All Stories
- Humans
What’s in your wallet? Another ‘estrogen’
A chemical cousin of bisphenol A, a hormone mimic, has turned up on banknotes from around the world in addition to tainting 14 other types of papery products. Owing to the near ubiquity of BPS in paper, human exposure is likely also “ubiquitous,” conclude the study's authors. Oh, and a second new study shows that BPS behaves like an estrogen.
- Health & Medicine
More adults put off kids’ vaccinations
Scientists say the practice has no proven value and poses risks of infection.
- Earth
Icelandic volcanoes slumber today, but not forever
Eruptions pepper the North Atlantic island.
- Health & Medicine
Like a prion, Alzheimer’s protein seeds itself in the brain
Injecting amyloid-beta into mice may induce misfolding of native amyloid-beta molecules, leading to the buildup associated with the neuron-killing disease.
- Science & Society
Measuring how well kids do science
On June 19, the National Assessment of Educational Progress released the first national report card gauging the performance in hand-on and research-oriented interactive computer tasks by U.S. children. And the overall grades: Well, they show lots of room for improvement.
- Life
Peacocks ruffle feathers, make a rumble
New recordings reveal that male birds use infrasound, emitting low-pitch sounds detected by peers but inaudible to human ears.
- Tech
The descent of music
Using an evolutionary process, researchers create pleasing tunes out of grating noise.
- Space
American Astronomical Society Meeting
Highlights from the 220th AAS meeting held June 10-14 in Anchorage, Alaska.
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- Astronomy
Giant celestial disk hard to explain
A star's oversized debris ring challenges theories of planet formation.
- Life
Chicks do worse in noisy nests
Baby bluebirds, and their parents, appear to have trouble communicating over the racket made by nearby humans.
- Humans
Color this chimp amazing
An extra layer of sensory perception called synesthesia might help ape make a monkey of humans on memory tests.
