A more environmentally friendly air conditioner

Summer is in full swing in the U.S., and people are turning up their air conditioners to beat the heat. But the hydrofluorocarbon refrigerants in these and other cooling devices are potent greenhouse gases and major drivers of climate change. Today, scientists report a prototype device that could someday replace existing "A/Cs." It's much more environmentally friendly and uses solid refrigerants to efficiently cool a space.

source https://www.lifetechnology.com/blogs/life-technology-science-news/a-more-environmentally-friendly-air-conditioner

New findings reveal how recovery progresses following inflammation triggered by injury or illness

Inflammation is the body's first line of defense, occurring as droves of immune cells rush to the site of injury or acute illness to make repairs and stem further damage.

Myocarditis risk significantly higher after COVID-19 infection vs. after a COVID-19 vaccine

In a detailed analysis of nearly 43 million people, ages 13 and older, who received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine in England, the risk of myocarditis in unvaccinated individuals after COVID-19 infection was at least 11 times higher compared to people who developed myocarditis after receiving a COVID-19 vaccine or booster dose between December 1, 2020 and December 15, 2021, according to new research published today in the American Heart Association's flagship, peer-reviewed journal Circulation.

Tracking air pollution disparities—daily—from space

Studies have shown that pollution, whether from factories or traffic-snarled roads, disproportionately affects communities where economically disadvantaged people and Hispanic, Black and Asian people live. As technology has improved, scientists have begun documenting these disparities in detail, but information on daily variations has been lacking. Today, scientists report preliminary work calculating how inequities in exposure fluctuate from day to day across 11 major U.S. cities. In addition, they show that in some places, climate change could exacerbate these differences.

source https://www.lifetechnology.com/blogs/life-technology-science-news/tracking-air-pollution-disparities-daily-from-space

A reinforcement learning framework to improve the soccer shooting skills of quadruped robots

Researchers University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley), Université de Montréal and Mila have recently developed a hierarchical reinforcement learning framework to improve the precision of quadrupedal robots in soccer shooting. This framework, introduced in a paper pre-published on arXiv, was deployed on a Unitree A1, a quadruped robot developed by UnitreeRobotics.

source https://www.lifetechnology.com/blogs/life-technology-technology-news/a-reinforcement-learning-framework-to-improve-the-soccer-shooting-skills-of-quadruped-robots