News
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Senior bees up all night caring for larvae
Honeybees turn out to be the first insect known to change circadian rhythms just because of a social cue, a crisis in the nursery.
By Susan Milius -
Tech
New device opens next chapter on E-paper
Researchers have developed a paperlike plastic that could become the pages of the first electronic books and newspapers.
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Paleontology
Did fibers and filaments become feathers?
A variety of filamentary structures on the fossil of a small theropod dinosaur recently found in China may provide new insight into the evolution of feathers.
By Sid Perkins -
Health & Medicine
Novel typhoid vaccine surpasses old ones
A new vaccine links a sugar molecule found on the surface of the bacterium that causes typhoid fever with a genetically engineered version of the exotoxin protein, which arouses the immune system to churn out antibodies against the bacterium.
By Nathan Seppa -
Anthropology
Peru Holds Oldest New World City
Construction of massive ceremonial buildings and residential areas at a Peruvian site began 4,000 years ago, making it the earliest known city in the Americas.
By Bruce Bower -
When parents let kids go hungry
Researchers comparing Northern and Southern birds have confirmed a prediction about parents protecting themselves at their offsprings' expense.
By Susan Milius -
Weather cycles may drive toad decline
For the first time, scientists have linked a global climate pattern to a specific mechanism of amphibian decline.
By Susan Milius -
Worm sperm stimulate ovulation
A sperm protein for movement also prompts egg maturation and ovulation.
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Huntington’s protein may be kidnapper
An abnormal protein associated with Huntington's disease kills cells by stealing another protein needed for cell survival.
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Astronomy
Solar cannibalism
Billion-ton clouds of charged gas hurled from the sun can overtake and eat their slower-moving gaseous brethren, complicating predictions of when and if one of these clouds might strike Earth.
By Ron Cowen -
Astronomy
Raging sun provides earthly light show
At the tumultous peak of its 11-year activity cycle, the sun is spitting out X-ray flares and belching giant clouds of high-energy particles at a furious rate.
By Ron Cowen -
Astronomy
Gamma-ray bursts reveal distant galaxies
A gamma-ray burst recorded Feb. 22, one of the brightest ever detected, is proving to be the strongest evidence so far that these cosmic flashbulbs originate in star-forming regions of distant galaxies and are generated by the explosive death of massive stars.
By Ron Cowen