More Stories from the July 14, 2007 issue
- Health & Medicine
Mouse method turns skin cells to stem cells
Reprogrammed mouse skin cells that act as stem cells may offer an alternative for research involving embryos.
- Planetary Science
Dust delays Martian rover
A dust storm has delayed the descent of the Mars rover Opportunity into Victoria crater.
- Chemistry
Gooey solution to a sticky problem
A new, gooey, and potentially useful protein has been extracted from the bodies of jellyfish that overpopulate the seas around Japan.
- Health & Medicine
Hepatitis B drug creates HIV resistance
A hepatitis B drug spurs resistance to HIV drugs in people infected with both diseases.
- Earth
As the last ice age waned, a great lake was born
Lake Agassiz, a huge and now vanished freshwater lake, formed almost 14,000 years ago, toward the end of the last ice age.
- Tech
More bang for the biofuel buck
Microbes that ferment glycerol to ethanol could add an economically valuable new ingredient to the biofuel industry.
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Adding to nature’s repertoire
Modified mouse cells make proteins that include synthetic amino acids in addition to the 20 natural ones.
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Anemone reveals complex past
The starlet sea anemone, a primitive creature with ancient evolutionary roots, has a surprisingly complex genome.
- Health & Medicine
Tumor Suicide: Gene therapy makes cancer cells self-destruct
Microscopic bubbles of fat that deliver a suicide gene to tumor cells show success in treating pancreatic cancer in mice.
- Ecosystems
Sea Change: People have affected what penguins eat
Adélie penguins in Antarctica significantly changed their eating habits about 200 years ago, after whaling and other human activities transformed the ocean ecosystem.
- Earth
E-Waste Hazards: Chinese gear recyclers absorb toxic chemicals
People who live in an area of China where electronic devices are dismantled and recycled, as well as villagers 50 kilometers away, have high concentrations of flame retardants in their blood.
- Health & Medicine
Smoke This: Parkinson’s is rarer among tobacco users
Life-long smoking cuts the chance of getting Parkinson's disease by about half.
- Astronomy
Shattering Find? Comet fragments show surprising uniformity
Close observations of fragments of a comet indicate that its interior was remarkably similar to its surface, meaning that repeated solar heating didn't much change its outer layers.
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Forget About It: How the brain suppresses unwanted memories
Two newly discovered neural processes give people the ability to intentionally forget upsetting memories.
- Physics
Pulling Strings: Stretching proteins can reveal how they fold
Unfolding a single protein by pulling on its ends reveals the molecular forces that make it fold up.
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- Health & Medicine
Brain Attack
Although they have explored many promising ideas, scientists are finding it difficult to develop new treatments to limit the damage caused by ischemic strokes.
- Humans
Letters from the July 14, 2007, issue of Science News
At least a few years to prepare “Northern Exposure: The inhospitable side of the galaxy?” (SN: 4/21/07, p. 244) posits that every 64 million years a mass die-off occurs due to increased cosmic rays. When will the cosmic rays again be at their maximum? Robert RichardsMetairie, La. The article failed to mention when the next […]
