News

  1. Small Wonder: Microbial hitchhiker has few genes

    Scientists have identified a microbe with remarkably few genes living on another microbe on the ocean floor.

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  2. Earth

    In case of temblor, run downhill

    Computer models of the ground motions measured on a shallow hill during an earthquake suggest that, in certain circumstances, the ground movements could be magnified by as much as 10 times those measured on flat areas nearby.

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  3. Humans

    In USSR, generals did it by the numbers

    A statistical analysis of the dates and times of Soviet underground nuclear tests suggests that the favorite numbers of the test-site commander may have had a significant influence upon the precise timing of the detonations.

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  4. Earth

    Monitors get weird vibes from Antarctic

    In late 2000, seismometers on islands in the South Pacific picked up vibrations that were eventually traced to a large iceberg drifting in the Ross Sea north of Antarctica.

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  5. Brain keeps tabs on arbitrary patterns

    Several parts of the frontal brain cooperatively identify apparent regularities in random sequences of events and detect breaks in those patterns.

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  6. Earth

    Symbionts affect coral’s chemistry

    The presence of symbiotic organisms in the tiny animals that build coral reefs changes the rates at which the animals take in minerals from the water, a finding that may affect the results of many research projects that have used chemical analyses of coral remains to infer past sea-surface temperatures.

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  7. Astronomy

    Elliptical duet rides the Kuiper belt

    Follow-up observations of an icy object in the Kuiper belt and its moon reveal that the two bodies revolve about each other in the most elongated orbit of any pair of objects in the solar system.

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  8. Health & Medicine

    Virus gives cancer the cold treatment

    A genetically engineered version of a common cold virus appears to kill cancer cells without harming healthy tissue.

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  9. Physics

    Not-So-Neutral Neutron: Clearer view of neutron reveals charged locales

    A sharp, new picture of the neutron reveals that rather than being uniformly electrically neutral, the particle contains regions of positive and negative charge.

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  10. Materials Science

    Self-Sutures: New material knots up on its own

    Researchers have used a new biodegradable material to make surgical sutures that knot and tighten themselves as they warm to body temperature.

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  11. Anthropology

    Attack of the Ancestor: Neandertals took a stab at violent assaults

    The pieced-together fragments of a 36,000-year-old Neandertal skull reveal a bony scar caused by a blow from a sharp tool or weapon.

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  12. Health & Medicine

    Deadly Pickup: Enzyme permits plague germ to ride in fleas

    Acquisition of a gene that enables the plague bacterium to live inside blood-sucking fleas may have set the stage for the Black Death.

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