Uncategorized
- Animals
Retaking Flight: Some insects that didn’t use it didn’t lose it
Stick insects may have done what biologists once thought was impossible: lose something as complicated as a wing in the course of evolution but recover it millions of years later.
- Earth
Predicting geomagnetic storms
Recent observations with an Earth-orbiting spacecraft may provide new ways to predict when solar temper tantrums will cause the geomagnetic storms that disrupt communications systems on Earth and harm satellites.
- Humans
From the June 28, 1930, issue
MULTIPLE AILERONS When men first began to dream of flying like birds (which they have done ever since the legendary Daedalus), they watched the flight of birds, hoping to catch their trick and learn to imitate them. The many-faceted Leonardo used to spend hours and days watching and sketching pigeons. And when at last the […]
- Health & Medicine
Herbal Activity
The Alternative Medicine Foundation offers a searchable database that provides scientific and general information about the biochemical activity of a variety of herbs, from Achillea (Yarrow) to Ziziphus (Jujube). The entry for each herb includes warnings about dangers to human health and links to relevant abstracts in the scientific literature. Go to: http://www.herbmed.org
- Health & Medicine
Stroke protection: A little fish helps
As little as one serving of fish per month offers protection against the most common form of stroke.
- Ecosystems
Why didn’t the beetle cross the road?
Beetle populations confined to specific forest areas by roads seem to have lost some of their genetic diversity.
- Math
Super Bowls and Stock Markets
The Super Bowl “theory” links U.S. stock market performance to the results of the championship football game, held each January since 1967. It holds that if a team from the original National Football League wins the title, the stock market increases for the rest of the year, and if a team from the old American […]
- Health & Medicine
Drug protects mouse eggs from radiation
Mice protected by a drug from radiation-induced sterility have normal offspring.
- Health & Medicine
Cheap hypertension drug works best
An old-fashioned pill for preventing high blood pressure and some heart disease appears to work better than new, more expensive drugs.
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It’s a tough job, but native bees can do it
An organic watermelon field in California near remnants of wild land still had enough bees of North American species to pollinate a commercial crop, but habitat-poor farms didn't.
- Planetary Science
Mars reveals more frozen water
Planetary scientists have discovered ice near the edge of Mars' south polar cap.
- Archaeology
Old legend dies hard
People who first entered King Tutankhamen's tomb did not suffer from a legendary curse but instead lived long lives.
