New Scientist - USA (2019-11-30)

30 November 2019 | New Scientist | 19

Music

Environment Bionics

Bitcoin’s impact

may not be so bad

Mining the cryptocurrency

bitcoin may be less

polluting than we thought.

A study found powering the

computers it uses led to the

release of 17 megatonnes

of carbon dioxide in 2018,

one-third that of an earlier

estimate (Environmental

Science and Technology,

doi.org/dfkx). The new

figure took into account

the various ways energy is

produced across the world.

Humans are putting

plant species at risk

A third of plants in the

tropical region of Africa

may be at risk of extinction,

according to an analysis of

22,000 species (Science

Advances, doi.org/dfkw).

Human impacts, including

increasing deforestation

and climate change, are

thought to be responsible.

Trash-talking robot

curbs performance

People who played a

video game against a

robot opponent made

worse decisions when the

bot trolled them, a study

has found (arxiv.org/

abs/1910.11459).

The research discovered

that negative comments,

for example, made

people make less rational

decisions in the game.

The world may sing

in harmony after all

ALL music seems to have similar

structural elements. In fact, we

even use the same simple building

blocks to make melodies, which

means humans might have an

innate “grammar” for music.

While music seems to be in all

cultures, the prevailing view is

that it has few, if any, universal

elements. Settling the matter

empirically has been difficult

because research often focuses

on individual cultures and

PALM oil has become a villain in

environmental terms, as people

realise that producing it often

involves clearing rainforests. But

it turns out this happens less often

in Colombia than in other countries

that are major producers.

If you buy products containing

palm oil from plants grown in

Colombia, there is a 60 to 70 per

cent chance that it comes from

trees on old cattle pasture, rather

than on former rainforest, says Juan

Carlos Quezada at the Swiss Federal

Institute of Technology Lausanne’s

Ecological Systems Laboratory.

Planting oil palms on pasture in

the South American country doesn’t

increase carbon emissions,

according to a study by Quezada

and his team (Science Advances,

doi.org/dfk6). He says it also has

much less impact on wildlife.

Globally, growing demand

for palm oil is leading to a rapid

expansion of oil palm plantations. In

Malaysia and Indonesia, rainforests

are being cut down to make way for

the crop. This is not only devastating

for wildlife such as orangutans, it

also releases a lot of carbon dioxide.

The main reason why palm oil

demand is increasing is that huge

quantities are now being turned

into subsidised biofuels, including

in Europe. Michael Le Page

musical contexts, says Samuel

Mehr of Harvard University.

To seek universal features,

Mehr and his team turned to

data science. They collated about

5000 descriptions of songs – the

voice being an instrument used

in all cultures – and their

performances in 60 societies.

Not only was music present

in all societies, but when they

analysed the data, clear patterns

emerged. For example, songs used

in similar contexts shared similar

features. Ritual healing songs were

more repetitive than dance songs,

and dance songs were quicker and

Wearable patch

gives sense of touch

A SYNTHETIC skin could help add

a sense of touch to prosthetic

hands or give video games a more

realistic feel. The skin comes as

a battery-free patch that can be

stuck onto any part of the body.

Created by John Rogers at

Northwestern University in

Illinois and his team, it works by

vibrating and pushing the skin. It

is powered wirelessly and can be

matched to the user’s skin colour.

In a demonstration, a man with

a prosthetic hand wore the skin on

the upper part of this arm. When

he grasped a cup with the artificial

hand, sensors transmitted the

touch sensations to his upper

arm (Nature, doi.org/dfk3).

“Touch is important for being

able to use a limb,” says Christof

Lutteroth at the University of Bath,

UK. Anyone who has tried opening

a door with cold, numb hands

knows how vital it is for grasping

and manipulating objects, he says.

The patch could also be used

in video gaming. In another

demonstration, it vibrated to

convert strikes in a combat game

into sensations felt on the body.

Rogers now wants to refine the

touch sensations transmitted by

the patch, for example by adding

the ability to gently heat and cool

the skin. Layal Liverpool

more rhythmic than lullabies.

But the most striking discovery

was that all cultures had melodies

centred around a “basis tone”. A

good example is Twinkle, Twinkle,

Little Star, which starts on the note

C and uses notes from the C major

scale. This means that the C note

gives the song a sense of stability

and feels like “home”.

The authors suggest that this

might be a sign of a universal

“musical grammar”, much like the

idea we have a universal linguistic

grammar of speech sounds

(Science, DOI: 10.1126/science.

aax0868). Ruby Prosser Scully

Turn pasture into plantations

if you want greener palm oil

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Really brief

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