Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Genetics
Organism with artificial DNA alphabet makes its debut
Using DNA molecules other than A, C, G and T, scientists have created the first living organism with an expanded genetic alphabet.
- Psychology
Why every face you draw looks a little Neandertal
Just about everyone draws faces with the eyes too high and a low Neandertal forehead, maybe because of the way we perceive the shape of the head.
- Paleontology
Dinosaurs could take tough breaks
Meat-eating dinosaurs may have survived some extremely bad bone breaks, according to detailed chemical maps of the fossils.
- Animals
Woodpecker beaks divulge shock-absorbing properties
Scales, sutures and porosity help the birds hammer without going stupid.
- Animals
What animal is the world’s best rock climber?
Lots of animals manage to scale vertical heights, and each has their own way of accomplishing the feat.
- Neuroscience
Young blood proven good for old brain
Blood — or one of its protein components — restores some of youth’s vibrancy to elderly mouse brains.
- Animals
Narwhal has the strangest tooth in the sea
Sometimes called the unicorn of the sea, the male narwhal’s tusk is actually a tooth. Narwhals detect changes in water salinity using only these tusks, a new study finds.
- Animals
How to milk a naked mole-rat
For the sake of science, Olav Oftedal has milked bats, bears and a lot of other mammals. But a naked mole-rat was something new.
- Health & Medicine
First MERS case found in the U.S.
Patient in Indiana had traveled from Arabian Peninsula, where most of the 463 cases of Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome have occurred.
- Neuroscience
You smell, and mice can tell
A new study shows that the smell of a man causes stress in lab mice. The findings show scientists have yet another variable to control: the scientist.
- Neuroscience
Young rats that use their brain keep more cells alive
Learning a task helps just-born cells survive in a learning and memory center of the rat brain.
- Animals
Some birds adapt to Chernobyl’s radiation
Some birds seem to fare well in and near the Chernobyl exclusion zone, but overall the nuclear disaster has been bad news for the region’s bird populations.
