Domesticated animals play a prominent role in our society, with two-thirds of American families enjoying the companionship of pets and many others relying on animal products for their nutritional needs. But the process of domestication remains a bit of a mystery. Convincing wild animals they are safe enough to coexist and mate in enclosures and in close proximity to humans and other animals is no small feat.

Managing a fussy infant or a determined toddler can be a daily test of patience and endurance for parents and caregivers. New research on the origins of emotional overeating in 3-year-olds suggests that how caregivers respond to infants’ and toddlers’ negative emotions such as disappointment, fear and anger influences the children’s development of emotional overeating.

LGBTQ+ people involved in farm work are over three times more likely to experience depression and suicidal intent and about two and a half times more likely to experience anxiety than the general population.

Scientists have identified a potential driver of aggressive lung cancer tumors in patients who live in areas with high levels of violent crime. Their study found that stress responses differ between those living in neighborhoods with higher and lower levels of violent crime, and between cancerous and healthy tissues in the same individuals. 

The findings are detailed in the journal Cancer Research Communications.

A multi-institutional study led by scientists in the Agroecosystem Sustainability Center (ASC) at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign concluded that although soil moisture varies significantly both within a single field and from field to field due to varying soil properties and different management practices, soil moisture distribution relative to the field average remains consistent across time within each field. 

Smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa tend to use very small amounts of fertilizer, limiting their crop productivity. A 2016 intervention in Tanzania increased farmers’ fertilizer use and their crop yields.

Organic farming can support soil microorganisms that promote plant defenses and reduce insect pests. But not all organic practices are equally beneficial for soil microbes, and it’s important to understand farmer motivations in order to encourage the adoption of microbiome-supportive efforts.

The Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment has awarded $30,000 in seed funding to Andrew Hultgren, assistant professor in the Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, and others for an interdisciplinary proposal examining the economic and human health effects of exposure to wildfire smoke on a broad scale. The project aims to inform policy related to climate change.

When scientists transplanted the gut microbes of aged mice into young “germ-free” mice — raised to have no gut microbes of their own — the recipient mice experienced an increase in inflammation that parallels inflammatory processes associated with aging in humans. Young germ-free mice transplanted with microbes from other young mice had no such increase. 

The findings suggest that changes to the gut microbiome play a role in the systemwide inflammation that often occurs with aging, the researchers said. 

Among the snowbirds returning north for the summer, A24 is special. For one thing, A24 is an actual bird: a Black-crowned night heron, to be exact. And it has just returned to Chicago to join hundreds of its kind nesting near Lake Michigan. But unlike the human snowbirds that share A24’s migratory habits, this bird is helping to inform conservation efforts in the city and far beyond.