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Categories: Mathematics: Modeling, Offbeat: Paleontology and Archeology
Published Ancient marine animal had inventive past despite being represented by few species



Brachiopods were evolving in new directions but this did not turn into evolutionary success in terms of the numbers of species, researchers have found.
Published Rock art and archaeological record reveal humans' complex relationship with Amazonian animals



Rock art explored by archaeologists in the Colombian Amazon has provided an insight into the complex relationship between the earliest settlers on the continent and the animals they encountered.
Published Raindrops grow with turbulence in clouds



Tackling a long-time mystery, scientists have found that the turbulent movements of air in clouds play a key role in the growth of water droplets and the initiation of rain. The research can improve computer model simulations of weather and climate and ultimately lead to better forecasts.
Published Can a computer tell patients how their multiple sclerosis will progress?



Machine learning models can reliably inform clinicians about the disability progression of multiple sclerosis, according to a new study published this week in the open-access journal PLOS Digital Health by Edward De Brouwer of KU Leuven, Belgium, and colleagues.
Published Komodo dragons have iron-coated teeth to rip apart their prey



Scientists have discovered that the serrated edges of Komodo dragons' teeth are tipped with iron. The study gives new insight into how Komodo dragons keep their teeth razor-sharp and may provide clues to how dinosaurs like Tyrannosaurus rex killed and ate their prey.
Published Scientists assess how large dinosaurs could really get



A study looks at the maximum possible sizes of dinosaurs, using the carnivore, Tyrannosaurus rex, as an example. Using computer modelling, experts produced estimates that T. Rex might have been 70% heavier than what the fossil evidence suggests.
Published Large language models don't behave like people, even though we may expect them to



People generalize to form beliefs about a large language model's performance based on what they've seen from past interactions. When an LLM is misaligned with a person's beliefs, even an extremely capable model may fail unexpectedly when deployed in a real-world situation.
Published Taco-shaped arthropod fossils gives new insights into the history of the first mandibulates



Palaeontologists are helping resolve the evolution and ecology of Odaraia, a taco-shaped marine animal that lived during the Cambrian period. Fossils reveal Odaraia had mandibles. Palaeontologists are finally able to place it as belonging to the mandibulates, ending its long enigmatic classification among the arthropods since it was first discovered in the Burgess Shale over 100 years ago and revealing more about early evolution and diversification.
Published Risks and benefits of integrating AI into medical decision-making



Researchers found that an artificial intelligence (AI) model solved medical quiz questions -- designed to test health professionals' ability to diagnose patients based on clinical images and a brief text summary -- with high accuracy. However, physician-graders found the AI model made mistakes when describing images and explaining how its decision-making led to the correct answer.
Published Hunter-gatherers kept an 'orderly home' in the earliest known British dwelling



Archaeological evidence from the world-famous Mesolithic site of Star Carr in North Yorkshire has shown that hunter-gatherers likely kept an orderly home by creating 'zones' for particular domestic activities.
Published There is mathematical proof in the pudding



In blockchain development, there is a rule of thumb that only two of scalability, security, and decentralization are valid simultaneously. However, the mathematical expression of that rule was still a work in progress. Researchers discovered a mathematical expression for the blockchain trilemma. In the formula for Proof of Work-based blockchains, including Bitcoin, the product of the three terms--scalability, security, and decentralization--is 1.
Published Are AI-chatbots suitable for hospitals?



Large language models may pass medical exams with flying colors but using them for diagnoses would currently be grossly negligent. Medical chatbots make hasty diagnoses, do not adhere to guidelines, and would put patients' lives at risk. A team has systematically investigated whether this form of artificial intelligence (AI) would be suitable for everyday clinical practice. Despite the current shortcomings, the researchers see potential in the technology. They have published a method that can be used to test the reliability of future medical chatbots.
Published Scientists use AI to predict a wildfire's next move



Researchers have developed a new model that combines generative AI and satellite data to accurately forecast wildfire spread.
Published How to assess a general-purpose AI model's reliability before it's deployed



A new technique estimates the reliability of a self-supervised foundation model, like those that power ChatGPT, without the need to know what task that model will be deployed on later.
Published A new neural network makes decisions like a human would



Researchers are training neural networks to make decisions more like humans would. This science of human decision-making is only just being applied to machine learning, but developing a neural network even closer to the actual human brain may make it more reliable, according to the researchers.
Published When to trust an AI model



A new technique enables huge machine-learning models to efficiently generate more accurate quantifications of their uncertainty about certain predictions. This could help practitioners determine whether to trust the model when it is deployed in real-world settings.
Published Artificial intelligence speeds up heart scans, saving doctors' time, and could lead to better treatment for heart conditions



Researchers have developed a groundbreaking method for analysing heart MRI scans with the help of artificial intelligence, which could save valuable time and resources, as well as improve care for patients.
Published 'A history of contact': Geneticists are rewriting the narrative of Neanderthals and other ancient humans



Using genomes from 2,000 living humans as well as three Neanderthals and one Denisovan, an international team mapped the gene flow between the hominin groups over the past quarter-million years.
Published First ever 3D reconstruction of 52,000-year-old woolly mammoth chromosomes thanks to serendipitously freeze-dried skin



An international research team has assembled the genome and 3D chromosomal structures of a 52,000-year-old woolly mammoth -- the first time such a feat has been achieved for any ancient DNA sample. The fossilized chromosomes, which are around a million times longer than most ancient DNA fragments, provide insight into how the mammoth's genome was organized within its living cells and which genes were active within the skin tissue from which the DNA was extracted. This unprecedented level of structural detail was retained because the mammoth underwent freeze-drying shortly after it died, which meant that its DNA was preserved in a glass-like state.
Published A new species of extinct crocodile relative rewrites life on the Triassic coastline



The surprising discovery of a new species of extinct crocodile relative from the Triassic Favret Formation of Nevada, USA, rewrites the story of life along the coasts during the first act of the Age of Dinosaurs. The new species Benggwigwishingasuchus eremicarminis reveals that while giant ichthyosaurs ruled the oceans, the ancient crocodile kin known as pseudosuchian archosaurs ruled the shores across the Middle Triassic globe between 247.2 and 237 million years ago.