All Stories
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Genetically Driven: Mutation shows up in binge eaters
Overweight binge eaters are more likely to harbor a genetic mutation that disrupts brain signals governing satiety than are people of normal weight.
- Physics
Muon Manna? Particle shower may spotlight loose nukes
Radiation from space may help border guards spot loose nukes stowed in shipping containers.
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Tyrannosaurus rex ‘s environment may have provided sufficient carrion for the giant to survive as a scavenger, and studies of its ratio of leg-muscle mass to body mass suggest that it wasn’t speedy enough to be an efficient predator. But this may be only how it ended its life. It didn’t hatch from the egg […]
- Paleontology
Was T. rex just a big freeloader?
A new study suggests that an ecosystem like today’s African savanna could provide sufficient carrion to nourish a scavenger the size of a Tyrannosaurus rex.
- Animals
Ants lurk for bees, but bees see ambush
A tropical ant has perfected the un-antlike behavior of hunting by ambush, but its prey, a sweat bee, has developed some tricks of its own.
- Physics
Squirming through space-time
In the exotic realm of curved space, the topography of space itself might provide a propulsion assist—albeit a tiny one.
- Earth
More Arctic clouds may lessen warming
Nearly 2 decades of satellite observations suggest that an increase in Arctic cloudiness at certain times of the year may partially counteract the effects of global warming in the region.
- Math
Disorder in the Deck
Card players sometimes get lazy, shuffling a deck fewer times than necessary to randomize the cards. Indeed, persistently sloppy shuffling can have a significant impact on play–an effect that experts (and gamblers) can exploit to their advantage. However, the problem lay not in the computer but with human expectations. Subsequent research showed that hands in […]
- Math
Disorder in the Deck
Card players sometimes get lazy, shuffling a deck fewer times than necessary to randomize the cards. Indeed, persistently sloppy shuffling can have a significant impact on play–an effect that experts (and gamblers) can exploit to their advantage. However, the problem lay not in the computer but with human expectations. Subsequent research showed that hands in […]
- Health & Medicine
Plot thickens for blood pressure drugs
A new study counters a recent report that diuretics taken for high blood pressure protect against heart problems better than newer, more expensive drugs.
- Math
Staying in Step
Late in the winter of 1665, an ailing Christiaan Huygens (1629–1695) was confined to his room for a few days. The Dutch physicist whiled away the hours of his confinement by closely observing and pondering the odd behavior of two pendulum clocks he had recently constructed. Huygens had obtained a patent on the first pendulum […]
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Discovery of bitter-taste gene is sweet
Scientists have found that variations in a gene explain why people differ in their ability to taste bitterness.
