Massive Google-Funded COVID Database Will Track Variants and Immunity

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February 25, 2021

Public Health Massive Google-Funded COVID Database Will Track Variants and Immunity Open repository will give free access to more than 160 million data points with details about individual infections By Amy Maxmen,Nature magazine

Public Health Biden's COVID Plan Is Just a Beginning The public health system needs wide-ranging reform to address weaknesses exposed by the pandemic By Katie D. Schenk

Climate How Climate Change May Influence Deadly Avalanches Greater temperature swings and more intense rain and snow storms could alter avalanche dynamics By Bob Berwyn,Inside Climate News

Biology Microscopic Wrinkles in Leaves Ward Off Insects Researchers identify a new insect-defense mechanism By Monique Brouillette

Policy & Ethics Black Inventor Garrett Morgan Saved Countless Lives with Gas Mask and Improved Traffic Lights In 1916 he strapped on his "safety hood" and dragged rescuers to safety, but racism prevented him from being hailed as a hero  By Leo DeLuca

Policy & Ethics Expert Opinion Can't Be Trusted If You Consult the Wrong Sort of Expert The failure of the U.S. to respond appropriately to the pandemic could have been predicted if anyone had bothered to ask social scientists By Naomi Oreskes

Computing Machine Learning Pwns Old-School Atari Games You can call it the 'revenge of the computer scientist.' An algorithm that made headlines for mastering the notoriously difficult Atari 2600 game Montezuma's Revenge, can now beat more games, achieving near perfect scores, and help robots explore real-world environments. Pakinam Amer reports. By Pakinam Amer | 07:46

Public Health How COVID Is Changing the Cold and Flu Season Measures meant to tame the coronavirus pandemic are quashing influenza and most other respiratory diseases, which could have wide-ranging implications By Nicola Jones,Nature magazine

Biology Graveyards Are Surprising Hotspots for Biodiversity Even the smallest burial sites could help conserve natural habitats in agricultural landscapes By Gemma Conroy

Public Health Unraveling the Complex Link between COVID and Diabetes Infection with the pandemic-causing virus seems to trigger diabetes in some patients. Here are five plausible explanations as to why By Claudia Wallis

Physics Mystery of Spinning Atomic Fragments Solved at Last New experiments have answered the decades-old question of how pieces of splitting nuclei get their spins By Charles Q. Choi

Public Health COVID Variants May Arise in People with Compromised Immune Systems The case history of a U.K. man in his 70s shows how selective "pressures" bring about viral mutations By Stephani Sutherland

FROM THE STORE Trailblazers: Women in Science Sally Ride, the first American woman to go to space, once said that she didn't set out to be a role model, but after her first flight, she realized that she was one. Like her, the 12 women scientists in this collection became unintentional heroes through perseverance and hard work, making great discoveries in all areas of science. From Vera Rubin's examination of the internal dynamics of galaxies to Nobel Prize winner May-Britt Moser's study of the brain's GPS-like navigating system, read up on the achievements of women who became role models for us all.

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