News
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Many cyanobacteria make a neurotoxin
A brain-damaging toxin, once believed to come only from a group of tropical plants and their live-in microbes, turns out to be much more widespread.
- Health & Medicine
Licorice ingredient ferrets out herpes
A compound in licorice homes in on lab-grown cells infected with a herpes virus and induces them to self-destruct.
- Paleontology
Early mammal had newfangled fangs
A tiny mammal that lived in Colorado about 150 million years ago had hollow teeth that lacked enamel, a characteristic that didn't reappear in mammals for another 100 million years.
- Earth
Coming Storms: Method predicts intensity of U.S. hurricane seasons
A new computer model that analyzes summer-wind patterns can help predict whether the United States will suffer a damaging hurricane season.
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Mood Brighteners: Light therapy gets nod as depression buster
Brief periods of daily exposure to bright light are an effective treatment option for depression.
- Tech
Double bubble comes off in a pinch
By nestling droplets inside larger droplets, scientists have created a new strategy for encapsulating food additives and fragrances.
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Frozen in Time: Gas puts mice metabolically on ice
Researchers have induced a hibernation-like state in mice by exposing them to low concentrations of hydrogen sulfide.
- Health & Medicine
Fast Start: Sex readily spreads HIV in infection’s first weeks
People with HIV are many times more infectious to their sexual partners in the weeks or months just after they acquire the virus than they are later on, a study in Uganda demonstrates conclusively.
- Ecosystems
Ambush Ants: Beware the moldy patch on that branch
Tiny tropical ants build shaggy platforms on plants and hide underneath them, poised to reach out and capture insects that may be far larger than themselves.
- Astronomy
Distant Dust: Asteroid belt or boiling comet?
A swarm of warm dust surrounding a star 41 light-years from Earth may be a sign of the closest extrasolar analog to the solar system's asteroid belt.
- Physics
Extreme Matter: Mother of all material flows into view
By making an extremely hot and dense state of matter that, surprisingly, is a liquid, physicists say they may have finally created a sample of matter much like the primordial stuff that permeated the newborn universe and gave rise to all other matter.
- Anthropology
These spines were made for walking
A new analysis of fossil backbones indicates that human ancestors living around 3 million years ago were able to walk much as people today do.
