Uncategorized
- Health & Medicine
Electrodes dupe brain into feeling touch
Stimulating the right neuron at the right time gave monkeys the sensation of contact.
- Animals
Dogs pick up robots’ social cues
Dogs were more likely to pay attention to a PeopleBot robot — a machine with a laptop head and Mickey Mouse–style hands — after watching it walk, talk and shake hands with humans.
- Science & Society
Scarcity
Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir explain why having too little means so much.
- Science & Society
Funding slide
U.S. federal spending on science has decreased sharply since 2010. Scientists are feeling the crunch.
- Astronomy
Galaxy’s petal-like structures came from collision
A cosmic crash of two huge masses of stars, gas and dust probably gave way to a new galactic structure with both young and old star clusters.
- Astronomy
Water seen in rubble around star
Hubble sees debris that was part of an asteroid with the ingredients for habitable planets.
- Anthropology
Ancient farmers, foragers kept genes to themselves
Ancient DNA and diet clues suggest how farmers and hunter-gathers contributed to modern Europeans’ genetic profiles.
- Math
Twin primes
Mathematicians have conjectured since Euclid’s time that there are infinite pairs of prime numbers.
- Health & Medicine
Highlights from annual meeting of infectious disease specialists
Heartburn pills increase risk of pneumonia, a better catheter and more were presented October 2-6, 2013 at ID Week in San Francisco.
- Health & Medicine
Old drug may have new trick
Parkinson’s medication helps mice with condition that mimics MS.
- Climate
Tropics to launch into uncharted climate territory by 2038
Global temperatures will take a permanent leap above historical bounds by 2047 if greenhouse gas emissions continue unabated, a simulation suggests.
- Chemistry
Simulating reactions in cyberspace earns Nobel Prize in chemistry
Computer models that meld quantum and classical calculations have earned three scientists the 2013 Nobel Prize in chemistry.
