News
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Not a Turn-On: Alleged X chromosome activator may be a dud
A gene that helps regulate X chromosome activity in mice doesn't work in people.
- Materials Science
Spinning Fine Threads: Silkworms coerced to make better silk
The caterpillars that spin commercial silk can make tougher or more elastic threads, depending on how fast they're forced to spin.
- Ecosystems
Tougher Weeds? Borrowed gene helps wild sunflower
Feeding concerns about developing superweeds, a test of sunflowers shows for the first time that a biologically engineered gene moving from a crop can give an advantage to wild relatives under naturalistic conditions.
- Health & Medicine
Toxin Trumped: New malaria vaccine protects mice
An experimental vaccine neutralizes a toxic molecule made by malaria-causing parasites.
- Physics
Scaling energy barriers to save data
Researchers demonstrate a promising new way to make semiconductor-based memory that doesn't erase when the power goes off.
- Earth
El Niño: It’s back!
An increase in ocean temperatures in the central Pacific heralds the onset of El Niño, whose effects should show up in the United States this fall.
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Malaria parasite reveals old age
The DNA of a malaria-causing parasite suggests it is at least 100,000 years old.
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Biological clock study challenged
A report disputes the controversial notion that bright light applied to skin can reset a person's biological clock.
- Health & Medicine
Worm genes take on bacterial foes
Creatures as simple as worms have an effective immune defense.
- Archaeology
Ancient birth brick emerges in Egypt
Investigations at a 3,700-year-old Egyptian town have yielded a painted brick that was used in childbirth rituals.
- Anthropology
Ancient populations were game for growth
Archaeological evidence of a Stone Age shift in dietary preferences, from slow to swift small game, suggests that the human population rose sharply sometime between 100,000 and 50,000 years ago.
- Animals
Slithering on Air: Flying snakes glide through the treetops
The paradise tree snake flies by flattening its body and slithering through the air.
