NEWS IN BRIEF Retinal prostheses stimulate animals' visual cortices 06.18.13 | more >>

Determining a room’s dimensions no longer requires a tape measure. An algorithm that sorts through echoes to develop accurate maps of a room, detailed June 17 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, may lead to better sound quality for teleconferences and online gaming. 06.17.13 | more >>

The changing chemistry of ocean waters may cause baby oysters to have trouble mustering the energy to build their shells, new research suggests. 06.17.13 | more >>

VIEW THE VIDEO Making something invisible does not require complex materials and techniques. Well-placed mirrors or lenses can cloak fish, cats and even people, two new studies show. 06.14.13 | more >>

NEWS IN BRIEF The long tube of the insects' mouthparts is fluid friendly only at the tip 06.14.13 | more >>

To a cacophony of boos, so-whats and even a few cheers, the American Psychiatric Association released the fifth edition of its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, DSM-5, on May 18 at its annual meeting in San Francisco. 06.14.13 | more >>

The bacterium that causes leprosy still packs the same punch it did in the Middle Ages, a study of the organism’s genome reveals. 06.13.13 | more >>

Ancient fish fossils with preserved muscle tissue offer a glimpse at how necks evolved in early vertebrate animals. The fossils also offer a puzzle: The fish had specialized abdominal muscles found today in land animals, but not in fish, paleontologists report June 13 in Science. 06.13.13 | more >>

An eel protein that shines green could enable a new test for liver problems and jaundice. The protein gets its glow on by connecting with the pigment bilirubin, scientists report in the June 20 Cell. 06.13.13 | more >>

Contrary to their hunting reputation, Stone Age Siberians killed mammoths only every few years when they needed tusks for toolmaking, a new study finds. 06.12.13 | more >>

Cheetahs may run down a track faster than any other land animal. But in the wild, the cats rarely hit top speed; it’s quick bursts of acceleration and sudden slow-downs that get the cats their dinner. 06.12.13 | more >>

Clumsy manicurists can thank a set of stem cells under the base of the fingernail for erasing their mistakes. Those cells allow not only trimmed fingernails but amputated fingertips to regrow. Doctors could one day use nail stem cells to treat malformed nails or even amputated limbs, Mayumi Ito of New York University Langone Medical Center suggests. 06.12.13 | more >>

Soccer players who hit the ball with their head a lot don’t score as well on a memory test as players who head the ball less often, a new study finds. Frequent headers are also associated with abnormalities in the white matter of the brain, researchers report June 11 in Radiology. 06.12.13 | more >>

Captive chimps might soon enjoy the same protections that their wild cousins do.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed to apply the full terms of the Endangered Species Act to all chimpanzees, captive and wild. If adopted, the new rule would restrict import, export and harm of the animals, and clamp down on research that uses chimps and even their blood or tissue. 06.11.13 | more >>

An advance in a speedy type of microchip could help engineers integrate computers’ short-term and long-term memory.

For all the recent advances in the speed of computers, their command centers remain relatively inefficient. A central processor does all the thinking and quickly stores a bunch of 1s and 0s on a chip called dynamic random access memory, or DRAM. But DRAM only works when the computer is on, so it can serve only as short-term memory. Data needed for the long haul has to be stored on separate ... 06.11.13 | more >>

NEWS IN BRIEF Selections from the acoustics meeting include personal listening zones in cars and how skull size affects music tastes, presented June 2-7 in Montreal 06.10.13 | more >>

Dogs evolved from a wolf lineage that has since gone extinct, a study of canine DNA suggests.

Researchers have long assumed that dogs branched off from a still-living wolf species. Geneticists have combed the world looking for wolf populations that most closely resemble dogs genetically, and concluded that dogs originated in the Middle East or Southeast Asia. But fossils suggest Europe as the site of dog domestication. 06.10.13 | more >>

MONTREAL — Eavesdroppers might not have to lip-read to listen in on a far-off conversation. Using a high-speed camera pointed at the throat, scientists can decipher a person’s words without relying on a microphone. 06.07.13 | more >>

Two research teams have figured out how to flip a switch in the brain circuits of mice that compels the animals to groom themselves with their paws over and over. The findings may yield new strategies for reducing compulsive behavior such as repetitive hand washing in humans who have obsessive-compulsive disorder  and other diseases marked by the trait such as autism and Tourette syndrome. 06.06.13 | more >>

NEWS IN BRIEF In mating display, male birds match moves to songs 06.06.13 | more >>

NEWS IN BRIEF Male chickens lose phalluses before hatching 06.06.13 | more >>