Uncategorized
-
River dolphins can whistle, too, sort of
In the most elaborate attempt so far to eavesdrop on Brazil's pink river dolphins, researchers have detected what may be a counterpart to seafaring dolphins' whistles.
By Susan Milius -
Do parents with extra help goof off?
When researchers stepped in to help feed baby sparrows, the parents did not slack off but brought even more food.
By Susan Milius -
New robot frog gets into fights
Researchers have finally managed to build a robot frog that can provoke male frogs to attack.
By Susan Milius -
18964
Although the physiological basis and purpose of dreams may be uncertain, we need to recall that Freud was more interested in what his patients said about their dreams than in the dream content itself. Humans are inveterate interpreters. We are constantly reading our surroundings, our inner states, even our pasts and futures. Those interpretations often […]
By Science News -
Brains in Dreamland
Sigmund Freud's century-old dream theory gets a contrasting reception from two current neuroscientific accounts of how and why the brain generates dreams.
By Bruce Bower -
Nursing moms face meds dilemma
A research review yields a little advice and a lot of uncertainty for nursing mothers with mental disorders who may expose their babies to potential dangers if they take prescribed psychoactive drugs.
By Bruce Bower -
Medicinal mirth gets research rebuke
Little scientific evidence to date supports any of the purported physical health benefits of laughter and humor, a psychologist concludes.
By Bruce Bower - Health & Medicine
Chemotherapy leads to bone loss
In women with early-stage breast cancer, malfunctioning ovaries and significant bone loss can occur within 6 months of chemotherapy treatment.
- Health & Medicine
Inflammation linked to diabetes
Women who go on to develop diabetes seem to have signs of widespread, low-level inflammation years before they have symptoms of the disease.
-
From the August 8, 1931 issue
TWO ARISTOCRATIC LADIES EMERGE FROM RETIREMENT There is something about newly-emerged silkworm moths that makes one think of the ladies of Cathay or Cipangu, long ago and far away, clothed in silk spun by ancestors of todays silk worms. In the cover picture of this weeks Science News Letter, Cornelia Clarke has made an admirable […]
By Science News - Health & Medicine
Ancient Estrogen
A jawless fish ancestor may have revealed the most ancient of hormones and how current hormones evolved from it.
-
18963
I was distressed to read that Science News thinks there are no steroid hormone receptors in insects. Granted, their reproduction is not regulated by steroids, but ecdysone, the molting hormone, is certainly a steroid. There is some evidence that juvenile hormone, the hormone that regulates development and sometimes reproduction, acts through a steroidlike-receptor pathway. Other […]
By Science News