Reviews & Previews
Science Visualized
Ecosystems
Online map tracks forest shifts from space
By layering more than 650,000 satellite images onto a Google map, researchers have created a new tool to track forest cover.
Notebook
Paleontology
Oldest bug bonk
Preserved as fossils, two insects remain caught in the act 165 million years later.
Features
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Heal thy neighbor
As antidepressants and other drugs gradually replace psychotherapy in the United States, new forms of the talking cure are growing in popularity in developing countries ravaged by civil war and poverty.
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Global neuro lab
With more than 50 million users, the brain-training website Lumosity is giving scientists access to an enormous collection of cognitive performance data. Mining the dataset could be the first step toward a new kind of neuroscience.
More Stories from the December 14, 2013 issue
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Earth
Greenhouse gas injections may unleash earthquakes
Plans to pump carbon dioxide into the ground to mitigate climate change could create other problems.
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LifeNewborns’ weak immunity may allow helpful bacteria to gain a foothold
Though infant immune systems raise risk of infection, they also allow good microbes into the body, study in mice shows.
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LifeImmune system follows circadian clock
Mice with jet lag have boosted supply of cells linked to inflammation.
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Health & MedicineMarrow transplant for child with leukemia cures allergy
A bone marrow transplant rid one child of his blood cancer and also an immune reaction to peanuts.
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LifePenguin’s flight from Antarctica clocked
A climate shift millions of years ago may have forced the birds’ ancestors to flee to warmer digs.
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Neuroscience
Bacteria may transfer mom’s stress to fetus
Expecting mice under psychological pressure passed different mix of microbes to their pups, affecting the babies’ brains.
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AnimalsSea slug mating features a stab in the head
Newly discovered hermaphroditic sea slug deploys specialized needle-thin organ for injections near the eyes.
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PhysicsSingle atoms hold on to information
Minutes-long data storage by individual atoms beats previous record of tiny fraction of a second.
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OceansExtremely salty water is at least 100 million years old
Supersaline sediments off East Coast shed light on Atlantic Ocean’s early history.
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HumansBigger numbers, not better brains, smarten human cultures
An experiment using a computer game supports the idea that big populations drove the evolution of complex human cultures.
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Health & MedicinePrion mutation yields disease marked by diarrhea
Rare prion ailment starts in adulthood, attacking the gut before brain.
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Quantum Physics
Quantum information storage that lasts and lasts
Physicists have stored a snippet of quantum information at room temperature for more than 1,000 times the previous record.
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Physics
Single photon detected but not destroyed
Researchers build first instrument that can witness the passage of a light particle without absorbing it.
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GeneticsDogs’ origins lie in Europe
First domesticated canines did not live in China or Middle East, a study of mitochondrial DNA finds.
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Health & Medicine
Changes in malaria parasite may make Africans more susceptible
Ominous signals are emerging simultaneously in population studies and under the microscope that Plasmodium vivax, a malaria parasite well known in Asia and Latin America, may have found a way to infect Africans.
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EarthFire may smolder under Antarctic ice
Quakes hint at moving magma that could influence glacial flow.
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AnthropologyHuman ancestors threw stone-tipped spears at prey
African discoveries show that hunting weapons thrown from a distance appeared by 279,000 years ago.
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Science & SocietyBest science to see and hear
Science Studio bills itself as “a collection of the best science multimedia on the web.
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SpaceMaking the most of zero gravity
Astronaut and author Chris Hadfield discusses life in, and after, space.
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Physics
New Atomic Accelerator
This excerpt from the December 14, 1963, issue of Science News Letter talks about how the atom smashers at Argonne National Lab have evolved.
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EarthCryovolcano
An ice volcano that erupts slurries of volatile compounds such as water or methane instead of lava.
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ComputingFastest supercomputers
The new list of the world’s fastest computers, now in its 20th year, has China’s Tianhe-2 on top with a processing speed of 33.9 petaflops — or quadrillions of calculations per second.