【推荐1】Sleep-deprived human parents know the value of a quick nap, but it turns out chinstrap penguins have us all beat. When nesting, these Antarctic birds take four-second-long “micro- sleeps”, a strategy that allows parents to keep constant watch over weak eggs and chicks, all while having 11 hours of total sleep a day, according to a new study.

Like other penguins, chinstrap parents take turns guarding the nest. While one bird protects the chicks, the partner finds food at sea. Then the penguins trade places. For two months between egg laying and fledging(羽化) , it’s a series of nonstop demands.

To study how penguins manage to accomplish all this and get the necessary sleep, Lee, a leader researcher, first stuck biologgers, small battery-powered devices, to the backs of 14 nesting penguins of both sexes. This device functions like a smart-watch, measuring physical activity, pulse, and the ocean depths of foraging birds.

Next, the team humanely arrested each of the penguins, attaching the devices temporarily into their skull to measure brain activity. When an animal is awake, the brain constantly buzzes with activity. During sleep, however, brain waves slow down and stretch out. When Lee started reviewing the data, he was surprised to discover the birds, slept in four-second intervals throughout the day and night while looking after their eggs or chicks.

“In both humans and penguins, micro-sleeps occur during times of exhaustion, yet nesting chinstrap penguins seem to have a near-exclusive reliance on it,” Cirelli, another scientist, says. Studying sleep in natural environments is difficult, so “the simple fact that they were able to record data in these conditions is incredible. ”

While the data is convincing, Cirelli notes that the researchers only studied the penguins during nesting periods, making it impossible to tell if the birds micro-sleep when they’re not parenting. The other challenge is understanding how micro-sleep impacts the brains and bodies of the pen-guins. Sleep deprivation in humans causes a range of health problems, and it’s not clear whether penguins experience this, too.

【推荐2】After being driven to near extinction, wolves are back in Washington state.

Wolf 32M, called The Old Guy by wolf specialist Ben Maletzke, lived some 12 years as the patriarch (族长) of the Teanaway Pack, kicking off the recovery of wolves in Washington. The pack’s territory was roasted by wildfire in 2014. But wolf 32M and his family remained in existence, bringing the call of the wild back for the first time in a century. These wolves are what Maletzke calls stepping stones in recovery — the animals that could help lead the way to new territory not yet repopulated by wolves.

Wolves spread to new territory to find mates and begin packs of their own. It is this pack dynamic that wildlife biologists are counting on, in time, to urge wolves into areas where they do not presently live. “We just need a couple to pick up and go,” Maletzke says.

All along, the Teanaway pack has stayed mostly out of trouble probably, helped by a lot of range riding (牧区巡逻) intended to help reduce conflicts over wolf recovery by keeping wolves away from cattle. “He is an example of wolves living and doing what they do, even around people,” Maletzke says of wolf 32M.

Story Warren, a student at the University of Montana, was just a girl when she first saw 32M’s tracks in the Teanaway River Valley — an exciting encounter that helped generate a serious interest in wildlife that now fuels her studies. To her, the return of the wolf is about more than the species; it is about recovering something even bigger: hope.

“Growing up in my generation, there is so much bad ecological news, a lot of hopelessness about climate change and loss of biodiversity and extinctions,” Warren says, “To have something as wild as wolves coming back to Washington is very encouraging for me — just to know such an amazing and powerful creature exists.”

【推荐1】What would life be like without commas (逗号)? It would be quite confusing. Take this simple sentence as an example: Let’s eat Dad! Without a comma, Dad becomes the food. Add comma, and Dad becomes a partner at dinner: Let’s eat, Dad! The comma enables people to have a better understanding of the sentence.

Here’s another example: Tom said Sarah stole the cake. Here, Sarah is the thief. But add a pair of commas, and Tom becomes the thief: Tom, said Sarah, stole the cake.

The examples above clearly show that people cannot do without commas in writing. Yet, the comma came from oral speeches. Long ago, most people could not read. They listened to the news or stories told by the people who gave speeches. The comma began as something to mark the resting place in a sentence. When reading, the speakers knew where to stop and take a breath.

In writing, commas are like shining red lights on the road. They require that you wait a moment before continuing. And don’t add a comma when you feel like it. There are rules that people shall not break. Learn them, and you won’t be eating anyone or making wrong changes.

【推荐2】The phrase "The early bird catches the worm" may be true. It means people who wake up early get more done than people who don’t. Another saying is, "Early to bed, early to rise" makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise." Scientists have found that people who go to bed before 11: 00 p. m. may do better in life than people who sleep around 2:30 a.m.

The researchers are from Birmingham's Centre for Human Brain Health in the UK. Their research showed that people who slept and rose early (early birds) had an advantage over people who slept and woke up late(night owls). There were differences in the brain function of early birds and night owls.

The scientists tested 38 people in their research. The people answered questionnaires about their sleeping pattern and when they felt tired during the day. They were then put into an early bird or night owl group based on their answers.

All of the people had MRI scans on their brain and did different tests throughout the day. The researchers said there were big differences between the two groups. The early birds said they felt less sleepy and were able to do the tests quicker than the night owls. The researchers said, "Night owls during school have to get up earlier, then they go into work and they have to get up earlier, so they re constantly having to fight against their bad life habits.”

【推荐3】Diet research is always messy, and study results on nutrition and bone health have been wildly inconsistent. But gradually something clearer is coming out. As we draw up resolutions for what to eat in the coming 2023, it’s useful to look at new data on Vitamin D, as well as recent research on coffee and other foods.

Bone is a dynamic tissue, constantly replaced with new cells. Calcium is the key nutrient for building bone, and Vitamin D enables us to absorb Calcium from the food we eat, so doctors often recommend D supplements to counteract age-related bone loss. Today more than a third of American adults aged 60 and older take this Vitamin.

But a huge study published this past summer found that taking Vitamin D for five years did not reduce the rate of fractures(骨折)in healthy adults aged 50 and older. That result built on earlier findings, led by the same team, that D supplements do not improve bone density. Besides they declared that it’s time for medical professionals to stop pushing these pills and quit ordering so many blood tests for Vitamin D levels.

“Food and incidental sun exposure likely provide enough Vitamin D for healthy adults,” says Meryl LeBoff who led the study. But LeBoff puts an emphasis on “healthy” adults. The study did not focus on those who already have osteoporosis(骨质疏松). Such people would be wise to remain on extra Vitamin D and Calcium, she advises.

What does help maintain strong bones for all of us? The easy answer is foods that are high in Calcium, such as dairy products, sardines and tofu. For those of us who like to start our day with coffee, modest consumption may help our bones. Although very high level of caffeine-say, six to eight cups of coffee-cause Calcium to be lost in urine(尿)one or two cups seems to have a beneficial effect. A study led by Ching-Lung Cheung of Hong Kong University linked three digestive by-products of coffee with greater bone density. “Coffee intake, if not excessive, should be safe for bone.” he says. “And if you still have concerns, add milk!”

【推荐3】Many robots have been sent to explore Mars. Such robots have usually looked like a box with wheels. These robots are useful but extremely expensive, and they break easily. Also, they cannot do many tasks. So scientists have been developing “snakebots”, which move like snakes.

The way a snake is shaped lets it get into very small spaces like cracks in rocks. It can also push its way below the ground or climb up different kinds of objects, like high rocks and trees. A snakebot would be able to do these things, too, making it much more effective than regular robots on wheels which easily get stuck or fall over. Since they can carry tools, snakebots would be able to work in space as well. They could, for example, help repair the International Space Station.

A snakebot is built like a chain made of about thirty parts or modules. Each module is basically the same in that they all have a small computer and a wheel to aid movement. The large computer in the “head” of the snake makes all of the modules in a snakebot work together.

The modular design of the snakebot has many advantages. If one module fails, another can be added easily. Snakebot modules can also carry different kinds of tools, as well as cameras. Since each module is actually a robot in itself, one module can work apart from the rest if necessary. That is, all the modules can separate and move on their own, and then later, reconnect back into a larger robot. Researchers are also trying to develop snakebots made of a special kind of plastic that can change its shape using electricity, almost like animal muscles. Snakebots made with this plastic will be very strong and hard to break.

Overall, the snakebot design is much simpler than that of common robots. Thus, snakebots will be much less expensive to build. With their versatility (多功能性) and affordability, snakebots seem to be the wave of the future, at least as far as space robots are concerned.