Saturday Quote: Deployment-based biosignatures. Body odor diplomacy; honeybee personality

This week, Curiosity Rover has found large carbon deposits on Mars, suggesting an ancient carbon cycle. Researchers exploring cat domestication believe they were originally from Tunisia. And Michigan researchers report that 41,000 years ago, Homo sapiens may have protected themselves from harmful solar radiation with technologies that include clothing, shelters and prehistoric sunscreen.

Furthermore, Cornell’s study found that personal odor is a powerful predictor of possible friendship. Astronomers have reported the most powerful evidence of deplanetary biosignatures. And German studies found that bee hive behavior was strongly driven by individual personalities than previously understood.

Scientists say friends smell good

In a study of heterosexual women, Cornell researchers determined whether the two could become friends within minutes and determined that personal smell was a powerful predictor of whether the two would be involved in each other. During the face-to-face orientation, the researchers took photos of the participants. Additionally, participants were issued a T-shirt that they could wear for 12 hours. Each participant was then engaged in an online session where snap judgments were made about the potential friendship of the other participant’s photographs.

During the second in-person session, participants sniffed T-shirts and evaluated the scent for potential friendship. Subjects then participated in a face-to-face “SpeedFriend” event where each of them spoke to 10 people for four minutes. This event was followed by another T-shirt scent evaluation session. Researchers found that odor-only ratings were very similar to face-to-face ratings. This is a demonstration of the power that scientists call “diplomacy.”

One of the researchers, Jessica Gaby said, “It’s not just a perfume. It’s your dietary choice. Are you a cat or a dog person? What kind of laundry detergent do you use? All of these judgments are summed up into what we call “diplomacy.” You live in this odorous space. Does it match the odor space of the people you interact with? ”

Aliens smell like dimethyldisulfide

Researchers led by the University of Cambridge report the strongest signs of biosignatures ever before. Using James Webb Space Telescope data, chemical signatures of dimethyl sulfide and/or dimethyl disulfide were discovered in the atmosphere of Explanet K2-18b.

There is only a 0.3% chance that observations will occur at what scientists call the three sigma level of statistical significance. To classify it as a scientific discovery, astronomers must meet the 5-sigma level or be below the 0.00006% chance that observations will occur by chance. The team says more time with JWST can meet this threshold.

This signal was first tentatively detected using the JWST near-infrared imager and slitless spectrograph and near-infrared spectrograph. The Cambridge team followed up on the JWST mid-infrared instruments and easily found the same signature. Professor Nikuku Madhusdan of the Astronomical Institute in Cambridge said he led the project.

Bees have their own personality

German researchers report that the likelihood that bees will attack or choose to hesitate to attack an intruder depends on the individual personality. Due to the distribution of tasks in the hive, researchers assumed that pollen collectors were less likely to stab than security guards. The question they wanted to explore was how to decide whether the bees would sting.

They used a humanitarian approach to test the bees. The bees were provoked to attack test dummies made from material that Stinger would not stick to. Therefore, they were able to test the same bee in multiple tests. Test conditions included grouping bees in homologous species, determining whether adaptability contributed to the stinging potential. Others tested whether the concentration of alarm pheromones was a factor.

“In the end, it turns out that these factors were influential, but not the predictability of individual stinging behaviors,” says neurobiologist Morgan Noubian. Researchers conclude that bee personality has been prioritized over factors such as suitability and group composition.

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