News
- Animals
Gender bender
Disabling a chemical-sniffing organ crucial for courting behavior makes girl mice act like frisky boys.
By Brian Vastag - Earth
Cholesterol boosts diesel toxicity
Nanoparticles in diesel exhaust can activate genes that worsen cholesterol's damaging effects.
By Janet Raloff - Planetary Science
Deep Impact and Stardust: Still on assignment
Two sturdy NASA spacecraft have new assignments, studying comets and looking for exoplanets.
By Ron Cowen - Health & Medicine
New Clues: Gene variations may contribute to MS risk
Variants of two genes encoding immune system proteins may confer a higher risk for multiple sclerosis.
By Nathan Seppa -
- Chemistry
Soot Sense: Test tallies exposure to diesel pollution
A chemical in urine reveals a person's exposure to diesel exhaust.
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Fatherless Stem Cells: Scientific fraud involved an accidental advance
Stem cells that discredited researcher Woo Suk Hwang claimed as the first example of human cloning actually came from embryos that contained only the mother's genetic material.
- Planetary Science
G Whiz! Craft identifies source of faint Saturnian ring
The Cassini spacecraft has discovered the source of particles that make up Saturn's G ring.
By Ron Cowen - Earth
Asian Forecast: Hazy, Warmer—Clouds of pollution heat lower atmosphere
Clouds of smoke and soot that blanket many regions of Asia heat the lower atmosphere by the same amount that rising greenhouse gases do.
By Sid Perkins - Health & Medicine
Waking Up: Brain stimulator spurs dramatic improvement years after injury
A man who spent 6 years in a minimally conscious state regained the ability to talk, eat, and move after doctors implanted electrodes deep in his brain.
By Brian Vastag - Earth
Slick Death: Oil-spill treatment kills coral
Chemicals used to disperse marine oil spills are more harmful to coral than the oil itself.
- Paleontology
Dinosaurs’ gradual rise to dominance
Early dinosaurs didn't quickly eclipse the creatures they evolved from, but lived alongside them for perhaps 20 million years.
By Sid Perkins