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  1. Humans

    From the December 30, 1933, issue

    NEW PIPE LINE TO BRING MORE WATER TO LOS ANGELES More water for Los Angeles is the purpose of the big steel serpent that the front cover of this weeks Science News Letter strikingly pictures climbing a mountain. This project, an achievement of electric welding, is conquering canyon and straddling mountain to join Boquet Canyon […]

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  2. Health & Medicine

    Putting Labels on Nutrients

    After all the holiday partying, it’s probably time for most people to get back in the habit of checking the labels on food. Which frozen desert has less fat per serving? Which cereal has the recommended amounts of iron and folic acid? FDA But do those nutrition fact boxes on packaged foods supply the information […]

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  3. Math

    Perfect Magic Cubes

    A magic cube is a three-dimensional array of whole numbers, in which each row, column, and body diagonal (corner to corner, through the center) adds up to the same total. A perfect magic cube is one in which the diagonals of each vertical or horizontal slice through the cube also sum to the same value. […]

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  4. Tech

    Gene Screen: Ultrasensitive nanowires catch mutations

    Researchers have devised a nanowire sensor that binds to DNA molecules and produces an electrical signal almost instantaneously.

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  5. Health & Medicine

    Pivotal Protein: Inhibiting immune compound slows sepsis

    By restraining the action of an immune system protein that can run amok, scientists experimenting on mice have reversed the course of severe sepsis.

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  6. Earth

    Blasts from the Past: Orbiting radar spots old nuclear-test sites

    A technique that analyzes satellite images to detect subtle ground motions often can perceive subsidence over underground nuclear-test sites, sometimes even if those tests occurred decades ago.

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  7. Paleontology

    Ancestral Handful: Tiny skull puts Asia at root of primate tree

    Researchers have unearthed the partial skull of the oldest known primate, a tiny creature that lived in south-central China 55 million years ago.

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  8. 19368

    In this article, the statement is made that personal environmental exposures to volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are easily solved. The implication is that if you have a long commute and are thereby exposed to high concentrations of VOCs, you should just quit your job to avoid exposure. I find that completely absurd. Mark PalmerRichland, Wash. […]

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  9. Earth

    My Own Private Bad-Air Day: Outdoor data underrate pollutant exposure

    Most people breathe in substantially more organic contaminants than airborne concentrations of such substances in their homes and communities would suggest.

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  10. Animals

    Whale Haunt: Nursing, feeding spot found off south Chile

    A survey along the coast of southern Chile has turned up a previously undocumented blue whale hangout that seems to be a feeding ground.

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  11. Physics

    Topsy Turvy: In neutrons and protons, quarks take wrong turns

    Revved-up particles, namely quarks, spinning inside neutrons in the opposite direction to that of the neutrons themselves, challenge the prevailing model of how quarks behave.

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  12. Humans

    Letters

    Letters from the Jan. 3, 2004, issue of Science News.

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