News

  1. Tech

    Timing Is Everything: Implantable polymer chip delivers meds on schedule

    A polymer microchip implanted under the skin could deliver multiple doses of medications at programmed intervals, eliminating the need for pills and injections.

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  2. Earth

    Chicken Little? Study cites arsenic in poultry

    Most chicken eaten in the United States contains 3 to 4 times as much arsenic as is present in other kinds of meat and poultry.

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  3. IQ Yo-Yo: Test changes alter retardation diagnoses

    Mental retardation placements in U.S. schools rose dramatically in the first five years after a commonly used IQ test was revised, raising concerns about how IQ scores are used to diagnose mental retardation.

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  4. Astronomy

    Vanishing planet

    An object orbiting a distant star is too heavy to be a planet, researchers have concluded.

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  5. Astronomy

    Extrasolar planet gets heavier

    An extrasolar planet that tightly orbits its parent star is heavier than astronomers had thought.

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  6. Health & Medicine

    Treatment helps newborns avoid HIV

    Giving healthy newborns whose mothers are infected with HIV a combination of anti-HIV drugs shortly after birth makes the infants less likely to contract the virus through breastfeeding.

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  7. Tech

    Sweet-toothed microbe tapped for power

    Using a newly discovered bacterium that both frees electrons from sugars and injects those charges straight into electric circuits, scientists have created a fuel cell that converts carbohydrates to electricity with extraordinary efficiency.

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  8. Earth

    Gulf War vets face elevated ALS risk

    Two studies suggest that veterans of the 1991 Gulf War are at elevated risk of developing the fatal neurodegenerative condition amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) compared with other military personnel and with the general population.

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  9. Health & Medicine

    Balance benefits from noisy insoles

    Sending subliminal vibrations to nerves on the bottoms of feet helps people, especially the elderly, keep their balance.

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  10. Earth

    Flame retardants take a vacation

    The lifetime in blood of flame- retarding diphenyl ethers, now-ubiquitous pollutants, ranges from 2 weeks to 2 years, Swedish researchers find.

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  11. Health & Medicine

    Cocoa puffs up insulin in blood

    Eating foods flavored with cocoa powder as opposed to other flavorings stimulates surplus production of the sugar-processing hormone insulin, but the metabolic implications of the finding aren’t yet known.

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  12. Humans

    Letters

    Letters from the Oct. 18, 2003, issue of Science News.

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