Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
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- Health & Medicine
Experimental Biology 2011 conference
Even larvae can love the blues, plus distemper’s roots, fat-busting blueberries and more meeting news.
- Life
Gut bacteria come in three flavors
Everybody has one of a trio of types — and which one seems to be less important than how the bugs behave.
- Life
Complex life hit freshwater early
Tiny fossils in Scottish rock show that cells with nuclei had spread beyond the seas by a billion years ago.
- Life
Gone fishing, orangutan-style
Apes that catch fish in ponds and eat them raise the possibility that ancient hominids did the same.
- Life
New light on moths gone soot-colored
Researchers trace the mutation that led to the dramatic darkening of an insect's wings during England's industrial revolution to a region rich in genes that control color patterns.
- Life
Dangerous dinos came out after dark
Predatory dinosaurs probably stalked the night, scientists say.
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- Life
Antarctic lake hides bizarre ecosystem
Bacterial colonies form cones similar to fossilized examples of Earth’s early life.
- Chemistry
Plants and predators pick same poison
Zygaena caterpillars and their herbaceous hosts independently evolved an identical recipe for cyanide.
- Life
Penguin declines may come down to krill
Lack of food appears to be hurting birds on the Antarctic Peninsula.
- Tech
Fishy fat from soy is headed for U.S. dinner tables
Most people have heard about omega-3 fatty acids, the primary constituents of fish oil. Stearidonic acid, one of those omega-3s, is hardly a household term. But it should become one, researchers argued this week at the 2011 Experimental Biology meeting.
