Humans
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We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Health & Medicine
Catching Flu’s Drift: Vaccines fight unexpected influenza
Vaccination can prevent three of every four flu infections, even when the vaccines are imperfectly tailored to block the common wintertime pathogens.
By Ben Harder - Health & Medicine
Express delivery for cancer drugs
A new drug-delivery method has dramatically reduced tumors in experiments conducted with mice.
- Anthropology
Neandertals’ tough Stone Age lives
Neandertals that 43,000 years ago inhabited what's now northern Spain faced periodic food shortages and possibly resorted to cannibalism to survive.
By Bruce Bower - Anthropology
South African find gets younger
The partial skeleton of a human ancestor previously found in South Africa dates to about 2.2 million years ago, roughly 1 million years younger than the original estimates.
By Bruce Bower - Health & Medicine
Salad Doubts
Researchers are looking into new ways to sanitize harvested produce and prevent foodborne pathogens from infecting people.
- Humans
Peer Review under the Microscope
The traditional method for communicating results of scientific research could get its biggest facelift in hundreds of years.
- Humans
Letters from the December 16, 2006, issue of Science News
Familiar pattern I am a retired high school mathematics teacher who has quilted mathematical ideas for over 20 years. Currently, I am working on a quilt called Pascal’s Pumpkin. I was totally excited by “Swirling Seas, Crystal Balls: Spirals of triangles crinkle into intricate structures” (SN: 10/21/06, p. 266) and began to think about quilting […]
By Science News - Humans
From the December 5, 1936, issue
New forms of glass, a new element in space, and Einstein's automatic camera.
By Science News - Health & Medicine
Red Heat Might Improve Green Tea
Roasting green-tea leaves using infrared heat boosts the concentration of various beneficial chemicals in tea brewed from the leaves.
By Janet Raloff - Humans
Lunar Outpost: NASA unveils plans for a return to the moon
NASA announced that it would begin in 2020 to assemble a human outpost on the moon.
By Ron Cowen - Health & Medicine
Bitter Pill: Costs surge for new schizophrenia drugs
Medications widely prescribed to treat schizophrenia cost hundreds of dollars more each month than does a less popular, older medication that has similar success at alleviating symptoms of the disorder.
By Bruce Bower - Health & Medicine
Pain type matters to brain
Chronic back pain affects different parts of the brain than acute back pain does, magnetic resonance images reveal.