More Stories from the March 3, 2007 issue
- Chemistry
Lighting up for uranium
A portable sensor could make it possible to rapidly detect environmental uranium contamination.
- Anthropology
New age for ancient Americans
New radiocarbon dates indicate that the Clovis people, long considered the first well-documented settlers of the New World, inhabited North America considerably later and for a much shorter time than previously thought.
- Health & Medicine
How antipsychotic drugs can cause weight gain
A study of mice has identified a biological mechanism by which medications called atypical antipsychotics cause people to gain weight.
- Physics
Breaking a molecule’s mirror image
The theory of entanglement explains a newly observed behavior in a symmetrical hydrogen molecule: When the molecule fractures, the directions in which its constituent particles move are not always random.
- Health & Medicine
Fungus produces cancer drug
Several varieties of fungi that attack hazelnuts produce high quantities of the popular cancer drug paclitaxel.
- Health & Medicine
A cornea that’s got some nerve
Researchers have developed a technique to grow corneal tissue that includes nerve cells, an advance that may enable them to test consumer products in lab dishes rather than live animals.
- Earth
Subglacial lakes may influence ice flow
The flow of water into and out of massive, ice-covered lakes in Antarctica may influence the speed at which the overlying glaciers move toward the sea.
- Health & Medicine
Cocoa compound increases brain blood flow
Cocoa that retains compounds usually removed to soften the product's flavor can significantly improve blood flow to the brain.
- Health & Medicine
Nice Shot: Hepatitis E vaccine passes critical test
An experimental vaccine for hepatitis E has proved nearly 96 percent protective in a test in Nepalese soldiers.
- Anthropology
Tools for Prey: Female chimps move to fore in hunting
For the first time, researchers have observed wild chimpanzees making and using tools to hunt other animals, a practice adopted mainly by adult females and youngsters.
- Materials Science
The New Black: A nanoscale coating reflects almost no light
A "carpet" of microscopic filaments sprayed onto a surface can prevent it from reflecting light, a potentially useful trait for technologies from solar cells to fiber-optic communications.
- Animals
Snail Highways: By following trails, periwinkles save slime
A snail that follows another snail's slimy path saves energy by not having to secrete so much mucus.
- Planetary Science
Stormy Weather in Space: Craft take panoramic view of solar eruptions
Twin spacecraft have for the first time tracked solar storms, known as coronal mass ejections, from their birth in the lower depths of the sun's atmosphere all the way to Earth's orbit.
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Natural-Born Addicts: Brain differences may herald drug addiction
Differences in the behavior and the brain receptors of rats seem to predict which of the rodents will become cocaine addicted.
- Earth
Equal Opportunity Outcome: Different pollutants show same impact
At concentrations present in the environment, each of three dissimilar toxic agents can seize control of a signaling pathway that regulates developing cells in the central nervous system.
- Paleontology
Ancient slowpoke
A 1-centimeter-long, 505-million-year-old fossil from British Columbia represents a creature that joins two lineages of marine invertebrates from that era that scientists previously hadn't linked.
- Health & Medicine
Fixes for Fatty Liver
A slate of experimental treatments, including three established diabetes drugs, could become medicines for nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, an obesity-related cause of cirrhosis.
- Animals
Science behind the Soap Opera
Tight family groups of meerkats in Africa's arid lands offer a chance to see the costs, as well as the charms, of cooperation. With audio.
- Humans
Letters from the March 3, 2007, issue of Science News
Up, down, around I haven’t seen any reference to the similarity between the “morphing” wing (“Ahead of the Curve: Novel morphing wing may reduce aircraft’s fuel use,” SN: 12/23&30/06, p. 406) and the “warping” wing that the Wright brothers used on their gliders and powered aircraft. It seems we’ve come full circle in our quest […]
