News
- Health & Medicine
Olfactory cells aid spine healing in rats
Injections of olfactory ensheathing glial cells from the brain help severed spinal cords heal in rats.
By Nathan Seppa -
Good Readers May Get Perceptual Lift
The ability to hear and see rapidly changing stimuli may underlie reading skills, raising the possibility of new approaches to reading instruction.
By Bruce Bower -
Alcohol can induce fainting spells
Alcohol imbibed in modest quantities can disrupt the reflex that maintains blood pressure when a person stands up quickly, which may account for why some people faint when they down a few drinks and then stand up.
By Nathan Seppa -
Progestin adds to breast cancer risk
Women taking estrogen are more prone to get breast cancer if they are also taking the hormone progestin.
By Nathan Seppa -
Listen to the shapes
People use still-unspecified acoustic cues to discern the shapes of hidden, vibrating plates.
By Bruce Bower -
Tough talk for depressed husbands
Positive comments directed by depressed men to their wives often elicit negative responses from the women, a conversational style that may contribute to the men's mood problems.
By Bruce Bower - Animals
Hormone still rules no-tadpole frogs
Coqui frogs may skip the tadpole stage, but within the egg, they undergo a metamorphosis ruled by thyroid hormone.
By Susan Milius -
Brain cells work together to pay attention
Cells in the brain's cortex may coordinate their electrical activity as attention shifts from visual to tactile information.
By Bruce Bower - Earth
Hey polluters! This billboard’s for you
Motorists generally like and respond to personalized billboard messages about when an engine tune-up may be warranted.
By Janet Raloff - Health & Medicine
HIV sexual spread exploits immune sentinels
The virus that causes AIDS latches onto a protein called DC-SIGN to hitch a ride on immune cells in mucus membranes and spread through the body.
By John Travis - Health & Medicine
Cell transplants combat diabetes in mice
Scientists have successfully reversed diabetes in mice by harvesting immature pancreatic cells that make insulin from one mouse, growing them in culture, and transplanting them into a mouse with the disease, which then recedes.
By Nathan Seppa - Planetary Science
Meteoric wallop may have diversified life
A new study suggests that the evolutionary burst on Earth some 540 million years ago occurred around the time that cosmic debris began pummeling our planet at an increasing rate.
By Ron Cowen