All Stories
- Physics
Solid-state insights yield physics Nobel
The 2000 Nobel Prize in Physics went to three scientists and inventors whose work laid the foundation of modern information technology, particularly through their invention of rapid transistors, laser diodes, and integrated circuits.
- Animals
Wasps drive frog eggs to (escape) hatch
A tree frog's eggs can match their response to the degree of danger: all-out mass action for snakes but less activity for one wasp.
- Astronomy
Cosmic afterglow steals the limelight
Thanks to a chance cosmic alignment, researchers appear to have resolved the detailed structure of the afterglow of a gamma-ray burst—even though the parent burst erupted halfway across the universe.
- Tech
Software enhances view of aircraft flaws
New software can run an ultrasonic machine that will map corrosion beneath the surface of an airplane more quickly, safely, and effectively than can existing devices.
-
Some teens show signs of future depression
Certain characteristics typify teens who suffer recurrences of depression as young adults, raising researchers' hopes for devising improved depression treatments.
- Health & Medicine
Bacteria Provide a Frontline Defense
Bacteria genetically engineered to secrete microbe-killing compounds can fight disease in mice and rats.
- Health & Medicine
Busy hospitals may not be best choice
A large number of heart surgeries done at a hospital doesn't always correlate with a low mortality rate from such operations at the facility.
- Earth
Ice-dammed lakes had cooling effect
New computer simulations suggest that massive lakes in northern Russia—formed when an ice sheet blocked the northward flow of rivers about 90,000 years ago—significantly cooled the region's climate in summer months.
- Humans
Better protection from mad cow disease
The Food and Drug Administration has announced several new measures to keep meat that's potentially infected with mad cow disease out of food supplies.
- Health & Medicine
Surgery removes grenade from soldier’s head
Colombian military doctors extracted an intact grenade from the head of a teenage soldier.
-
19377
Of course animals think, I’d say. But you say, “Many [scientists] theorized that nonhuman animals react to their surroundings without actually thinking.” My observation over the decades has been that most humans do the same, most of the time. George BlenderSan Diego, Calif. You don’t need all the elaborate experiments described in the article. If […]
-
Unsure Minds
A controversial set of studies indicates that monkeys and dolphins know when they don't know the answer to certain tasks, an ability that presumably relies on conscious deliberations.
