[Popular STEM] Curating the Internet: STEM digest for August 21, 2021

Video Friday: Constant Gardener; This Rattlesnake Dares You to Call Its Bluff; How snake venom and a smoking cessation drug inspired a nasal spray that blocks COVID; 30-Minute Afternoon Workout Tied to Better Mood in Patients With Depression; and Using 'AI-based software like Proctorio and ProctorU' to monitor online exams is a really bad idea, says uni panel

Links and micro-summaries from my 1000+ daily headlines. I filter them so you don't have to.

1. Video Friday: Constant Gardener - Here is a robotic hand from MIT and Shanghai Jiao Tong University that gives real tactile control to amputees:
   

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   Click through to learn about more recent advances in the field of robotics.
   
   

2. This Rattlesnake Dares You to Call Its Bluff - Researchers have long known that rattlesnakes change the frequency of their rattling, but they haven't understood why. Now, in a new paper, Boris Chagnaud offers an explanation. His team devised an experiment to study the speed of a snake's rattle when a simulated object was approaching. In that experiment, the researchers learned that the speed of the rattle does not increase linearly. Instead, it advances suddenly when a certain distance threshold is crossed. With that knowledge in hand, the team studied college students in a virtual reality environment, asking them to estimate when they were three feet from the rattling snake. In general, the student's got it wrong, mistaking the time when the speed ramped up for the time when they were dangerously close to the snake. In short, the researchers propose that the high speed rattling is a type of disinformation, saying, "this sudden jump in frequency is an evolved behavior that rattlesnakes use to fool the listener about their actual distance to the snake".
   
   As an aside, I was at a reptile presentation a few years ago where the guide asserted that snakes in the United States rattle much less than they used to because of natural selection. In short, rattling tells hunters where they are, so being quiet became a survival advantage and hunters have killed off the lines of the species that are quick to rattle.
   
   

   -h/t RealClear Science
   
   

3. How snake venom and a smoking cessation drug inspired a nasal spray that blocks COVID - Princeton, New Jersey's Oyster Point Pharma recently announced that they are repuroposing Chantix and also deploying another substance in order to guard against COVID. CEO, Jeffrey Nau, says that the products, "“could allow us to reduce transmission and be able to have a quick response to outbreaks in certain areas of the world". Chantix is also known as a smoking cessation medication, and the second product is based on a similar molecule called, simpinicline. The two molecules will be deployed in nasal sprays to disrupt the pathway that leads to infection from the eyes and nose. One of the inspirations behind the idea was the observation that COVID's spike protein binds to nACh receptors in a similar way to snake venom.
   
   -h/t RealClear Science


4. 30-Minute Afternoon Workout Tied to Better Mood in Patients With Depression - Researchers studied a group of 92 people who had been diagnosed with depression. The experimental group was given a 30 minute, supervised, aerobic workout every day, and the control group spent the same 30 minutes reading a book. The sleep quality of all subjects was also monitored. There were no apparent differences in sleep quality or daytime sleepiness, but the experimental group was "strongly associated" with improved mood quality. Lead researcher, Gavin Brupbacher, said, ,"A single 30-minute bout of moderate-intensity aerobic exercise seems to be enough of a stimulus to improve mood immediately after the exercise session, however, it might not be enough to affect sleep a few hours later". Giselle Soares Passos commented on the work, saying (among other things), "I'm sure exercise should be included as a non-pharmacological adjuvant strategy for insomnia and depression".


5. Using 'AI-based software like Proctorio and ProctorU' to monitor online exams is a really bad idea, says uni panel - In a report, a committee from the University of Texas cited psychological concerns and financial cost in recommending against AI-based proctoring software. The committee acknowledged the need to proctor online exams, but said that AI software is not the way to do it. Known to detractors as "academic surveillance software", AI-based proctoring software watches remote students when they are taking exams. It has been widely criticized, however, because of proprietary algorithms and the possibility of bias or arbitrary signalling rules. Instead of AI-based software, the committee recommends that professors watch over small groups of students using tools like Zoom.



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