Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Paleontology
Ancient armored fish revises early history of jaws
The fossil of a 423-million-year-old armored fish from China suggests that the jaws of all modern land vertebrates and bony fish originated in a bizarre group of animals called placoderms.
- Health & Medicine
Staph infections still a concern
Scientists have been searching for a vaccine against a deadly microbe for 50 years.
- Genetics
Zika disrupts cellular processes to impair brain development
Discoveries about how Zika virus slows brain cell development could lead to treatments.
- Genetics
Readers question the biology of alcoholism and more
Alcoholism-linked genes, making better corneas and more in reader feedback.
- Neuroscience
Mice smell, share each other’s pain
Pain can jump from one mouse to another, presumably through chemicals detected by the nose.
- Archaeology
Wild monkeys throw curve at stone-tool making’s origins
Monkeys that make sharp-edged stones raise questions about evolution of stone tool production.
- Genetics
Big biological datasets map life’s networks
Expanding from genomics to multi-omics means stretching data capacity, but it may lead to a future of early diagnosis, personalized medicine and hardy crops.
- Genetics
‘Three-parent babies’ explained
Several in vitro techniques can produce babies with three biological parents.
- Animals
Melatonin makes midshipman fish sing
Melatonin lets people sleep but starts male midshipman fish melodiously humming their hearts out.
- Oceans
Reef rehab could help threatened corals make a comeback
Reefs are under threat from rising ocean temperatures. Directed spawning, microfragmenting and selective breeding may help.
- Animals
Berries may give yellow woodpeckers a red dye job
A diet of invasive honeysuckle berries may be behind stray red feathers in woodpeckers called yellow-shafted flickers.
- Life
In a first, mouse eggs grown from skin cells
Stem cells grown in ovary-mimicking conditions in a lab dish can make healthy mouse offspring, but technique still needs work.
