News
- Health & Medicine
Obesity messes with the brain
Excess weight may compromise memory and concentration, possibly by spurring inflammation that damages white matter.
By Janet Raloff - Chemistry
Silicene: It could be the new graphene
Single-layer sheets of silicon might have electronic applications.
By Devin Powell - Earth
Global gale warning
Over the world’s oceans, the strongest winds may be getting more powerful, a new study shows.
- Humans
Go east, ancient tool makers
New finds put African hand ax makers in India as early as 1.5 million years ago.
By Bruce Bower - Humans
A new glimpse at the earliest Americans
Along a stream in central Texas, archaeologists have found a campsite occupied at the tail end of the Ice Age.
- Physics
Diamond could store quantum information
A new technique would use flaws in crystal structure to hold data.
By Devin Powell - Health & Medicine
Gene therapy for Parkinson’s advances
Brain surgery to insert genetic cargo improves movement in some patients, a study shows.
By Nathan Seppa - Life
Brain chemical influences sexual preference in mice
Males lacking the neurotransmitter serotonin court both sexes equally, researchers are surprised to find.
- Life
Who felt it not, smelt it not
A genetic defect in a crucial protein stops both pain and smells from reaching the brain.
- Life
Fruit-eating fish does far-flung forestry
Overfishing may be robbing trees in the Amazonian floodplain of vital seed dispersers.
By Susan Milius - Space
Laser proposed to deflect space junk
A ground-based device would use light to push debris off a collision course.
By Ron Cowen - Plants
From a mismatch in growth, a flower blooms
Scientists reveal the forces at work in the blossoming of a lily.