Uncategorized
- Astronomy
Rocky Finding: Evidence of extrasolar asteroid belt
Astronomers have obtained some of the best evidence yet for an asteroid belt beyond the solar system.
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19777
At least on Earth, rock impacts result in charging of the particles. In space, wouldn’t this have a great effect on the motion of the rocks? Stuart HoenigTucson, Ariz. According to researchers, it’s true that the electrostatic charging of space dust and rocks may affect the motions of small particles. However, little is known about […]
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- Health & Medicine
Better Blood: New tool removes agent of brain disease
Scientists have developed a device that filters from blood the mutant proteins that cause the human form of mad cow disease, an advance that may hold promise for increasing the safety of donated blood.
- Paleontology
Paleotrickery: A lengthy lineage for leaf-mimicking insects
Species in one group of insects have escaped the hungry eye of predators by looking like foliage and moving like swaying leaves for at least 47 million years, a new fossil find suggests.
- Tech
Loopy Light: Rings that delay photons may advance microchips
Chains of tiny, high-precision, light-conducting loops of silicon may open the door to using optical circuits to carry enormous data flows within computer chips.
- Health & Medicine
Bad to the Bone: Acid stoppers appear to have a downside
Popular acid-reducing drugs called proton-pump inhibitors may increase the risk of hip fractures in people over 50.
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19776
Without a corresponding study of bone densities, it’s not possible to determine whether the link between proton-pump inhibitors and increased fractures in people over age 50 is due to increased numbers of falls (dizziness, etc.) or to bone damage. It would be extremely helpful to try to tease out the cause behind this linkage. Dan […]
- Humans
Letters from the January 6, 2007, issue of Science News
Gone with the heat? “Feeling the heat of an extrasolar planet” (SN: 10/28/06, p. 285) made me wonder how long a gas planet is expected to survive when one of its faces is more than 1,000°C. The conventional model of our solar system assumes that gas planets can form and survive only in a cold […]
- Humans
When budgeting for quakes, dig deep
If earthquakes that struck the United States since 1900 are any guide, the nation can expect to suffer seismic damages of about $2.5 billion dollars each year in the future.
- Earth
Scraping the bottom
A survey of deep waters in western Lake Superior has revealed the tracks left by massive icebergs scraping bottom there during the last ice age.
- Earth
Glaciers give major boost to sea level
The ongoing disappearance of glaciers and other small ice masses worldwide makes a larger contribution to sea level rise than the melting of ice sheets on Greenland and Antarctica does.
