News
- Tech
Nervy chip may open window into brain
Researchers have built a simple circuit that blends living neurons with silicon-based transistors.
- Health & Medicine
Oceans apart, but surgery succeeds
A French group performed the first transatlantic operation when surgeons in New York controlled a robot in Strasbourg, France, which removed a woman's gall bladder.
- Health & Medicine
For a change, infection stymies HIV
A hepatitis-like virus that causes no known diseases seems to help people stave off the progression of HIV, the AIDS virus.
- Earth
Rain of foreign dust fuels red tides
Soil particles from Africa, raining out from clouds over the Americas, may trigger the first steps that lead to toxic red-tide algal blooms off Florida.
- Earth
EU moves against flame retardants
The European Union has provisionally voted to ban the use and importation of nearly all members of a family of flame retardants known as polybrominated diphenyl ethers.
- Earth
Where’s the smoke from the N.Y. fires?
Analyses of smoke from the destroyed World Trade Center towers indicated little risk that the fires would cause significant health effects for cleanup crews and city residents.
- Anthropology
Humans in eastern Asia show ancient roots
Human ancestors lived in northeastern Asia about 1.36 million years ago, making it the oldest confirmed occupation site in eastern Asia.
- Health & Medicine
Acacia-tree extract fights cancer in mice
Compounds called avicins extracted from Acacia victoriae, an Australian desert tree, inhibit inflammation and cancer in test-tube and mouse studies.
- Health & Medicine
Germs can survive weeks on fabrics, plastic
Soft, dry surfaces in hospitals can harbor live germs for more than a month.
- Health & Medicine
Blood vessels (sans blood) shape organs
Even before they begin to carry blood, blood vessels provide signals that help spark the development of organs such as the liver.
- Animals
Meerkat pups grow fatter with extra adults
Meerkat pups growing up in large, cooperative groups are heftier because there are more adults to entreat for food.
- Anthropology
Isotopes reveal sources of ancient timbers
Isotopic analysis of architectural timbers from ancient dwellings in the U.S. Southwest has shown from which distant forests the massive logs came.
