Life

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We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.

  1. Life

    Donor mitochondria could influence metabolism, aging

    Mitochondrial DNA donation could have unexpected long-term health consequences for “three-parent babies.”

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  2. Animals

    To zip through water, swordfish reduce drag

    A newly discovered oil-producing organ inside the swordfish’s head gives the animal slick skin to swim faster.

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  3. Animals

    Lionfish invasion comes to the Mediterranean

    Scientists had thought that the Mediterranean was too cold for lionfish to permanently settle there. But now they’ve found a population of the fish off Cyprus.

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  4. Neuroscience

    Rewarding stimulation boosts immune system

    Activating feel-good nerve cells boosts mice’s immunity, a new study suggests.

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  5. Life

    Letting parasites fight could help battle drug resistance, too

    Helping one strain of malaria trounce another in lab mice demonstrates a way of avoiding the evolution of drug resistance.

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  6. Climate

    Warming alters mountain plant’s sex ratios

    Global warming has different effects on male and female plants. Tracking sex ratio shifts could be a fast signal of climate change, researchers say.

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  7. Animals

    Frigate birds fly nonstop for months

    The great frigate bird can fly for up to two months without landing, thanks to a boost from wind and clouds.

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  8. Animals

    Sneaky male fiddler crabs entrap their mates

    Some male banana fiddler crabs get a female to mate with them by trapping her in their burrow, a new study finds.

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  9. Science & Society

    Empathy for animals is all about us

    We extend our feelings to what we think animals are feeling. Often, we’re wrong. But anthropomorphizing isn’t about them. It’s about us.

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  10. Health & Medicine

    This week in Zika: vaccine progress, infection insights

    Vaccine candidates for Zika virus take a step forward, birth defects span spectrum of problems and doubts about Zika’s link to microcephaly may be extinguished by new reports from Colombia.

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  11. Health & Medicine

    Vaccines could counter addictive opioids

    Scientists turn to vaccines to curb the growing opioid epidemic.

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  12. Paleontology

    Parasites wormed way into dino’s gut

    Tiny slimed tunnels in the guts of a 77-million-year-old duck-billed dinosaur fossil offer the first hard evidence that dinosaurs may have been infected by parasitic worms, paleontologists say.

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