Colombia sterilizes invasive hippos

What matters in science | 

View this email in your browser Monday 13 November 2023

Hello Nature readers, Today we learn how the Colombian government plans to tackle its invasive hippo problem, hear that rigorous methods helped to boost the reproducibility of studies in experimental psychology and see how neglected tropical diseases are gaining a foothold in Europe.

The Colombian government also plans to ship hippos abroad to sanctuaries and zoos. (Fernando Vergara/AP Photo/Alamy)

Colombia begins sterilizing invasive hippos Colombia has started sterilizing its population of invasive hippos — thought to number around 200 — that are overrunning the nation's riverside habitats. The hippos (Hippopotamus amphibius) are the descendants of four illegally imported individuals that escaped from drug-cartel leader Pablo Escobar's estate in the 1990s. Ecologists warn that sterilization is expensive and logistically challenging — and probably won't be enough. Many researchers advocate culling the hippos, which the government says it will also try to do — but the idea is controversial. Nature | 6 min read

AI finds Alzheimer's in brain scans Artificial intelligence (AI) tools designed to spot signs of Alzheimer's disease in brain scans could help researchers to investigate treatments for the disease. There are databases containing thousands of people's genomes and brain scans, but it's hard to be sure which of those people have Alzheimer's. There's no foolproof blood test, and dementia is also a feature of other disorders. One of the new algorithms detects Alzheimer's with an accuracy of more than 90%, and scientists hope to train another to identify structural features that differ between brain scans of people with and without the disease. The goal is to use brain images as visual 'biomarkers' of Alzheimer's disease. Nature | 5 min read References: bioRxiv preprint & medRxiv preprint (not peer reviewed)

Reproducible behavioural science Four prominent research groups showed that the replication crisis in experimental psychology can be turned around by using the most rigorous and careful experimental conditions. By sticking to best practices such as 'preregistration' — the publication of a research plan in advance — the researchers produced results that were replicable 86% of the time, even better than could be expected on the basis of the sizes of the samples and the observed effects. The study, the authors say, shows that research in the field can be top quality if all the right steps are taken. Nature | 4 min read Reference: Nature Human Behaviour paper

Features & opinion

Why Delhi's air is so bad India's capital has been blanketed by choking smog since the beginning of November. But the situation is not unusual. Every year, the cooler, drier weather of the post-monsoon season provides ideal conditions for pollution to spike. The atmosphere's lowest layer, the troposphere, shrinks at this time, and the soup of pollutants within it becomes more concentrated. Windless days exacerbate the problem. Although crop burning in neighbouring regions is often blamed for the pollution, locally produced emissions from traffic and woodfired stoves and heaters are enough to create a toxic cocktail. Nature | 4 min read

ACCESS NATURE AND 54 OTHER NATURE JOURNALS Nature+ is our most affordable 30-day subscription, giving you online access to a wide range of specialist Nature Portfolio journals, including Nature. Nature+ is for personal use and is suitable for students. Learn more about Nature+ in the Americas, in the UK and internationally.

The future is quantum Universities are starting quantum-training programmes at the bachelor's and master's levels to feed the burgeoning quantum-technology industry. "A technology can't succeed if the only people who know how to use it are PhDs," says physicist Olivia Lanes, who works at IBM. Nature | 9 min read

How heat revs up animals until they starve A drastic crash in the Bering Sea's population of snow crabs (Chionoecetes opilio) — a loss of some 10 billion crabs — might have been caused, in part, by marine heatwaves that increased the crabs' metabolisms until they starved. "You heat up a crab or anything else, everything gets faster, up to a certain point when it can't handle it anymore," says evolutionary biologist Carolyn Tepolt. "It's what happens when you increase that need for energy, essentially, beyond the point that the environment can provide it." Wired | 7 min read Reference: Science paper

Infographic of the week

Climate change, international trade and travel are bringing the vectors of debilitating and sometimes deadly pathogens to Europe. And other parts of the non-tropical world that have previously had the luxury of not worrying about neglected tropical diseases — including the Gulf Coast of the United States — are experiencing similar issues. (Nature | 11 min read) This article is part of Nature Outlook: Neglected tropical diseases, an editorially independent supplement funded by a grant from Merck Sharp & Dohme and with financial support from Moderna. (Source: ECDC. Nature publications remain neutral with regard to contested jurisdictional claims in published maps.)

Quote of the day "There is hope that comes from pointing a spotlight on the worst of physicians' behaviour." A new Lancet Commission report explores the extensive participation of the medical profession in the Nazi regime — and the courage of those who resisted it — with lessons for health professionals today. (The Lancet editorial | 5 min read) Reference: The Lancet Commission on medicine, Nazism, and the Holocaust

On Friday, Leif Penguinson was exploring Hohe Tauern National Park in Austria — the largest national park in Central Europe. Did you find the penguin? When you're ready, here's the answer. Thanks for reading, Flora Graham, senior editor, Nature Briefing With contributions by Katrina Krämer and Dyani Lewis Want more? Sign up to our other free Nature Briefing newsletters: Nature Briefing: Cancer — a weekly newsletter written with cancer researchers in mind Nature Briefing: Translational Research covers biotechnology, drug discovery and pharma Nature Briefing: Anthropocene — the footprint of humanity on Earth, including climate change, biodiversity, sustainability and geoengineering Coming soon: Nature Briefing: AI & Robotics — the use of artificial intelligence and robotics in science, and their impact on how science is done — 100% written by humans, of course

Join our community

You received this newsletter because you subscribed with the email address: manojdole1.Lens@blogger.com Please add briefing@nature.com to your address book. Enjoying this newsletter? You can use this form to recommend it to a friend or colleague — thank you! Had enough? To unsubscribe from this Briefing, but keep receiving your other Nature Briefing newsletters, please update your subscription preferences. To stop all Nature Briefing emails forever, click here to remove your personal data from our system. Fancy a bit of a read? View our privacy policy. Forwarded by a friend? Get the Briefing straight to your inbox: subscribe for free. Want to master time management, protect your mental health and brush up on your skills? Sign up for our free short e-mail series for working scientists, Back to the lab. Get more from Nature: Register for free on nature.com to sign up for other newsletters specific to your field and email alerts from Nature Research journals. Would you like to read the Briefing in other languages? Sign up for the weekly round-up e-mail in Arabic, curated and translated by the editors of Nature Arabic Edition. هل تود أن تقرأ هذا الموجز باللغة العربية؟ سَجِّل الآن لتصلك نشرة العلوم الموجزة أسبوعيًّا، التي يختار محتواها ويترجمه فريق محرري "نيتشر الطبعة العربية". Follow Nature Portfolio on WeChat for a weekly round-up post in Chinese, curated and translated by our team in China. 关注Nature Portfolio官方微信订阅号，每周二为您推送Nature Briefing精选中文内容——自然每周简报。 Nature | The Springer Nature Campus, 4 Crinan Street, London, N1 9XW, United Kingdom Nature Research, part of Springer Nature. © 2023 Springer Nature Limited. All rights reserved.