News
- Health & Medicine
Baby Rescue: Cord blood saves infants with rare disease
Using umbilical cord blood, doctors can rescue babies from Krabbe's disease, a lethal enzyme deficiency that causes brain damage.
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Perfect Match: Embryonic stem cells carry patients’ DNA
By priming embryonic cells with genetic material from people with problems that stem cells may one day treat, researchers have isolated 11 new lines of stem cells that exactly match the patients' own DNA.
- Tech
In Its Own Image: Simple robot replicates itself block by block
A robot made by stacking identical, cubelike modules has demonstrated that it can copy itself.
- Health & Medicine
Watch and Wait, or Not: Studies weigh risks of delaying prostate surgery
Two long-running studies of men with prostate cancer have partly clarified the risks of postponing treatment of the disease.
- Chemistry
Metal Rebel: Under extreme pressure, sodium breaks the rules for turning into liquid
In a demonstration that defies certain basic assumptions in physics, researchers have created liquid sodium at room temperature under high pressures.
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DNA’s Moody Temperament: Gene variant linked to depression-ready brain
A common version of a gene involved in regulating the neurotransmitter serotonin creates a brain that responds sensitively to stress and is therefore more likely to become depressed.
- Astronomy
Fleeting Flash: Pinpointing a short gamma-ray burst
An invisible, highly energetic flash detected by a spacecraft early this week may have given astronomers their first glimpse of two neutron stars colliding to forge a black hole.
- Animals
Built for Blurs: Jellyfish have great eyes that can’t focus
Eight of a box jellyfish's eyes have superb lenses, but their structure prevents them from focusing sharply.
- Health & Medicine
Proteins’ Promise: New test could reveal early ovarian cancer
A screening test for ovarian cancer shows promise in preliminary trials.
- Physics
Galactic data shore up a constant
Alpha, a constant of nature found to vary in some astrophysical studies, actually holds steady, according to the first survey of galaxies used to evaluate alpha's constancy.
- Physics
Scales tilt against five-quark particles
Studies that fail to find purported five-quark particles, or pentaquarks, are stacking up quicker than studies that claim to have found such particles, suggesting that they might not really exist.
- Physics
Test puts pedal to heavy metal
Stellar explosions forge heavy elements such as gold more quickly than scientists had predicted, as indicated by the first measurement of the half-life of a rare form of nickel that's a key link in the chain of element formation.
