News
- Health & Medicine
Progestin linked to hearing loss in older women
Elderly women who received progestin as part of hormone replacement therapy have poorer hearing than do women who didn't get progestin.
- Anthropology
Neandertal debate goes south
A controversial report concludes that Neandertals lived on southwestern Europe's Iberian coast until 24,000 years ago, sharing the area for several thousand years with modern humans before dying out.
- Tech
A thin laser gets thinner
Researchers have created a microchip laser that fires an extraordinarily thin beam of high-intensity light.
- Physics
Solid Surprise: High-pressure oxygen takes unpredicted form
X-ray analysis of oxygen crystals under high pressure indicated that the substance's two-atom molecules aggregate into groups of four, a crystalline structure that has never been seen before and isn't predicted by current quantum theory.
- Animals
Sexually Deceptive Chemistry: Beetle larvae fake the scent of female bees
Trick chemistry lets a bunch of writhing caterpillars attract a male bee that they then use as a flying taxi on their way to find food.
- Planetary Science
Oversize Orb: Puffy planet poses puzzle
Astronomers have discovered what may be the largest planet ever found, an orb 36 percent wider than Jupiter that circles a nearby star.
- Humans
Grounded Epidemic: Reduced air travel after 9/11 slowed flu spread
The perennial winter-flu season developed more gradually than usual in the United States in the months after September 11, 2001, because of a reduction in air travel following that day's terrorist attacks.
- Animals
Family Tree: An arboreal genome is sequenced
Researchers have sequenced the genome of a tree for the first time.
- Anthropology
Scripted Stone: Ancient block may bear Americas’ oldest writing
A slab of stone found by road builders in southern Mexico may contain the oldest known writing in the Americas, although some scientists regard the nearly 3,000-year-old inscriptions cautiously.
- Health & Medicine
Weapon against MS: Transplant drug limits nerve damage
An immune-suppressing drug called fingolimod slows multiple sclerosis relapses in patients.
- Earth
Link between El Niños and droughts in India
Scientists have discovered a correlation between droughts in India and a particular type of El Niño, the climate phenomenon marked by increased sea-surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific.
- Tech
Cyber attack depletes cell phone batteries
In a new type of cyber attack, assailants using computers connected to the Internet can secretly induce distant cell phones to rapidly deplete their batteries.
