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WSU researchers see gene influencing performance of sleep-deprived people

Paul Whitney
Paul Whitney

Washington State University researchers have discovered a genetic variation that predicts how well people perform certain mental tasks when they are sleep-deprived.

Their research shows that individuals with a particular variation of the DRD2 gene are resilient to the effects of sleep deprivation when completing tasks that require cognitive flexibility, the ability to make appropriate decisions based on changing information.

“Our work shows that there are people who are resilient to the effects of sleep deprivation when it comes to cognitive flexibility. Surprisingly these same people are just as affected as everyone else on other tasks that require different cognitive abilities, such as maintaining focus,” said Paul Whitney, a WSU professor of psychology and lead author of the study, which appeared in the journal Scientific Reports.

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WSU News
Science Newsline
Sleep Review
PsychCentral
ScienceDaily
Discover Magazine
Genetic Literacy Project

Narrowing Down Pre-spawning Mortality Factors for Coho Salmon

Jennifer McIntyre

The annual pre-spawning salmon mortality study at the Suquamish Tribe’s Grovers Creek Hatchery takes a different twist each year.

After six years of learning how coho and chum salmon are affected by runoff from urban streets, scientists are narrowing down which pollutant is killing fish. This year, they focused on how tire residue in water affects juvenile and adult coho and chum salmon.

“We want to figure out which concentration of the tire residue in the water will kill fish and how long after exposure do the fish become sick and die,” said Jen McIntyre, aquatic ecotoxicologist for Washington State University, who has overseen the last few years of the project.

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Northwest Treaty Tribes

Best of Last Year—The top Phys.org articles of 2017

Peter Engels
Peter Engels

It was another great year for science, particularly physics.

A team of physicists at Washington State University, led by professor Peter Engels, announced that they had created “negative mass,” which, as they noted, behaved in surprising ways, such as accelerating backwards when pushed from a forward direction—it was created by using lasers to cool rubidium atoms to just above absolute zero and could be used to study challenging questions related to the cosmos.

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Phys.org

How tall trees move sugars

Michael Knoblauch, biological sciences
Michael Knoblauch

Scientists have long assumed that the sugars that nourish trees are pushed by water pressure from the leaves where they are created to the stems and roots where they are needed. But how do taller accomplish that task, given the longer distances the nutrients must travel and the greater force that seems needed to them?

A nine-member team of scientists, including Michael Knoblauch, a plant cell biologist from Washington State University, discovered an answer with a recent study whose findings could also help end a longstanding debate over the dynamics involved in sugar transport in trees. The study, whose results are detailed in the Dec. 4 issue of the journal Nature Plants, determined that the hydraulic resistance to moving sugar-rich sap downward from the leaves does not increase with the height of the tree as much as would be expected, because of physical features in the transport system.

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Phys.org

WSU chemists develop dye offering remarkable potential for bioimaging advancement

Ming Xian
Ming Xian

Washington State University scientists have created an injectable dye that illuminates molecules with near-infrared light, making it easier to see what is going on deep inside the body.

The new dye will help medical researchers track the progression of a wide array of diseases, such as cancer.

Ming Xian, the Ralph G. Yount Distinguished Professor of chemistry, calls the new dye Washington Red. He and Wei Chen, an assistant research professor in the WSU Department of Chemistry, published a study detailing the dye’s unique properties and how it is made in Angewandte Chemie, one of the top chemistry journals in the world.

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National Science Foundation
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Drug Target Review
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The Lewiston Tribune