More Stories from the November 17, 2012 issue
- Science & Society
Misconduct prompts most retractions
Two-thirds of scientific papers pulled from journals are for fraud, suspected fraud and plagiarism.
- Health & Medicine
Common heart treatment fails to help
People prescribed beta blockers are no more likely to avoid a heart attack or stroke than those not getting them.
- Animals
Right eye required for finding Mrs. Right
Finches flirt unwisely if they can only use their left eyes.
- Science & Society
Banks err by confusing risk, uncertainty
Too much information prompted bad currency projections by international money firms, a psychologist contends, and may have blinded them to the global financial crisis.
- Chemistry
Solar blobs collide with a bounce
Superhot ejections from the sun surprise physicists by gaining energy of motion in collision.
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- Chemistry
Depths hold clues to dearth of xenon in air
The gas doesn’t dissolve well in minerals deep inside Earth, a discovery that may explain why it’s also scarce in the atmosphere.
- Animals
Early arthropod had a fancy brain
A 520-million-year-old fossil of a segmented animal shows that sophisticated central nervous systems are surprisingly ancient.
- Health & Medicine
Tomato compound might prevent some strokes
Men with high blood concentrations of lycopene are less vulnerable, a study finds.
- Planetary Science
Scientists probe fresh Martian meteorite
Rock holds clues to Red Planet’s atmosphere and surface conditions.
- Neuroscience
Teens can keep their cool to win rewards
An unexpected experimental result suggests adolescent impulsivity is not inevitable.
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- Health & Medicine
Body & Brain
Blood pressure decreases with apnea treatment, vitamins fail to protect against colorectal cancer, and more news from this week’s medical journals.
- Psychology
Delaying gratification is about worldview as much as willpower
Preschoolers’ social expectations influence how long they’re willing to hold out for extra goodies.
- Neuroscience
Drug helps put bad memories to rest
A brain injection before sleep aids fearful mice — and might lead to a PTSD treatment strategy.
- Earth
Years after big quake, Turkish fault still slip-sliding
Creeping movement underscores the seismic danger threatening Istanbul.
- Genetics
Genetic mutations may explain a brain cancer’s tenacity
DNA damage may transform adult cells in glioblastoma, making the malignancy harder to kill.
- Neuroscience
Highlights from Neuroscience 2012
A collection of reports from the Society for Neuroscience annual meeting, New Orleans.
- Genetics
Cloning-like method targets mitochondrial diseases
Providing healthy ‘power plants’ in donor egg cells appears feasible in humans, a new study finds.
- Science & Society
Insect illustrator
Taina Litwak is an “art department of one” in D.C. for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Systematic Entomology Laboratory.
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- Tech
Beginnings of Bionic
Electronics that bend with the human body may soon make their way into medical devices to track health, deliver treatments and improve surgery.
- Climate
Extremely Bad Weather
Teasing out global warming's role in worsening hurricanes, droughts and other extreme events.
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