Hannah Wood
LASER DEFENSE The U.S. Navy is reportedly deploying a laser weapon system on one of its ships. New work on carving out air-based conduits for high-energy laser beams could improve this technology.
Copyright U.S. Navy
GIVE A HOOT Peacocks make guys-only noises, including a hoot that may exaggerate their popularity and attract females during breeding season.
R. Dakin
STAR RIVERS The galaxy ESO 137-001, 200 million light-years away, leaves trails (shown in blue in this false-color Hubble Space Telescope image) of gas and newly born stars as it plows through the Norma Cluster. Bright stars in the foreground sit within our galaxy.
Ming Sun/UAH, Serge Meunier, NASA, ESA
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Comets collide around young star
Astronomers detect clouds of carbon monoxide around Beta Pictoris that could help lead to the discovery of new planets.
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Domestic violence arrests may be counterproductive
Mandatory arrest laws may increase mortality rates, especially among employed black women.
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Pelican spiders: slow, safe assassins
Spiders, thank goodness, haven’t evolved assassin drones. But the specialized hunters of the family Archaeidae can kill at a distance.
Feature
The addiction paradox
Addiction is often seen as a chronic disease that requires maintenance treatment even after years of sobriety. But even without help, most addicts eventually can quit for good.
News in Brief
Material’s magnetism tuned by temperature
Layered substance may lead to more reliable hard drives in the future.
Feature
Cloudy forecast
Over decades climatologists have grown more confident in their projections of the future impact of greenhouse gas emissions. But whether shifts in cloudiness will amplify global warming continues to vex researchers.
News in Brief
Shining a light on radio waves
A new device detects faint signals by first converting them to laser pulses.
Introducing
Power-packed bacterial spores generate electricity
With mighty bursts of rehydration, bacterial spores offer a new source of renewable energy.
News
Black holes may shut down stellar factories
Astronomers find dead galaxies loaded with the cold gas needed to make stars.
Science Visualized
A tiny ocean vortex, with pop art pizzazz
Coral polyps kick up a whirling vortex of water by whipping their hairlike cilia back and forth in the photography winner of the 2013 International Science & Engineering Visualization Challenge.
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Casinos may reduce poverty, obesity in Native American communities
A modest reduction in overweight youth was observed after the addition of slot machines.
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