News
- Earth
Nanosponges: Plastic particles pick up pollutants
Nanometer-scale polymer particles can extract pollutants from contaminated soil.
- Earth
Catching Waves: Ocean-surface changes may mark tsunamis
A new theoretical model that describes a tsunami's interaction with winds may explain enigmatic observations associated with the waves and could lead to a technique for spotting them long before they hit shore.
- Ecosystems
Bird Dilemma: More seabirds killed when boats discard fewer fish
A long-term study of great skuas shows that when fishing fleets discard less fish, birds that scavenge for waste make up for the loss by increasing attacks on other seabirds.
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Neural Aging Walks Tall: Aerobic activity fuels elderly brains, minds
Moderate amounts of regular walking improve brain function and attention in formerly sedentary seniors.
- Physics
Candy Science: M&Ms pack more tightly than spheres
Squashed or stretched versions of spheres snuggle together more tightly than randomly packed spheres do.
- Animals
Flesh Eaters: Bees that strip carrion also take wasp young
A South American bee that ignores flowers and collects carrion from carcasses has an unexpected taste for live, abandoned wasp young.
- Anthropology
Some Primates’ Sheltered Lives: Baboons, chimps enter the realm of cave
In separate studies, researchers have gathered the first systematic evidence showing that baboons and chimpanzees regularly use caves, a behavior many anthropologists have attributed only to people and our direct ancestors.
- Health & Medicine
Pregnancy Alert: Proteins may predict preeclampsia
Blood concentrations of two proteins that affect blood vessel growth appear to foretell the pregnancy condition known as preeclampsia.
- Paleontology
Early Flight? Winged insects appear surprisingly ancient
New analyses of a fossil suggest that winged insects may have emerged as early as 400 million years ago.
- Tech
Snappy DNA: Long strand folds into octahedron
By harnessing the self-assembling properties of DNA, researchers coerced a single strand of the genetic material to assume the shape of an octahedron.
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Tailoring Therapies: Cloned human embryo provides stem cells
Scientists have for the first time carried test-tube cloning of a human embryo to the stage at which it can yield stem cells.
- Anthropology
European find gets Stone Age date
A new radiocarbon analysis indicates that a skeleton found more than a century ago in an Italian cave dates to around 26,400 to 23,200 years ago.
