Scientists found a new Alzheimer’s trigger and a drug that stops it - Science Daily

FORT McMURRAY, Alta. — There is just one week to go until the peak of the Orionid meteor shower. Skywatchers could see some of the fastest meteors of the year streaking across the predawn sky. The Orionids peak overnight Oct. 21 and 22 and can produce up to 20 meteors per hour under dark, favourable conditions. The shower is active from Oct. 2 through Nov. 7. The meteors are comprised of debris left behind by Halley’s Comet, which last passed by in 1986. As Earth passes through the comet’s debris stream each October, the particles strike the atmosphere at about 68 kilometres per second. Richard Covey, amateur astronomer, published astrophotographer and member of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, says the Orionids are especially appealing because of their speed and their connection to one of astronomy’s best-known comets. “You’re literally watching tiny pieces of Halley’s Comet burn up in the atmosphere. They’re moving incredibly fast, so the Orionids can produce some very sharp, impressive streaks across the sky.”Moonlight will make this year’s peak more challenging. The Moon will be bright around Oct. 21 and 22, washing out many of the fainter meteors for much of the night

A technology developed at The University of Queensland allowing scientists to observe how disease-related proteins behave inside living neurons will be used to advance early drug discovery for neurodegenerative diseases. The NASTIC (Nanoscale Spatiotemporal Indexing Clustering) platform, spun out into Brisbane-based startup Accretion Bio, enables researchers to study real-time biological processes in living cells across space and time at the single-molecule level for the first time.

For some cancer patients, the effects of immunotherapy can linger in an unexpected place: their joints. Painful arthritis may return repeatedly, sometimes becoming more severe with each episode. Now, scientists have uncovered a possible explanation involving the immune system's ability to remember previous attacks. Researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center have found evidence that arthritis triggered by certain cancer immunotherapies behaves like a disease driven by immune memory. Rather than launching an entirely new inflammatory response during each flare, the immune system appears to reactivate cells involved in earlier episodes.

A fossil theropod vertebra about the length of a thumb, found in the Algarve region in southern Portugal, may be the oldest dinosaur remains ever discovered on the Iberian Peninsula. An artist’s impression of Sarcosaurus. Image credit: TotalDino / CC BY 4.0.