News
- Space
Saturn moons spied from the side
Cassini captures Titan and Dione against the sixth planet’s rings.
By Nadia Drake - Paleontology
Early animals dethroned
Cell division patterns in controversial Chinese fossils place them outside the animal kingdom.
- Ecosystems
Groundwater dropping globally
Nine-year record collected from orbit finds supply dropping mostly due to agriculture.
By Devin Powell - Life
Pigeons rival primates in number task
Trained on one-two-three, the birds can apply the rule of numerical order to such lofty figures as five and nine.
By Susan Milius - Humans
Network analysis predicts drug side effects
A computer technique can foresee adverse events before medications are widely prescribed.
- Life
Drugs activate dormant gene
A compound that blocks DNA unwinding can spur production of a critical brain protein in mice, leading to hope for a therapy for Angelman syndrome.
- Astronomy
Toasty planets circle stellar heart
Roasted remains orbit former red giant.
By Nadia Drake - Space
First Earth-sized planets netted
The Kepler space telescope gets one step closer to its mission of discovering habitable worlds by finding two orbs of terrestrial proportions orbiting a distant sunlike star.
By Nadia Drake - Humans
Fewer fires in Africa these days
How flames spread, not how frequently people start them, controls burning on the continent.
- Life
BPA sends false signals to female hearts
The ingredient of some plastics and food packaging can interfere with cardiac rhythm at surprisingly low concentrations.
By Janet Raloff -
- Humans
Smells like a bear raid
Analysis of stock trading data suggests an effort to manipulate the market in 2007.