Science Blog

Hubble discovers a true water world

sb — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:52:47 +0000

Our solar system contains three types of planets: rocky, terrestrial worlds (Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars), gas giants (Jupiter and Saturn), and ice giants (Uranus and Neptune). Planets orbiting...

Real value of a green card? About $1,000 per month

sb — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:44:46 +0000

Just what does it mean to get a green card? To some applicants, about $1,000 each month. A recent study by a Universityof Nevada, Reno economist and a graduate student found that employer-sponsored...

Education doesn’t increase support for affirmative action among whites, minorities

sb — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:42:33 +0000

Highly educated whites and minorities are no more likely to support workplace affirmative action programs than are their less educated peers, according to a new study in the March issue of Social...

Nanotech converts body heat into power

sb — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:37:48 +0000

Never get stranded with a dead cell phone again. A promising new technology called Power Felt, a thermoelectric device that converts body heat into an electrical current, soon could create enough...

Chemists build an ‘off’ switch for pain

sb — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:35:31 +0000

The notion of a pain switch is an alluring idea, but is it realistic? Well, chemists have now shown in laboratory experiments that it is possible to inhibit the activity of pain-sensitive neurons...

Anticipating Stressful Events Makes You Old

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 21:52:43 +0000

The ability to anticipate future events allows us to plan and exert control over our lives, but it may also contribute to stress-related increased risk for the diseases of aging, according to a study...

Obscure fungus killing rare rattlesnakes

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 19:41:46 +0000

A small population of rattlesnakes that already is in decline in southern Illinois faces a new and unexpected threat in the form of a fungus rarely seen in the wild, researchers report. The eastern...

Can Consuming Caffeine While Breastfeeding Harm Your Baby?

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 19:26:37 +0000

Babies are not able to metabolize or excrete caffeine very well, so a breastfeeding mother’s consumption of caffeine may lead to caffeine accumulation and symptoms such as wakefulness and...

Chess Experts Help Researchers Understand How We See the World

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 15:02:37 +0000

Just as expert chess players scrutinize a board to calculate their next moves, UT Dallas cognitive neuroscientists are studying the way these players’ brains work to better understand how visual...

Rare Earth element found far, far away

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:28:32 +0000

Nearly 13.7 billion years ago, the universe was made of only hydrogen, helium and traces of lithium — byproducts of the Big Bang. Some 300 million years later, the very first stars emerged, creating...

‘Storm of the Century?’ Try ‘Storm of the Decade’

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:28:02 +0000

Last August, Hurricane Irene spun through the Caribbean and parts of the eastern United States, leaving widespread wreckage in its wake. The Category 3 storm whipped up water levels, generating storm...

First wirelessly controlled drug-delivery chip

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:27:25 +0000

About 15 years ago, MIT professors Robert Langer and Michael Cima had the idea to develop a programmable, wirelessly controlled microchip that would deliver drugs after implantation in a patient’s...

Nine in 10 U.S. adults get too much sodium … every single day

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:20:08 +0000

Nearly all Americans consume much more sodium than they should, according to a report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Most of the sodium comes from common restaurant or grocery...

A lot of kids have gender non-conformity; a lot will get beat up

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:03:37 +0000

Children in the U.S. whose activity choices, interests, and pretend play before age 11 fall outside those typically expressed by their biological sex face increased risk of being physically,...

Conforming to society linked to size of certain brain region

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 14:02:20 +0000

Every generation has its James Dean: the rebel who refuses to follow the path beaten by their peers. Now, a new study in ‘Current Biology’ has found a link between the amount of grey matter in one...

300-Million-Year Old Forest, Preserved Like Pompeii

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 13:59:52 +0000

Pompeii-like, a 300-million-year-old tropical forest was preserved in ash when a volcano erupted in what is today northern China. A new study by University of Pennsylvania paleobotanist Hermann...

Colic tied to mom’s migraines

sb — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 13:58:51 +0000

A study of mothers and their young babies by neurologists at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) has shown that mothers who suffer migraine headaches are more than twice as likely to...

Tasmanian devil cancer genome decoded

sb — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 20:25:12 +0000

Researchers, including several from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute near Cambridge, have sequenced the genome of a cancer that is threatening the existence of the Tasmanian devil. An...

Telling tails: telomere length in early life predicts lifespan

sb — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 18:23:39 +0000

Whether it’s the lines on our palms, the lumps on our heads or the pattern of our moles, for thousands of years, we humans have been looking to our bodies for predictions of the future. The advent of...

Vaccine discovered for hep C

sb — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 17:21:58 +0000

A University of Alberta researcher and Canada Excellence Research Chair in Virology has made the discovery of a vaccine that will potentially help combat hepatitis C. Michael Houghton, who led the...