News
- Astronomy
Hubble Weighs In: Pinning down an extrasolar planet’s mass
Using a decades-old technique, astronomers have precisely measured the mass of a planet outside our solar system.
- Materials Science
Nanotube ID: New signatures aid nanotech progress
Researchers have developed a means for rapidly distinguishing among 33 semiconducting varieties of carbon nanotubes.
- Health & Medicine
Cluster Bombs: Metabolic syndrome tied to heart disease deaths
Men with a certain cluster of metabolic characteristics are about three times as likely to die of heart disease as men without the traits are.
- Animals
Frogs Play Tree: Male tunes his call to specific tree hole
Borneo's tree-hole frog may come as close to playing a musical instrument as any wild animal does. [With audio file.]
- Health & Medicine
Jarring Result: Extreme biking can hurt men’s fertility
Men who maintain grueling mountain-bicycling programs are apt to have lower sperm counts than nonbikers are.
- Anthropology
Script Delivery: New World writing takes disputed turn
Researchers announced, to considerable controversy, that inscriptions found on artifacts at an Olmec site in southeastern Mexico represented the earliest known writing system in the Americas.
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Debate over Alzheimer’s enzyme flares up
Scientists continue to tussle over the identity of an enzyme implicated in Alzheimer's disease.
- Earth
Algal bloom is smothering Florida coral
The anomalous growth of a native alga—now blanketing the seabed in a huge swath off the southern coast of Florida—points to overfertilization with upwelling sewage.
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Cancer patients accentuate the positive
Group therapy that promotes positive types of personal growth in breast cancer patients may also result in beneficial physiological changes.
- Agriculture
Bt corn variety OK for black swallowtails
The first published field study of butterflies and genetically altered corn finds no harm to black swallowtail caterpillars from a common corn variety.
- Health & Medicine
Keeping the beat
Muscle cells taken from embryonic rats and put into an adult rat's heart can transmit the electric signals that govern the heartbeat.
- Tech
Robotic heart surgery
By using robotic rather than conventional open-heart techniques, doctors can perform heart surgery with smaller incisions, giving patients less pain and speeding recovery.
