More Stories from the January 26, 2008 issue
- Animals
Fenced-off trees drop their friends
Protecting acacia trees from large, tree-munching animals sets off a chain of events that ends up ruining the trees' partnership with their bodyguard ants.
- Paleontology
Life explodes twice
The Ediacaran fauna were as varied as all animals in existence today and, more impressively, as in the Cambrian, report paleontologists.
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Antidepressants get overly positive spin
Studies finding beneficial effects of antidepressant drugs for depressed patients get published far more often than do studies that uncover no antidepressant benefits.
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9/11 attacks stoked U.S. heart ailments
People who experienced serious stress reactions shortly after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks also displayed markedly elevated rates of new heart and blood vessel ailments over the next 3 years.
- Astronomy
Case of the misshapen disk
A deformed disk around a young star may have gotten its swept-back appearance as the result of a collision with a dense gas cloud.
- Astronomy
Gravity at play: A double lens
Astronomers have discovered an extraordinarily rare double cosmic mirage.
- Astronomy
Four’s a crowd
Astronomers have found a quartet of stars packed into a region smaller than Jupiter's orbit around the sun.
- Planetary Science
Mercury, As Never Seen Before: MESSENGER visits innermost planet
The first spacecraft to visit Mercury in 33 years imaged 25 percent of the crater-pocked surface that had never before been seen close-up.
- Ecosystems
Big Foot: Eco-footprints of rich dwarf poor nations’ debt
The first global accounting finds rich and middle-income nations stomping heavy footprints on poorer ones.
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Do-It-Yourself DNA: Scientists assemble first synthetic genome
Assembly of the first human-made microbial genome could pave the way for making microbes with synthetic DNA.
- Physics
Scanner Darkly: Tiny venetian blinds enhance radiography
Microscopic gratings that select scattered X rays might improve luggage screening and cancer detection.
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Sickness and Schizophrenia: Psychotic ills tied to previous infections
Two new studies provide evidence for the longstanding suspicion that certain viral infections early in life promote the development of schizophrenia and related psychotic disorders.
- Health & Medicine
Bariatric Reversal: Stomach surgery curbs some patients’ diabetes
Weight-loss stomach surgery in obese people with type 2 diabetes sends the disease into remission in some patients.
- Physics
Supercool, and Strange
Scientists tracking H2O's highs and lows are finding new clues as to how and why the familiar substance is so odd. Recent research, for example, suggests that water may exist in two distinct liquid phases at ultralow temperatures.
- Materials Science
Life in Print
Tissues printed with an ink-jet could provide patches for damaged organs, new cell-based materials for drug testing, new ways to probe cellular communication, living sensors, or even fuel cell–type batteries.
- Humans
Letters from the January 26, 2008, issue of Science News
Bad medicine? In “Unseen Risk: Lifestyle, physical problems may underlie psoriasis link to early mortality” (SN: 12/22&29/07, p. 389), the definition of patients with severe psoriasis as those needing systemic drugs raises the question whether treatment itself may be linked to early mortality. The journal article cited in the story indicates that some systemic treatments […]
