Uncategorized
- Paleontology
Fossil whale skull hints at echolocation’s origins
Ancestors of toothed whales used echolocation as early as 34 million years ago, analysis of a new fossil skull suggests.
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- Neuroscience
Pianists learn better by playing
Pianists’ muscle memory helped them recognize incorrect notes.
- Science & Society
Flu drug research takes Intel STS top honors
A teenager’s computer analyses that identified six potential new flu-fighting compounds claimed first place at the 2014 Intel Science Talent Search.
- Animals
Chimps catch people’s yawns in sign of flexible empathy
Chimpanzees may show humanlike empathy, as evidenced by their contagious yawning.
- Neuroscience
Brain chemicals help worms live long and prosper
Serotonin and dopamine accompany long lives in C. elegans worms under caloric restriction.
- Health & Medicine
Second wave of bird flu ups pandemic worries
The H7N9 avian influenza virus, which first appeared in 2013, is sweeping China with a second, larger wave of illness.
- Life
Acid-bath method for making stem cells under fire
No one has been able to reproduce a new technique for creating stem cells called STAP cells, leading some researchers to call for the retraction of the original research papers.
- Planetary Science
Feedback
Readers respond to a special report on neuroscience and discuss moon dust.
- Health & Medicine
MS milder when patients begin with higher vitamin D levels
Multiple sclerosis patients with low concentrations of vitamin D early in their disease have more nerve damage several years later.
- Animals
Elephants can tell men’s voices from women’s
Amboseli elephants may pick out age and gender — and even distinguish between languages — when listening to human voices.
- Physics
Shifting grains may explain earthquake lightning
Mysterious lightning before or during earthquakes could get its spark from underground shifting.
