Uncategorized
- Paleontology
Dino Dwarf: Island living may have led to ancient downsizing
Fossils unearthed at a German quarry hint that members of one species of dinosaur that lived in the region about 152 million years ago evolved to be abnormally small because of the constraints of its island ecosystem.
By Sid Perkins - Physics
Piddly Puddle Peril: Little water pools foil road friction
Physicists have proposed an explanation for how even slight wetness can cut road-to-rubber friction.
By Peter Weiss - Plants
Give and Take: Plant parasites dole out genes while stealing nutrients
New evidence suggests that parasitic plants can transfer their own genes into host plants.
- Health & Medicine
Vaccine Stretch: Smaller dose packs punch against flu
A fraction of the standard dose of flu vaccine appears to grant people immunity to influenza if injected into the skin rather than in the muscle of the upper arm.
By David Shiga - Animals
Elephant Voices
Elephants are highly social animals and have a well-developed method of communicating with each other. For nearly 30 years, scientists at a national park in Kenya have been studying elephants and their behavior. The researchers have found that these intelligent beasts use more than 70 kinds of vocal sounds and 160 different visual and tactile […]
By Science News - Earth
DDT linked to miscarriages
A study of Chinese women finds that the pesticide DDT can not only affect menstrual cycles but also foster miscarriages very early in pregnancy.
By Janet Raloff - Health & Medicine
Uranium, the newest ‘hormone’
Animal experiments indicate that waterborne uranium can mimic the activity of estrogen, a female sex hormone.
By Janet Raloff - Earth
Can phthalates subtly alter boys?
Researchers have linked a mom's exposure to phthalates with a genital marker in boys suggesting a subtle feminization of their reproductive organs.
By Janet Raloff -
19481
This article seems to confuse triggers with long-term contributing factors. Traffic might just cause small peaks in stress that trigger only heart attacks that would have otherwise happened days later. To recommend staying out of traffic, research would need to show that people regularly in traffic are more likely to have heart attacks or have […]
By Science News - Health & Medicine
Heavy traffic may trigger heart attacks
Exposure to traffic can dramatically increase a person's risk of having a heart attack soon afterward.
- Planetary Science
Riddles on Titan
Two puzzles have emerged from the Cassini spacecraft's first close flyby of Saturn's largest moon, Titan.
By Ron Cowen - Physics
Particle hunt off, collider comes down
Despite tantalizing, last-minute hints of a long-sought, mass-giving particle called the Higgs boson, dismantling of the Large Electron-Positron collider has begun.
By Science News