Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Space
Americans would welcome alien life rather than fear it
Americans would probably take the discovery of extraterrestrial microbes pretty well.
- Animals
Ants practice combat triage and nurse their injured
Termite-hunting ants have their own version of combat medicine for injured nest mates.
- Neuroscience
To hear the beat, your brain may think about moving to it
To keep time to a song, the brain relies on a region used to plan movement — even when you’re not tapping along.
- Animals
Strong winds send migrating seal pups on lengthier trips
Prevailing winds can send northern fur seal pups on an epic journey.
- Paleontology
Fossil footprints may put lizards on two feet 110 million years ago
Fossilized footprints found in South Korea could be the earliest evidence of two-legged running in lizards.
- Anthropology
In Borneo, hunting emerges as a key threat to endangered orangutans
Only small numbers of Bornean orangutans will survive coming decades, researchers say.
- Climate
Look to penguins to track Antarctic changes
Scientists say carbon and nitrogen isotopes found in penguin tissues can indicate shifts in the Antarctic environment.
- Genetics
Study debunks fishy tale of how rabbits were first tamed
A popular tale about rabbit domestication turns out to be fiction.
- Health & Medicine
Cutting off a brain enzyme reversed Alzheimer’s plaques in mice
Inhibiting an enzyme involved in the production of Alzheimer’s protein globs also made old globs, or plaques, disappear in mouse brains.
- Life
Shipping noise can disturb porpoises and disrupt their mealtime
Noise from ships may disturb harbor porpoises enough to keep them from getting the food they need.
- Genetics
Genes could record forensic clues to time of death
Scientists have found predictable patterns in the way our genetic machinery winds down after death.
- Animals
Even after bedbugs are eradicated, their waste lingers
Bedbug waste contains high levels of the allergy-triggering chemical histamine, which stays behind even after the insects are eradicated.
