Cellular cognition: How single cells learn using non-neural networks.

Single cells can perform surprisingly complex behaviors and computations, including primitive forms of learning like habituation. New work highlighted here uses mathematical modeling to show that relatively simple biochemical networks can recapitulate many features of habituation in animals.

Estimating lives saved and serious injuries reduced by bicycle helmet use in Colorado, 2006-2014.

Using the methodology developed by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) for motorcyclists, this paper estimates bicycle helmet effectiveness factors (HEFs), defined as the percentage greater chance that a helmeted bicyclist will avoid a fatality or serious injury relative to a non-wearer. We analyse reported motor vehicle-bicycle collisions in Colorado between 2006 and 2014. We conclude that NHTSA's motorcycle HEF methodology did not provide reasonable results given underreporting of low-severity collisions of helmeted bicyclists.

Sodium zirconium cyclosilicate treatment and rates of emergency interventions for hyperkalaemia: a propensity-score weighted case-control study.

Background: Sodium zirconium cyclosilicate (SZC) reduces serum potassium in patients with chronic hyperkalaemia in clinical trials, but its role in the emergency treatment of hyperkalaemia is unproven. We hypothesized that SZC use for emergent hyperkalaemia would be associated with a reduction in rates of emergency interventions for hyperkalaemia.

Methods: This was a single-centre, propensity score-weighted case-control study of patients admitted with hyperkalaemia to a specialist renal centre.

Fishnet mesh of centrin-Sfi1 drives ultrafast calcium-activated contraction of the giant cell .

is a unicellular ciliate capable of contracting to a quarter of its body length in less than five milliseconds. When measured as fractional shortening, this is an order of magnitude faster than motion powered by actomyosin. Myonemes, which are protein networks found near the cortex of many protists, are believed to power contraction.