News
- Life
Penguin DNA evolving faster than thought
Comparing the DNA in modern birds to that in ancient generations shows molecular evolution happens at varying rates, and that each species has its own rate of evolution.
- Health & Medicine
Heart attack patients get high radiation dose
Medical imaging can add up to exposure similar to what nuclear power plant workers experience.
By Laura Beil - Earth
Plastics ingredients could make a boy’s play less masculine
Study links boys' fetal phthalate exposure to tendency toward gender-neutral play later on.
By Janet Raloff - Health & Medicine
B vitamin outperforms another drug in keeping arteries clear
The findings led to an early halt of a small study comparing Niaspan and Zetia, two compounds commonly used along with statins to reduce heart attack risk.
By Laura Beil - Health & Medicine
Chill-out device may protect brain during heart attacks
A portable method to quickly lower body temperature passes safety tests
By Laura Beil - Space
Moon crash reveals crater held water
Plume of lunar material contained roughly 25 gallons of vapor and ice.
By Ron Cowen - Physics
New device can use noise to store one bit
Data storage system employs a resonance effect to do work.
- Anthropology
For Hadza, build and brawn don’t matter for choosing mates
Study of hunter-gatherer community in Tanzania shows that, across human groups, mating criteria vary.
By Bruce Bower -
Unsticking Spirit
Efforts to extract the Mars rover from a sandpit will start November 16, but success is uncertain.
- Ecosystems
Impatiens plants are more patient with siblings
Streamside wildflower holds back on leaf competition when roots meet close kin
By Susan Milius - Life
Newborn cells clear space in brain’s memory-maker
Rodent study offers first evidence that neurogenesis clears old memories in key part of the brain to make way for new ones.
- Life
Genetic effects suggest FOXP2 role in language evolution
Human version of the protein alters activity of 116 genes compared with the chimp version.