News
- Astronomy
Stellar Switch: Sun not alone in making magnetic flip-flops
After years of searching, researchers have for the first time documented that a star other than the sun flips its magnetic poles.
- Earth
Going Down: Climate change, water use threaten Lake Mead
If climate changes as expected and future water use is not curtailed, there's a 50 percent chance that Arizona's Lake Mead, one of the southwestern United States' key reservoirs, will become functionally dry in the next couple of decades.
- Health & Medicine
Benign—Not: Unexpected deaths in probiotics study
Acute pancreatitis patients provided nutrition laced with supposedly beneficial gut microbes died at far higher rates than did patients who received just the nutrients.
- Animals
People bring both risk and reward to chimps
Tolerating human researchers and ecotourists brought a group of chimpanzees a higher risk of catching human diseases but a lower chance of attacks from poachers.
- Earth
Spying asbestos
A quick, on-site test will allow contractors and inspectors to test for asbestos in construction materials such as concrete.
- Astronomy
Organic ring around nearby star
Researchers have found the first evidence that a dust ring around another star, the likely vestige of recent planet formation, contains complex organic molecules that could be the building blocks of life.
- Paleontology
From China, the tiniest pterodactyl
Researchers excavating the fossil-rich rocks of northeastern China have discovered yet another paleontological marvel: a flying reptile the size of a sparrow.
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It takes a village of proteins
Scientists learn how nerve cells sprout new connections by looking at thousands of distinct proteins simultaneously.
- Health & Medicine
Cancer drug limits MS relapses
The anticancer drug retuximab inhibits nerve damage and relapses in multiple sclerosis patients.
- Physics
Birds network too
Starlings in a flock adjust their trajectories to those of their closest neighbors, which helps the flock stay together when under attack.
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New World Stopover: People may have entered the Americas in stages
People first reached the edge of the Americas about 40,000 years ago but had to stay put for at least 20,000 years before melting ice sheets allowed them to move south and settle the rest of the continent.
- Earth
Don’t like it hot
King penguins don't live on continental Antarctica but even they are vulnerable to warming water.
