News in Brief
- Genetics
Pregnancy in mammals evolved with help from roving DNA
DNA that “jumped” around the genome helped early mammals shift from laying eggs to giving birth to live young.
- Anthropology
Israeli fossil may recast history of first Europeans
New find suggests humans mated with Neandertals in Middle East before taking on Europe.
- Animals
Highway bridge noise disturbs fish’s hearing
In the lab, blacktail shiners had trouble hearing courtship growls over Alabama bridge traffic recordings.
- Animals
Chameleon tongue power underestimated
A South African chameleon species can shoot its tongue with up to 41,000 watts of power per kilogram of muscle involved, a new study finds.
- Agriculture
Superbugs take flight from cattle farms
Winds can carry antibiotics and drug-resistant bacteria from cattle farms to downwind communities.
- Physics
How blueshift might beat redshift
Even though the expanding universe makes light redder, light emitted by collapsing stars and dust clouds could appear unusually blue.
- Life
When bacteria-killing viruses take over, it’s bad news for the gut
A rise in some bacteria-killing viruses in the intestines may deplete good bacteria and trigger inflammatory bowel diseases.
- Environment
Atrazine’s path to cancer possibly clarified
Scientists have identified a cellular button that the controversial herbicide atrazine presses to promote tumor development.
- Planetary Science
Young asteroids generated long-lasting magnetism
Pockets of iron and nickel in meteorites suggest that asteroids in the early solar system produced magnetic fields for much longer than once thought.
- Health & Medicine
Immune system ‘reset’ may give MS patients a new lease on life
With the help of their own stem cells, MS patients can stop the disease in its tracks in many cases.
- Animals
Cone snail deploys insulin to slow speedy prey
Fish-hunting cone snails turns insulin into a weapon that drops their prey’s blood sugar and eases capture.
- Life
Human evolution tied to a small fraction of the genome
Natural selection has concentrated on a small portion of the human genome, and mostly not on genes themselves.
