Feature
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Gut Check
The normal microbial inhabitants of our intestines do a lot for their host.
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Repeat After Me
New research suggests that the ability to infer the thoughts and feelings of others grows out of a capacity for imitation exhibited by human infants and perhaps by other animals, as well.
- Astronomy
Gorgeous Gas
Beyond their undeniable beauty, images of nearby, starlit clouds of gas and dust, known as HeII nebulae, may reveal properties of the very first stars in the universe.
- Earth
Patterns from Nowhere
Scientists are developing geophysical models that may explain the polygonal patterns that appear in and on the ground in remote regions of the Arctic, Antarctica, and possibly the surface of Mars.
- Chemistry
Plastic Electric
Scientists are finding new ways to improve the molecular order and electrical conductivity of a commercially important conducting plastic.
- Earth
The Fires Below
Underground coal fires help shape the landscape on many scales and in many ways, some transient and some long-lasting.
- Health & Medicine
Unproven Elixir
For aging men with low testosterone, hormone replacement may stall or counteract some common declines that come with age, but it'll take years to determine whether the treatment is doing most men more good than harm.
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Yikes! The Lichens Went Flying
Tales from the dark (and frequently crunchy) side of biodiversity.
- Physics
Seeking the Mother of All Matter
World's mightiest particle collider may transform less-than-nothing into a primordial something.
- Plants
Any Hope for Old Chestnuts?
Next year will mark the 100th anniversary of the discovery of chestnut blight in the United States, but enthusiasts still haven't given up hope of restoring American chestnut forests.
- Computing
Minding Your Business
By means of novel sensors and mathematical models, scientists are teaching the basics of human social interactions to computers, which should ease the ever-expanding collaboration between people and machines.
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A Rocky Start
A new origin-of-life theory holds that life began within the confines of iron sulfide rocks surrounding hydrothermal vents at the ocean bottom.
