News
- Plants
Wind Highways: Mosses, lichens travel along aerial paths
Invisible freeways of wind may account for the similarity of plant species on islands that lie thousands of kilometers apart.
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Pot on the Spot: Marijuana’s risks become blurrier
A research review challenges the assumption that scientists have demonstrated a causal link between teenage marijuana use and later psychological and behavioral problems.
- Astronomy
Old Stars Even Older: Determining a new age for the universe
Using particles accelerators to mimic the conditions inside stars, two independent research groups have found evidence that the most-ancient known stars are about a billion years older than astronomers had estimated.
- Paleontology
Rare English bits are oldest known charcoal
Analyses of small black chunks of material extracted from 420-million-year-old rocks found along the England-Wales border suggest that they're remnants of the earliest known wildfire.
- Archaeology
Guatemalan sites yield Maya insights
Excavations at three archaeological sites in Guatemala have provided new insights into both the early and late stages of ancient Maya civilization.
- Astronomy
Before the big one hits
The next time you hear about an asteroid or comet about to hit Earth, you can go to a new Internet site to find out where the collision will be and how much damage will occur.
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Neurons slow down for placebo effect
A placebo treatment temporarily quelled symptoms of Parkinson's disease in six people by decreasing the electrical activity of brain cells crucial to the condition.
- Health & Medicine
Herbal erection pills may be spiked
Some pills marketed as herbal remedies for erectile dysfunction contain drugs that should be available only by prescription.
- Earth
Filtered air cuts down mutations
Microscopic particles in the air may mutate the DNA of sperm.
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Two egg cells make fatherless mouse
By fusing two egg cells, researchers have created a mouse with no father.
- Astronomy
Windy endeavor
In early April, an Earth-orbiting satellite closed its doors after more than 2 years of collecting ions from the solar wind.
- Agriculture
Rethinking Refuges? Drifting pollen may bring earlier pest resistance to bioengineered crops
Pollen wafting from bioengineered corn to traditional varieties may be undermining the fight to keep pests from evolving resistance to pesticides.
