Uncategorized

  1. Plants

    Trees dim the light on spring flowers

    Early spring flowers and the sugar maples they grow under use different alarm clocks to get going in the spring, which can make life hard for the flowers in northern forests.

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  2. Health & Medicine

    Pulse pressure linked to dialysis death rate

    People on kidney dialysis who have high pulse pressure—the difference between the top and bottom numbers on a blood pressure reading—seem to be at a greater risk of dying than those with low pulse pressure.

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  3. Immune cells carry concealed weapons

    Scientists propose that protein-cleaving enzymes called proteases are the real microbe destroyers in bacteria-killing cells called neutrophils.

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  4. 19056

    In this article John L. Hubisz mentions that his research shows that 80 percent of elementary school teachers have never taken a physical science course yet are required to teach physical concepts. Disturbing as this is, the larger problem would seem to be parents who home school and have never taken the classes necessary to […]

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  5. Humans

    Web site debuts on junior high science

    A new Web site reviews the accuracy of commonly used middle school physical science books and offers tips and assistance for teachers working from those texts.

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  6. Math

    Tricky Dice Revisited

    The game involves a set of four cubic dice, each one numbered differently. You let your opponent pick any one of the four dice. You choose one of the remaining three. Each player tosses his or her die, and the higher number wins. Amazingly, in a game involving 10 or more turns, you will nearly […]

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  7. Math

    Tricky Dice Revisited

    The game involves a set of four cubic dice, each one numbered differently. You let your opponent pick any one of the four dice. You choose one of the remaining three. Each player tosses his or her die, and the higher number wins. Amazingly, in a game involving 10 or more turns, you will nearly […]

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  8. 19055

    Shame on Nature for saying, “the evidence available is not sufficient to justify the publication of the original paper.” The fact that transgenes get into maize is cause for caution. The agribusiness conglomerates are spending millions to stifle any intelligent debate about the risks and benefits of genetically engineered crops and modern chemicals. Without information […]

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  9. Agriculture

    Journal disowns transgene report

    The journal Nature now says it shouldn't have published a report that genetically engineered corn is leaking exotic genes into the traditional maize crops of Mexico.

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  10. Earth

    Stemming the Tide

    New approaches to stopping the introduction by ships of invasive species to North American waters are beginning to show promise but have a long way to go.

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  11. Chemistry

    The True Sweet Science

    New techniques and tools are helping scientists elucidate the roles that complex sugars play in the human body and in drug manufacturing.

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  12. From the April 9, 1932 issue

    SPIDERS’ EGGS FORM PATTERN LIKE MOSAIC OF PEBBLES Like a rough mosaic of pebbles is the array of spider’s eggs photographed by Cornelia Clarke and reproduced on the cover of this week’s Science News Letter. Although smaller than small pinheads, the enlarging lens brought the eggs up to such apparent size that they were guessed […]

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