News
- Science & Society
Slight boost for U.S. climate research funding
While most science funding remains flat lined in President Obama’s 2015 budget, climate change research gets an increase.
- Astronomy
Behemoth star destroys potential solar systems
A massive star in the Orion Nebula is evaporating disks surrounding young stars in its neighborhood but some disks mysteriously manage to survive.
- Archaeology
Roman gladiator school digitally rebuilt
Imaging techniques unveil a 1,900-year-old Roman gladiators’ training center that’s buried beneath a site in Austria.
- Health & Medicine
Experimental drug might get the salt out
Tests in people and rats show sodium levels in blood drop as drug candidate limits the body’s salt absorption.
- Paleontology
Fossil whale skull hints at echolocation’s origins
Ancestors of toothed whales used echolocation as early as 34 million years ago, analysis of a new fossil skull suggests.
- Neuroscience
Brain chemicals help worms live long and prosper
Serotonin and dopamine accompany long lives in C. elegans worms under caloric restriction.
- Life
Acid-bath method for making stem cells under fire
No one has been able to reproduce a new technique for creating stem cells called STAP cells, leading some researchers to call for the retraction of the original research papers.
- Animals
Elephants can tell men’s voices from women’s
Amboseli elephants may pick out age and gender — and even distinguish between languages — when listening to human voices.
- Materials Science
Phosphorene introduced as graphene alternative
Sheets of ultrathin phosphorus could lead to faster semiconductor electronics.
- Ecosystems
City spiders may spin low-vibe webs
Spider webs built on human-made materials have less background bounce than those built on trees and other natural surfaces, which might shrink the arachnid’s hunting success.
- Life
Giant zombie virus pulled from permafrost
After lying dormant in Siberian permafrost for 30,000 years, the largest virus ever discovered is just as deadly as it was when mammoths roamed the Earth.
- Astronomy
Comets collide around young star
Astronomers detect clouds of carbon monoxide around Beta Pictoris that could help lead to the discovery of new planets.
