News
- Humans
Bear deadline
Court calls for the already overdue decision on listing polar bears as a threatened species.
- Earth
Molten salts give biofuels a boost
Making biofuels from the chemical energy locked in plant cell walls has proven difficult, but molten salts may help.
- Astronomy
Massive minis
Astronomers have discovered a puzzling group of galaxies in the early universe that are as tiny as babies but as massive as full-grown adults.
- Planetary Science
Hop, skip and a jump
Less gravity on Mars means wind-driven grains of sand travel up to 10 times faster than those blowing along Earth’s surface, new analyses suggest.
- Health & Medicine
Let there be light
Researchers report restoring vision to people with a rare, genetic form of blindness. A different technique helped blind mice see again and could bring back some sight in people with macular degeneration, retinitis pigmentosa or other blinding diseases.
- Psychology
Smarten up
Taxing memory training produces at least short-term increases in a critical type of intelligence.
- Health & Medicine
Tripping up avian flu
Developing an effective vaccine for avian flu has been difficult, but small rings of DNA that hinder virus replication could offer an alternative.
- Earth
Climate fix could deplete polar ozone
Scientists seeking to cool Earth’s climate by injecting sulfuric acid droplets high in the atmosphere might trim rising temperatures but could also destroy much of the ozone in polar regions, a new study suggests.
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- Health & Medicine
New approach might strike at the core of Alzheimer’s disease
By finding a way to stick an enzyme-inhibiting molecule to the membrane of a cell, scientists may have devised the framework for an Alzheimer’s drug.
- Humans
Incan skull surgery
Incan healers became highly adept at skull surgery techniques that developed over thousands of years in ancient Peru.
- Ecosystems
Eight-legged bags of poison
Birds eating arachnids get high dose of toxic metal as mercury climbs up the food chain.
