Uncategorized

  1. For geneticists, interference becomes an asset

    A new method of disrupting genes, called RNA interference, works in mouse cells.

    By John Travis
  2. Astronomy

    X-ray Data Reveal Black Holes Galore

    Using a sensitive, new X-ray telescope, astronomers have identified the origin of the high-energy part of the X-ray background and found that supermassive black holes at the cores of galaxies are far more numerous than visible-light surveys indicate.

    By Ron Cowen
  3. Math

    Fractal Roots and Artful Math

    The term “mathematical art” usually conjures up images of M.C. Escher’s endless staircases, Möbius-strip ants, and mind-boggling tilings. Or it might remind one of the intimate intertwining of mathematics and art during the Renaissance with the development of perspective painting and eye-teasing stagecraft. A view of the recent MathArt/ArtMath show at the Selby Gallery in […]

    By Ivars Peterson
  4. Math

    Fractal Roots and Artful Math

    The term “mathematical art” usually conjures up images of M.C. Escher’s endless staircases, Möbius-strip ants, and mind-boggling tilings. Or it might remind one of the intimate intertwining of mathematics and art during the Renaissance with the development of perspective painting and eye-teasing stagecraft. A view of the recent MathArt/ArtMath show at the Selby Gallery in […]

    By Ivars Peterson
  5. Humans

    Solar series wins award for Science News

    The Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society has given its 2002 popular writing award to Ron Cowen and Sid Perkins for a two-part series on cyclic variations in the sun's activity.

    By Julie Ann Miller
  6. Agriculture

    Moos, microbes, and methane

    A feed additive could reduce methane emissions from cows.

    By John Travis

  7. Ironing out underarm odor

    Chemicals that deprive bacteria of iron may improve deodorants.

    By John Travis

  8. Bacterial genes and cell scaffolding

    A bacterium may have revealed the origin of a key cell structure.

    By John Travis
  9. Astronomy

    Seeing Red: A cool revival of Hubble’s infrared camera

    New images provide a graphic demonstration that the Hubble Space Telescope's infrared vision has been restored.

    By Ron Cowen
  10. Health & Medicine

    Efficient Germ: Human body boosts power of cholera microbe

    Some genes in the cholera-causing bacterium Vibrio cholerae are activated and others are silenced when the microbe passes through the human gut, changes that make the bacterium more virulent.

    By Nathan Seppa
  11. Ecosystems

    Plight of the Iguanas: Hidden die-off followed Galápagos spill

    Residues of oil spilled in the Galapágos Islands in January 2001 may have caused a 60 percent decline in one island's colony of marine iguanas.

    By Susan Milius
  12. Health & Medicine

    Transplant Triumph: Cloned cow kidneys thrive for months

    Cow kidneys and other tissue made by cloning ward off immune rejection after transplantation into cows.

    By John Travis