September 18, 2024: We're covering why our brains choke under pressure, how we discern speech from music and a quantum way to image live plants. —Robin Lloyd, Contributing Editor | | | 'Ghost Imaging' of Plants | A newly described method for imaging live plants at the molecular level over time relies on "ghost imaging," a process that starts by splitting a light source into two photons with different wavelengths, reports freelance science writer Rachel Berkowitz. One stream of the entangled photons (at an infrared wavelength) is directed at the plant in a box with a photon counter behind it. The other stream of photons (at a wavelength in the visible light range) is directed at an empty box with a multi-pixel camera behind it. The infrared stream interacts with the plant tissue but gives incomplete spatial information, whereas the visible stream yields complete spatial information without interacting with the plant. Analysis of the detected entangled photons from each stream yields an image of the molecular activity of the live plant.
Why this is cool: The plant absorbs some of the infrared light, but the light that makes it through reveals crucial elements of the plant's molecular makeup and activity. These elements likely would have been disrupted if imaged conventionally in visible light. With ghost imaging, the image is produced by light that doesn't "touch" the plant, which would otherwise affect the gathered information.
What the experts say: "We saw [leaf pores called] stomata closing as the plants reacted to darkness," says study co-author Duncan Ryan of Los Alamos National Laboratory. | | | New experiments with monkeys are shedding light on why our brains freeze up at times when the stakes get high. When they learned to anticipate rare but big rewards for accurate performances of a computer task, the activity of neurons linked to preparing to move declined, reports freelance science journalist Jude Coleman. That drop left the monkeys unprepared for the next task such that they appeared to "choke" under pressure. The research has yet to be tested in humans.
Why this matters: Choking under pressure is widely observed in sports, but it happens in a range of fields and settings.
What the experts say: In some ways, "you just don't perform better as the reward increases," says behavioral neuroscientist Bita Moghaddam. | | | Basketball star Isaiah Thomas reacts after missing a crucial shot. Hector Amezcua/Sacramento Bee/Tribune News Service via Getty Images | | | • Black men are at greater risk than white men of severe prostate cancer and should start prostate cancer screening as early as age 40. | 13 min listen | | | • The brain's auditory pathway discerns between music and speech by monitoring how quickly a series of sounds changes during an audio clip or session, a property called "amplitude modulation," writes neuroscientist Andrew Chang. In controlled white-noise audio clip experiments that Chang conducted with colleagues, participants reported as speech those clips with faster amplitude modulation rates and less reliable rhythms. Clips with slower amplitude modulation rates and more reliable rhythms were judged as music, Chang writes. | 5 min read | | | • Dobbs has fundamentally changed obstetric care, study finds. | MedPage Today | • Birds form surprising relationships with other avian species during migration, study suggests. | Smithsonian | • Do you see blue or green? This viral test plays with color perception. | The Guardian
| | | One summer evening, my spouse and I were winding down when an opossum strolled into our living room. After gazing at one another in wonder and astonishment, we humans stifled our giggles and quietly shepherded the bold explorer out the way it had entered the house—through what we then called "the door to the basement," which someone apparently had left ajar. Our basement is strangely replete with doors, so that designation always perplexed me. The egress now has a more precise, unforgettable name. It's "the possum door." Opossums sure are curious animals, as Steve Macone pokes fun at in this recent New Yorker essay.
| —Robin Lloyd, Contributing Editor | | Subscribe to this and all of our newsletters . | | | | Scientific American
One New York Plaza, New York, NY, 10004 | | | | | | Support our mission, subscribe to Scientific American | | | | | | | | | |
