occurring in the Southeast, where they are twice as deadly as tornadoes elsewhere in the United States, according to an E&E News analysis.
A shift of tornado activity from the Great Plains to the Southeast has brought heightened danger by concentrating twisters in a far more perilous landscape—one covered by forest that conceals tornadoes and is filled with mobile homes that are easily demolished.
During the 2019 Alabama tornado, 19 of 23 victims were killed in mobile homes. The state has the most recorded tornado deaths than every other state. It also has one of the nation’s highest concentrations of people living in mobile homes.
NOAA records dating to 1950 show that tornado activity has increased in the Southeast since the late 1990s and that the trend—and death toll—has accelerated in recent years.
“The number of killer tornadoes in the Southeastern U.S. is disproportionately large when compared to the overall number of tornadoes throughout the country,” NOAA says.
Since January 2019, 99 of the nation’s 120 tornado-related deaths occurred in the Southeast, NOAA records show. That’s 83%.
In the 2010s, 54% of tornado deaths occurred in the Southeast.
In the 1980s, 25% of the deaths were in the Southeast.
The Southeast includes Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee—an area some tornado analysts call “Dixie Alley.”
West of the Mississippi River, the Great Plains region known as “Tornado Alley” has become oddly safe.
Kansas, once the epicenter of tornado activity and home to the most famous tornado survivor in fiction, Dorothy Gale, has not had a tornado death since Feb. 28, 2012.
Nebraska hasn’t had a tornado death since June 16, 2014, and has had only five tornado deaths in the past 32 years.
Iowa has had only three tornado deaths since June 2008.
Throughout Tornado Alley, there have been only 24 tornado deaths since the start of 2016, NOAA records show. The region includes Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Texas.
“There’s definitely been a spatial redistribution of tornadoes,” said Purdue University climate scientist Ernest Agee.
Agee’s 2016 study in the Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology concluded that Alabama and Tennessee had replaced Oklahoma as “the modern-day center for annual tornado activity.”
‘The shift is real’
The shift has raised scientific questions, particularly about the influence of climate change and whether tornadoes in the Southeast have unique traits that make them more perilous, such as a propensity to strike in the middle of the night.
Studies have suggested possible links between global ocean temperatures and U.S. tornadoes but are inconclusive about the effect of climate change. Tornado activity is difficult to link to climate change because tornadoes are small and spontaneous compared with hurricanes and cannot generally be produced in large-scale climate models.
“Whether tornadoes are driven by trends in climate still needs more research,” said Christopher Nowotarski, a tornado researcher at Texas A&M University.
Yet as tornado deaths shift to the Southeast, some scientists scorn efforts to understand the reasons for their redistribution. They say research should instead focus on social science—finding ways to protect people through measures such as stronger building codes and public education about tornado danger.
“The shift is interesting from a scientific perspective. But the cause does not matter,” said Northern Illinois University professor Victor Gensini, a leading tornado researcher. “The reality is, we have people in these [Southeastern] regions who are way more vulnerable. The shift is real, and it’s putting a lot more people at risk.”
The hard-science-versus-social-science split mirrors a divide in climate research between experts focused on slowing climate change and advocates of adaptation strategies such as coastal retreat to protect people from rising sea levels.
The shift of deadly tornadoes prompted NOAA to launch a research program in 2016 to study how the Southeast’s environmental factors affect tornadoes and their formation, intensity and paths. The program, called VORTEX-SE, is an offshoot of a program NOAA began in 1994 to determine how tornadoes form.
One goal of VORTEX-SE is to improve forecasts and warnings, which are notoriously problematic. Tornado warnings typically go out just 15 minutes before a strike, and many turn out to be false alarms.
In the Southeast, extra warning time is crucial because homes generally do not have basements where people can take shelter, prompting some residents to leave home and seek safety elsewhere.
“If you can give people a half-hour instead of 15 minutes, that makes a big difference,” said Nowotarski, who has done research for VORTEX-SE. “If you think about schools, 15 minutes might not be enough time to get everybody to safety. But 30 minutes would definitely be enough time.”
The National Institute of Standards and Technology found that 75% of the nation’s tornado warnings issued from 2007 to 2012 were false alarms—a rate that “can lead to public complacency.”
NIST found that in Joplin, Mo., where one of the deadliest tornadoes in U.S. history killed 158 people in 2011, a prevalence of false alarms “fed the notion that tornadoes would not strike the city.”
“The main issue with warnings is the false-alarm ratio. People get complacent and don’t follow warnings if we have too many of them,” Nowotarski said. “If we learn more about the tornadoes, we can better predict them and forecast them.”
Gensini of Northern Illinois University says some VORTEX-SE research is misguided by focusing on tornado behavior instead of human behavior.
“There is a unique problem in the Southeast, but it’s not related to the storms or how they form, which has been unfortunately where some of the research money has gone,” Gensini said.
“It’s quite silly to think we’re going to find something different about the storms in the Southeast. I don’t think we should have wasted any money on the physical science. If you want to solve the problems of the storms in the Southeast, you have to solve the social vulnerabilities,” Gensini added.
A starting point is educating Southeastern residents about the danger they face from tornadoes.
“It’s going to take a complete overhaul to educating people as to what’s happening around them,” Gensini said.
They come when you’re sleeping
The shift in tornadoes and tornado deaths from the Great Plains to the Southeast is clear, according to NOAA records, though the trend has received little attention.
E&E News analyzed NOAA data for the 38,000 tornadoes that occurred in the 70 years from 1950 to 2019 and found clear shifts from the first half of the 70-year period to the second half. The analysis covers every tornado rated EF1 to EF5 and excludes 29,000 tornadoes rated EF0, which have winds between 65 and 85 mph and are considered insignificant.
E&E News found:
Tornado activity nationwide was almost identical in the two 35-year periods—there were 18,992 tornadoes from 1950 to 1984, and 19,418 tornadoes from 1985 to 2019. But in the Southeast, the number of tornadoes increased by 42%. In the Great Plains, the number of tornadoes decreased by 20%.
The number of tornado-related deaths nationwide fell by 37%—from 3,629 in the period between 1950 and 1984 to 2,281 in the period from 1985 to 2019. The decline is attributed to better warnings and safety measures. But the decline was much steeper in the Great Plains than in the Southeast. As a result, the Southeast accounted for 46% of tornado deaths from 1985 to 2019. The Great Plains accounted for only 28% of the tornado deaths in that period.
There was no difference in the intensity of the tornadoes in the two regions. The average tornado in the Southeast had an EF rating of 1.59. In the Great Plains, the average was 1.6. The EF rating is derived from the Enhanced Fujita scale and measures wind speeds. Although the intensity was roughly the same in the two regions, tornadoes in the Southeast have proved to be much more deadly than those in the Great Plains, the E&E News analysis shows.
The average tornado in the Southeast caused 0.24 deaths. The average tornado in the Great Plains caused 0.12 deaths.
That disparity explains why since the 1950s the Southeast has had far more deaths from tornadoes despite experiencing far fewer tornadoes than in the Great Plains—9,500 versus 14,000. Tornadoes have killed 2,345 people in the Southeast and 1,721 in the Great Plains.
The two regions account for 62% of all U.S. tornadoes since 1950 and 67% of all tornado deaths.
The Great Plains in some ways is an ideal place for tornadoes to strike. The flat, open landscape makes tornadoes easy to spot and warn against. The sparse population minimizes the chances that a tornado will strike a person. Homes often have basements that provide shelter.
The Southeast differs in ways that make it vulnerable to tornadoes—perhaps the most vulnerable region in the country.
The Southeast’s rolling hills and thick forests conceal tornadoes from spotters and the public. In the six Southeastern states, 61% of the land is forested, according to an E&E News analysis of Forest Service data. In the seven Great Plains states, 23% of the land is forested.
The Southeast has a far greater population density—110 people per square mile compared with 68 people per square mile in the Great Plains.
Few houses in the Southeast have basements where people can take shelter because soil conditions limit underground construction.
And tornado patterns are different in the Southeast.
Tornado activity is spread more evenly throughout the year in the Southeast compared with the Great Plains, where two-thirds of tornadoes occur between April and June. The short season helps residents prepare for the storms and be on alert.
Then there’s this grim data point: Tornadoes in the Southeast are much more likely to strike in the middle of the night, when people are asleep and when the darkness conceals tornadoes from spotters.
The March 2020 tornado that killed 19 people in Tennessee struck at 1:48 a.m.
Twenty-one percent of tornadoes in the Southeast struck between 11 p.m. and 6:59 a.m., according to E&E News’ analysis.
Just 12% of tornadoes in the Great Plains hit during those hours.
“You have a pretty similar tornado risk for each region, but the Southeast has greater population density mixed with all those vulnerabilities,” said Stephen Strader, an atmospheric scientist at Villanova University.
“It’s not just that there are nighttime tornadoes in the Southeast or that people aren’t getting a tornado warning or all these little factors. It’s the additive effect of all of them,” Strader added. “In the Southeast, the built environment—the exposure—is so much greater than in any other tornado-prone region.”
Deadly pinpricks
The condition in the Southeast that has drawn the most scrutiny is its concentration of mobile homes, which are notoriously vulnerable to powerful winds.
Since 1995, 42% of the nation’s tornado deaths have occurred in mobile homes, according to an E&E News analysis of NOAA data, which in 1995 began recording the setting of tornado deaths.
The mobile home death rate is high even during weaker tornadoes—64% of the people killed in EF1 and EF2 tornadoes were in a mobile home, E&E News found.
EF1 tornadoes have gusts from 86 mph to 110 mph and are considered “moderate” by the National Weather Service. EF2 tornadoes, with gusts up to 135 mph, are considered “significant.” Stronger EF3-EF5 tornadoes are “severe,” “devastating” and “incredible.”
Just 5.5% of the U.S. population lives in a mobile home, according to the latest Census Bureau figures. In the Southeast, that number climbs to 10%.
“They’re a small fraction of housing types that are responsible for a majority of these deaths,” said Strader, the Villanova scientist. His 2018 study in Weather, Climate and Society says that someone in a mobile home is 15 to 20 times more likely to be killed during a tornado than someone in a home with a foundation.
The vulnerability arises from both mobile home construction and the maintenance and location of the homes.
“Even if it has the best tie-downs, if they’re steel and in the Southeast, they’re going to corrode,” Strader said. “A lot of times, we see fatalities in mobile homes where anchoring was sufficient, but it’s corroded and it’s broken, so it failed.”
Mobile homes in the Southeast are spread across the landscape instead of concentrated in mobile home parks that often have community tornado shelters.
“Everywhere else in the U.S., when we have a mobile home, it’s in a park. Zoning requires them to be built in a designated park. That’s not the case in the Southeast,” Strader said. “A lot of mobile homes are 20 minutes from a city.”
The concentration of tornado damage in mobile homes helps minimize the cost of tornado disasters because mobile homes are relatively inexpensive.
Tornadoes are notoriously deadly but cause only minor property damage compared with other disasters. Tornado damage is often a pinprick—homes on one side of a street are demolished, while the other side is untouched—unlike hurricanes and floods, which wipe out communities.
Tornadoes killed 5,910 people from 1950 through 2019—an average of 84 people a year.
But the combined property damage of every recorded tornado from 1950 through 2019 is just $176 billion, according to E&E News’ analysis, which adjusts for inflation and excludes crop damage.
That’s roughly the same as the $170 billion cost of Hurricane Katrina, the most damaging disaster in U.S. history, according to NOAA’s estimate.
The relatively minor property damage is one reason tornadoes have received less attention than other disasters from researchers and insurance companies.
“Mobile homes are not a huge loss for insurers, so there’s not much incentive for insurance companies to get involved unless they want to save lives,” Strader said, referring to incentives that insurers offer policyholders for making homes more resilient.
“Most people in mobile homes aren’t really in a financial position to make big changes to their homes,” he added.
Reprinted from Climatewire with permission from E&E News. E&E provides daily coverage of essential energy and environmental news at www.eenews.net.


scientificamerican--2020-09-23--The First Ever Image of a Black Hole Is Now a Movie

The historic first image of a black hole unveiled last year has now been turned into a movie .
The short sequence of frames shows how the appearance of the black hole ’ s surroundings changes over years as its gravity stirs the material around it into a constant maelstrom .
The images show a lopsided blob of light swirling around the supermassive black hole at the centre of the galaxy M87 .
To create them , the Event Horizon Telescope ( EHT ) collaboration — which harnesses a planet-wide network of observatories — exhumed old data on the black @ @ @ @ @ @ @ model based on the image released in April 2019 , to show how the surroundings have evolved over eight years .
Although it relies partly on guesswork , the result gives astronomers rich insights into the behaviour of black holes , the intense gravity of which sucks in matter and light around them .
“ Because the flow of matter falling onto a black hole is turbulent , we can see that the ring wobbles with time , ” says lead author Maciek Wielgus , a radio astronomer at Harvard University in Cambridge @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appeared on 23 September in The Astrophysical Journal , offers a taste of what the team might be able to do in the near future , as its techniques improve .
“ In a few years , it could really start to look like a movie , ” Wielgus says .
The black-hole image that the EHT collaboration unveiled last year made the front pages of newspapers around the world .
It portrayed M87* , the supermassive black hole at the centre of the M87 galaxy , some 17 megaparsecs ( 55 million @ @ @ @ @ @ @ constructed the picture by combining radio-frequency signals they had collected from observatories across Earth over two nights in April 2017 .
Their feat has been compared to resolving the shape of a doughnut on the surface of the Moon from Earth .
Although blurry , the image matched the predictions of Albert Einstein ’ s general theory of relativity for what the immediate neighbourhood of a black hole should look like .
In particular , it gave researchers the first direct evidence of the shadow of an event horizon , the surface of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ black hole from its surroundings .
This darker disk was set against a ring of light emitted by superheated matter just outside the event horizon .
Strikingly , one side of the ring appeared brighter .
This was expected , owing to a combination of effects in the complex dynamics around a black hole .
In particular , matter falling into the void should spiral at a high velocity outside the black hole ’ s equator , forming what astrophysicists call the accretion disk .
The lopsided look is in part to do @ @ @ @ @ @ @ side of the disk that rotates towards the observer , the motion of the matter boosts the radiation , making it look brighter ; the opposite happens on receding side .
On the basis of those results , Wielgus wanted to go back and look at the older data from EHT telescopes to see whether he could reinterpret them , using the 2017 picture as a guide .
The EHT had been observing M87* since 2009 , initially using telescopes at just three locations .
As the team added more observatories to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ observations improved .
In 2017 , the collaboration involved eight observatories that spanned the globe from Hawaii and Chile to Europe , reaching for the first time the level at which the EHT could produce an actual image .
The older data consisted of four batches , collected in 2009 , 2011 , 2012 and 2013 , two of which had remained unpublished .
“ To a degree , they were forgotten , because everyone was super excited about the 2017 data , ” Wielgus says .
With a group of other EHT @ @ @ @ @ @ @ found them to be consistent with the results of the 2017 campaign , including the presence of a dark disk and a bright ring .
And although , by themselves , the 2009–13 data batches did not have sufficient resolution to produce pictures , the team was able to generate synthetic images for each of the years by combining the limited data available with a mathematical model of the black hole built from the 2017 data .
And the results turned out to contain more information than Wielgus expected .
Like the 2017 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the ring was brighter than the other — but the bright spot moved around .
This could be because different regions of the accretion disk became brighter or dimmer , which could enhance or sometimes even cancel out the Doppler brightening .
This was not unexpected , the authors say : although the M87* black hole itself does not change from year to year , the environment around it does .
On a scale of several weeks , strong magnetic fields should stir the accretion disk and produce hotter spots that then @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , a separate team reported evidence of a blob of hot gas circling Sagittarius A* , the Milky Way ’ s central black hole , over the course of around 1 hour .
Because M87* , at 6.5 billion times the mass of the Sun , is more than 1,000 times the size of Sagittarius A* , the dynamics around M87* take longer to unfold .
The EHT collaboration attempts to observe M87* and Sagittarius A* every year , in late March or early April .
That is when weather conditions are most @ @ @ @ @ @ @ many sites in its network .
The 2020 campaign had to be scrapped because of restrictions owing to the COVID–19 pandemic , but the team hopes to have another chance in 2021 .
If all goes well , more observatories — including one in Greenland and one in France — will join the effort .
The team also hopes that next year ’ s campaign will include its first global observations using shorter-wavelength radiation .
Although more challenging to see through Earth ’ s atmosphere , this would improve the resolution of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ even closer to that black-hole shadow , and get sharper images , ” says EHT member Sara Issaoun , a radio astronomer at Radboud University in Nijmegen , the Netherlands .
This article is reproduced with permission and was first published on September 23 2020 .

The historic first image of a black hole unveiled last year has now been turned into a movie. The short sequence of frames shows how the appearance of the black hole’s surroundings changes over years as its gravity stirs the material around it into a constant maelstrom.
The images show a lopsided blob of light swirling around the supermassive black hole at the centre of the galaxy M87. To create them, the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) collaboration — which harnesses a planet-wide network of observatories — exhumed old data on the black hole and combined these with a mathematical model based on the image released in April 2019, to show how the surroundings have evolved over eight years. Although it relies partly on guesswork, the result gives astronomers rich insights into the behaviour of black holes, the intense gravity of which sucks in matter and light around them.
“Because the flow of matter falling onto a black hole is turbulent, we can see that the ring wobbles with time,” says lead author Maciek Wielgus, a radio astronomer at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
The work, which appeared on 23 September in The Astrophysical Journal, offers a taste of what the team might be able to do in the near future, as its techniques improve. “In a few years, it could really start to look like a movie,” Wielgus says.
Wobbling ring
The black-hole image that the EHT collaboration unveiled last year made the front pages of newspapers around the world. It portrayed M87*, the supermassive black hole at the centre of the M87 galaxy, some 17 megaparsecs (55 million light years) away. The researchers constructed the picture by combining radio-frequency signals they had collected from observatories across Earth over two nights in April 2017. Their feat has been compared to resolving the shape of a doughnut on the surface of the Moon from Earth.
A series of images constructed from observational data and mathematical modelling show the evolution of the black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy from 2009 to 2017. Credit: M. Wielgus, D. Pesce & the EHT Collaboration
Although blurry, the image matched the predictions of Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity for what the immediate neighbourhood of a black hole should look like. In particular, it gave researchers the first direct evidence of the shadow of an event horizon, the surface of ‘no return’ that separates a black hole from its surroundings. This darker disk was set against a ring of light emitted by superheated matter just outside the event horizon.
Strikingly, one side of the ring appeared brighter. This was expected, owing to a combination of effects in the complex dynamics around a black hole. In particular, matter falling into the void should spiral at a high velocity outside the black hole’s equator, forming what astrophysicists call the accretion disk. The lopsided look is in part to do with the Doppler effect: on the side of the disk that rotates towards the observer, the motion of the matter boosts the radiation, making it look brighter; the opposite happens on receding side.
Revisiting data
On the basis of those results, Wielgus wanted to go back and look at the older data from EHT telescopes to see whether he could reinterpret them, using the 2017 picture as a guide. The EHT had been observing M87* since 2009, initially using telescopes at just three locations. As the team added more observatories to the EHT network, the quality of the observations improved. In 2017, the collaboration involved eight observatories that spanned the globe from Hawaii and Chile to Europe, reaching for the first time the level at which the EHT could produce an actual image.
The older data consisted of four batches, collected in 2009, 2011, 2012 and 2013, two of which had remained unpublished. “To a degree, they were forgotten, because everyone was super excited about the 2017 data,” Wielgus says. With a group of other EHT researchers, he reanalysed the data and found them to be consistent with the results of the 2017 campaign, including the presence of a dark disk and a bright ring. And although, by themselves, the 2009–13 data batches did not have sufficient resolution to produce pictures, the team was able to generate synthetic images for each of the years by combining the limited data available with a mathematical model of the black hole built from the 2017 data.
And the results turned out to contain more information than Wielgus expected. Like the 2017 picture, they revealed that one side of the ring was brighter than the other — but the bright spot moved around. This could be because different regions of the accretion disk became brighter or dimmer, which could enhance or sometimes even cancel out the Doppler brightening.
Dynamic disk
This was not unexpected, the authors say: although the M87* black hole itself does not change from year to year, the environment around it does. On a scale of several weeks, strong magnetic fields should stir the accretion disk and produce hotter spots that then orbit the black hole. In 2018, a separate team reported evidence of a blob of hot gas circling Sagittarius A*, the Milky Way’s central black hole, over the course of around 1 hour. Because M87*, at 6.5 billion times the mass of the Sun, is more than 1,000 times the size of Sagittarius A*, the dynamics around M87* take longer to unfold.
The EHT collaboration attempts to observe M87* and Sagittarius A* every year, in late March or early April. That is when weather conditions are most likely to be good simultaneously at the many sites in its network. The 2020 campaign had to be scrapped because of restrictions owing to the COVID–19 pandemic, but the team hopes to have another chance in 2021. If all goes well, more observatories — including one in Greenland and one in France — will join the effort.
The team also hopes that next year’s campaign will include its first global observations using shorter-wavelength radiation. Although more challenging to see through Earth’s atmosphere, this would improve the resolution of the EHT images. “We would get even closer to that black-hole shadow, and get sharper images,” says EHT member Sara Issaoun, a radio astronomer at Radboud University in Nijmegen, the Netherlands.
This article is reproduced with permission and was first published on September 23 2020.


scientificamerican--2020-09-25--Fish Eggs Survive Journey through a Duck

For centuries scientists speculated that fish eggs reached isolated lakes and ponds by hitching rides on water birds ' feathers or feet .
But according to findings published in July in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA , the mode of transport for at least some eggs could be much more intimate : the new research provides the first evidence that soft-membraned fish eggs , eaten and pooped out by birds , can still hatch into viable young .
“ No one ever really thought of bird guts before because I think it 's quite an absurd @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , an ecologist at the Danube Research Institute in Debrecen , Hungary .
“ We were hopeful we 'd find something , but we still thought it was pretty unlikely.
” Researchers did hatch a killifish egg from swan excrement in 2019—but killifish eggs are unusually hardy , able to withstand extended periods of dehydration .
Vincze and her colleagues hypothesized that ordinary fish eggs might be able to survive being eaten after the study 's first author , Ádám Lovas-Kiss , observed that soft plant material stayed alive in bird feces .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ acquired eight captive-bred mallard ducks from a local breeder and the eggs of two carp species from an aquaculture institute .
They force-fed each duck three grams of fertilized eggs ( about 500 eggs per serving ) from each fish species over two separate experiments .
Examination of the birds ' feces revealed 18 whole eggs , which the investigators placed in an aquarium .
Twelve had viable living embryos , and three hatched into normal baby fish .
“ For me , this research shows that there are scientific questions that can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ within simple , easy-to-understand and [ easy-to- ] reproduce experimental setups , ” says Tibor Hartel , an ecologist at Babeş-Bolyai University in Romania , who was not involved in the study .
Vincze and her colleagues suspect the success rate would be higher in the wild , where conditions are more favorable for keeping eggs healthy ; they hope to test this idea in future experiments .
They also plan to conduct follow-up studies on a more diverse set of fish species .

For centuries scientists speculated that fish eggs reached isolated lakes and ponds by hitching rides on water birds' feathers or feet. But according to findings published in July in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, the mode of transport for at least some eggs could be much more intimate: the new research provides the first evidence that soft-membraned fish eggs, eaten and pooped out by birds, can still hatch into viable young.
“No one ever really thought of bird guts before because I think it's quite an absurd thing,” says co-author Orsolya Vincze, an ecologist at the Danube Research Institute in Debrecen, Hungary. “We were hopeful we'd find something, but we still thought it was pretty unlikely.” Researchers did hatch a killifish egg from swan excrement in 2019—but killifish eggs are unusually hardy, able to withstand extended periods of dehydration.
Vincze and her colleagues hypothesized that ordinary fish eggs might be able to survive being eaten after the study's first author, Ádám Lovas-Kiss, observed that soft plant material stayed alive in bird feces.
To test their hunch, the researchers acquired eight captive-bred mallard ducks from a local breeder and the eggs of two carp species from an aquaculture institute. They force-fed each duck three grams of fertilized eggs (about 500 eggs per serving) from each fish species over two separate experiments. Examination of the birds' feces revealed 18 whole eggs, which the investigators placed in an aquarium. Twelve had viable living embryos, and three hatched into normal baby fish.
“For me, this research shows that there are scientific questions that can yield insightful results, while being implemented within simple, easy-to-understand and [easy-to-]reproduce experimental setups,” says Tibor Hartel, an ecologist at Babeş-Bolyai University in Romania, who was not involved in the study.
Vincze and her colleagues suspect the success rate would be higher in the wild, where conditions are more favorable for keeping eggs healthy; they hope to test this idea in future experiments. They also plan to conduct follow-up studies on a more diverse set of fish species.