News
- Earth
Pack Rat Piles: Rodent rubbish provides ice age thermometer
Analyses of fossilized plant remnants collected by pack rats reveal that the Grand Canyon was much cooler than previously thought during the latter part of the last ice age.
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- Earth
Organic Choice: Pesticides vanish from body after change in diet
Children can eliminate their bodies' loads of agricultural pesticides by eating organically grown products.
- Animals
Balls of Fire: Bees carefully cook invaders to death
Honeybees that defend their colonies by killing wasps with body heat come within 5 degrees C of cooking themselves in the process.
- Earth
Dim View: Darkening skies a regional phenomenon
The decline in the solar radiation reaching Earth's surface in the latter half of the 20th century turns out to have been mostly a regional phenomenon.
- Planetary Science
Fresh Mars: Craft views new gullies, craters, and landslides
A comparison of images taken just a few years apart by a Mars orbiting spacecraft reveals recent landslides, freshly carved gullies, and a 20-meter-wide crater gouged in the planet's surface no earlier than 25 years ago.
- Earth
Steep Degrade Ahead: Road salt threatens waters in Northeast
Using road salt to clear icy highways in the northeastern United States is increasingly tainting streams throughout the region.
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Meds Alert: Old schizophrenia drug stands up to new ones
A new, much-touted generation of antipsychotic drugs generally yields no more improvement in people with schizophrenia than an older, cheaper antipsychotic medication does.
- Humans
Docs shy away from telling kids they’re heavy
A major study has found that doctors don't routinely discuss a child's weight problems with the family, and that the younger the child the less likely the topic will come up.
- Earth
Liquid-detergent packets threaten children’s eyes
Sealed bags containing liquid detergent for single loads of laundry may be convenient, but if squeezed, they're liable to burst and spray their caustic contents into people's eyes.
- Anthropology
Genes tied to recent brain evolution
Two genes already known to influence brain size have undergone relatively recent, survival-enhancing modifications in people and appear to be still evolving.
- Planetary Science
Icy world found inside asteroid
New observations of Ceres, the largest known asteroid, hint that frozen water may account for as much as 25 percent of its interior.
