NEWSY | Memories shape brain development⏤ forgetting regulates that process
We get bombarded with endless information, so the brain has to be selective, tossing out a memory unless it's told, "This one's important, keep it!" To be clear, we're not talking about disease or injury or age — just a normally functioning organ that prefers tidiness. "Without forgetting, we would have no memory at all" is the way assistant professor in psychology Oliver Hardt of McGill University puts it. It comes down to clutter.&nbs
CBC | How Montreal is preparing for the 'scooter-pocalypse'
The sudden appearance of e-scooters in a city is a phenomenon McGill University geography Prof. Grant McKenzie half-jokingly refers to as the "scooter-pocalypse." McKenzie says Montrealers tend to like new technology and green policies, but he suspects the early days of the e-scooter era won't be easy.
GLOBAL NEWS | Commentary: Why doctors argue ‘carbon pricing’ can ‘cure’ climate change
According to McGill's Christopher Ragan, for doctors across Canada, the evidence at the bedside is increasingly hard to ignore: climate change poses a serious health risk.
FINANCIAL POST | Cracks in the sidewalk: How will experimental city-building techniques fare in the real world?
Experts are skeptical about how all the experimental city-building techniques will fare in the real world, and they wonder what the consequences will be if one or more of the new technologies doesn’t work as intended. Multiple experts in urbanism across North America who spoke to the Financial Post all essentially said the same thing: They’re curious to see how the Sidewalk Toronto project plays out, but they’d be fighting the idea if it were happening in their backyard, because it gives
PURPLE MUSEUM | The benefits of boredom
Daniel Levitin, a behavioral neuroscientist at McGill University, said that when people try to pay attention, they tend to pay attention to several different things at once. These interrupted thought processes can have a tangible (and negative) neurological effect on the brain.
MONTREAL GAZETTE | Hope for people with fibromyalgia from Montreal-based researchers
A Montreal-based research team has shown that the composition of the microbiome, the complex mixture of microorganisms that populate our gastrointestinal tract, is altered in people with fibromyalgia. Their paper was published online this month in the journal Pain and will appear in print.
WIRED | How a PTSD expert developed a viable cure for heartbreak
Alain Brunet, a psychologist who has studied PTSD for decades, has developed a therapy to heal what he calls “romantic betrayal”.
NATURE | Build Science in Africa
Africa’s population is projected to nearly quadruple over the next century1. And that is following a staggering increase over just seven decades — from 200 million people in 1950 to 1.25 billion in 20182.
CTV | Montreal marine biologist brings new eco-friendly watering stations to Osheaga
While Montreal’s numerous festivals provide ample opportunity for fun during the summer, they can also have a negative impact on the environment. A Montreal marine biologist is behind a new project aimed at reducing the amount of plastic in the oceans.
Rachel Labbe-Bellas, McGill almuni, has teamed up with Evenko to bring The Green Stop, an environmentally-friendly water refill stations, to this year’s Osheaga.
THE STAR | Three hundred long-term rentals back on market in Vancouver thanks to new Airbnb rules
Just over 300 homes that were being rented on Airbnb full time were likely returned to Vancouver’s long-term rental market in the first four months of the city’s new regulations coming into force, according to new research from McGill University.
CBC | Cree language and culture keepers celebrate McGill graduation
A room full of Cree students wearing red celebrated their graduation from McGill University Saturday in Pikogan, Que., with a lot of emotion, pride and a deep commitment to strengthening the Cree language and culture, one child at a time.
They were part of a large graduating class of close to 60 students — more than 45 of them with a 60-credit teaching certificate in First Nations and Inuit Education, Language and Culture from McGill's Department of Education.
SCIENCE NEWS | How seafood shells could help solve the plastic waste problem
Lobster bisque and shrimp cocktail make for scrumptious meals, but at a price. The food industry generates 6 million to 8 million metric tons of crab, shrimp and lobster shell waste every year. Depending on the country, those claws and legs largely get dumped back into the ocean or into landfills. In many of those same landfills, plastic trash relentlessly accumulates. Some scientists think it’s possible to tackle the two problems at once.
MACLEANS | Is that my plastic bag in the Mariana Trench?
Until Victor Vescovo landed his submersible there recently, no human had been to the seabed’s deepest point at the very bottom of the fearsome Mariana Trench, nearly 11 km below the surface of the Pacific Ocean. But Vescovo found more than shy marine life and vast untouched landscapes in the ocean’s most remote trough. Within minutes of reaching bottom, he also found trash.
MORNINGSTAR | Combatting the Toxicology Skills Crisis
Each year, tens of thousands of North Americans experience intentional and unintentional poisonings and overdoses from both prescription drugs and other widely available chemicals and substances that can result in serious illness and even death.
BUSINESS KOREA | Samsung Electronics Betting on Neural Processing Unit
Samsung Electronics has unveiled a plan to develop a neural processing unit (NPU), an artificial intelligence-based semiconductor that resembles a human brain, as part of its efforts to become the global leader in system semiconductors by 2030.
