Researchers found 37 mine sites in Australia that could be converted into renewable energy storage. So what are we waiting for?

Timothy Weber, Australian National University and Andrew Blakers, Australian National UniversityThe world is rapidly moving towards a renewable energy future. To support the transition, we must prepare back-up energy supplies for times when solar panels and wind turbines are not producing enough electricity. One solution is to build more pumped hydro energy storage. But where should this expansion happen? Our new research identified more than 900 suitable locations around the world: at former and existing mining sites. Some 37 sites are in Australia. Huge open-cut mining pits would be turned into reservoirs to hold water for renewable energy storage. It would give the sites a new lease on life and help shore up the world’s low-emissions future. The benefits of pumped hydro storage Pumped hydro energy storage has been demonstrated at scale for more than a century. Over the past few years, we have been identifying the best sites for “closed-loop” pumped hydro systems around the world. Unlike conventional hydropower systems operating on rivers, closed-loop systems are located away from rivers. They require only two reservoirs, one higher than the other, between which water flows down a tunnel and through a turbine, producing electricity. The water can be released – and power produced – to cover gaps in electricity supply...

Read More........→February 29, 2024

Think you’re good at multi-tasking? Here’s how your brain compensates – and how this changes with age

Peter Wilson, Australian Catholic UniversityWe’re all time-poor, so multi-tasking is seen as a necessity of modern living. We answer work emails while watching TV, make shopping lists in meetings and listen to podcasts when doing the dishes. We attempt to split our attention countless times a day when juggling both mundane and important tasks. But doing two things at the same time isn’t always as productive or safe as focusing on one thing at a time. The dilemma with multi-tasking is that when tasks become complex or energy-demanding, like driving a car while talking on the phone, our performance often drops on one or both. Here’s why – and how our ability to multi-task changes as we age. Doing more things, but less effectively The issue with multi-tasking at a brain level, is that two tasks performed at the same time often compete for common neural pathways – like two intersecting streams of traffic on a road. In particular, the brain’s planning centres in the frontal cortex (and connections to parieto-cerebellar system, among others) are needed for both motor and cognitive tasks. The more tasks rely on the same sensory system, like vision, the greater the interference. This is why multi-tasking, such as talking on the phone, while driving can be risky. It takes longer to react to critical events, such as a car...

Read More........→January 02, 2024

Polar bears may struggle to produce milk for their cubs as climate change melts sea ice

During their time onshore, polar bear mothers may risk their survival by continuing to nurse when food is not available. (Shutterstock) Louise Archer, University of TorontoWhen sea ice melts, polar bears must move onto land for several months without access to food. This fasting period is challenging for all bears, but particularly for polar bear mothers who are nursing cubs. Our research, published in Marine Ecology Progress Series, found that polar bear lactation is negatively affected by increased time spent on land when sea ice melts. Impaired lactation has likely played a role in the recent decline of several polar bear populations. This research also indicates how polar bear families might be impacted in the future by continued sea-ice loss caused by climate warming. Challenges of rearing cubs While sea ice might appear as a vast and perhaps vacant ecosystem, the frozen Arctic waters provide an essential platform for polar bears to hunt energy-rich seals — the bread and butter of their diet. Sea ice is a dynamic environment that can vary through time and in different regions of the Arctic. Polar bears in Canada’s western Hudson Bay area experience seasonal sea ice, which melts in the warmer summer months, forcing the polar bears to move onto land until cooler winter temperatures cause the sea ice to refreeze.While...

Read More........→October 09, 2023

Is it normal to forget words while speaking? And when can it spell a problem?

Greig de Zubicaray, Queensland University of TechnologyWe’ve all experienced that moment mid-sentence when we just can’t find the word we want to use, even though we’re certain we know it. Why does this universal problem among speakers happen? And when can word-finding difficulties indicate something serious? Everyone will experience an occasional word-finding difficulty, but if they happen very often with a broad range of words, names and numbers, this could be a sign of a neurological disorder. The steps involved in speaking Producing spoken words involves several stages of processing. These include: identifying the intended meaning selecting the right word from the “mental lexicon” (a mental dictionary of the speaker’s vocabulary) retrieving its sound pattern (called its “form”) executing the movements of the speech organs for articulating it. Word-finding difficulties can potentially arise at each of these stages of processing. When a healthy speaker can’t retrieve a word from their lexicon despite the feeling of knowing it, this is called a “tip-of-the-tongue” phenomenon by language scientists. Often, the frustrated speaker will try to give a bit of information about their intended word’s meaning, “you know, that thing you hit a nail with”, or its spelling, “it starts with an H!”. Tip-of-the-tongue states...

Read More........→October 05, 2023

How consciousness may rely on brain cells acting collectively – new psychedelics research on rats

Psychedelics can help uncover consciousness. agsandrew/Shutterstock Pär Halje, Lund UniversityPsychedelics are known for inducing altered states of consciousness in humans by fundamentally changing our normal pattern of sensory perception, thought and emotion. Research into the therapeutic potential of psychedelics has increased significantly in the last decade. While this research is important, I have always been more intrigued by the idea that psychedelics can be used as a tool to study the neural basis of human consciousness in laboratory animals. We ultimately share the same basic neural hardware with other mammals, and possibly some basic aspects of consciousness, too. So by examining what happens in the brain when there’s a psychedelically induced change in conscious experience, we can perhaps glean insights into what consciousness is in the first place.We still don’t know a lot about how the networks of cells in the brain enable conscious experience. The dominating view is that consciousness somehow emerges as a collective phenomenon when the dispersed information processing of individual neurons (brain cells) is integrated as the cells interact.But the mechanism by which this is supposed to happen remains unclear. Now our study on rats, published in Communications Biology, suggests that psychedelics radically change the...

Read More........→August 23, 2023