Feature
- Health & Medicine
Palm-Nut Problem
The ancient custom of chewing areca nuts is getting more popular as young Asians take up the habit, but betel-nut chewing has been linked to several types of oral cancer.
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Proteins in the Stretch
Scientists are for the first time getting a feel for how proteins fold and unfold.
- Health & Medicine
Food Colorings
Many deeply hued plant pigments appear to offer health benefits, from fighting heart disease and obesity to preserving memory.
- Tech
Frankenstein’s Chips
As evidence mounts that drug-safety trials can miss dangerous effects, scientists are building living, miniature models of animals and people to enhance drug and chemical tests.
- Earth
Hidden Canyons
Among Earth's unsung geological masterpieces are undersea canyons, some of which stretch hundreds of kilometers and can be deep enough to hold skyscrapers.
- Materials Science
Concrete Nation
From ultrahigh-performance concrete that bends like metal to concrete blocks that transmit light, scientists are pushing the physical and architectural limits of this ubiquitous construction material.
- Humans
Science News of the Year 2004
A review of important scientific achievements reported in Science News during the year 2004.
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- Animals
Song Fights
Birds settle many of their disputes by some rough-and-tough singing bouts, and recording equipment now lets researchers pick a song fight, too.
- Physics
An Electron Runs through It
Now that physicists can observe electrons beneath the surface of microchips, they have uncovered electron-flow patterns that are both surprising and visually startling, as well as new details of electron behavior that may lead to faster electronics and quantum computing.
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Sit, Stay, Speak
If dogs could verbally comment on the scientific study of canine minds and how they really think, it might sound something like this.
- Astronomy
Explosive Tales
Four hundred years after the explosion of the Kepler supernova, the last such stellar eruption in our galaxy, astronomers have examined the supernova's remnant with state-of-the-art telescopes that view it in infrared, optical, and X-ray light.
