News
- Earth
Baking dirt to predict erosion after a fire
Lab tests suggest that a wide variety of soils exposed to the heat of intense wildfires end up with a similar resistance to erosion, a finding that may help scientists model that process more accurately.
By Sid Perkins - Health & Medicine
Cell transplants make gains versus diabetes
Transplanting insulin-making cells from a single cadaver into people with type 1 diabetes can reverse the disease in some people.
By Nathan Seppa - Earth
Winged solution to biopollution?
Government officials have released alien moths in hopes that they will rein in the spread of an aggressive climbing fern now invading some 100,000 acres in south Florida.
By Janet Raloff -
Healing secret lies in blood
An unknown factor in blood may be the key to why young people and animals heal much faster than old ones do.
- Ecosystems
Return of the Wetlands? Restoration possible for some Iraqi marshes
Field studies conducted in Iraq last year suggest that some of the region's ecologically devastated marshes could be returned to health.
By Sid Perkins - Health & Medicine
To Stanch the Flow: Hemophilia drug curbs brain hemorrhage
A blood-clotting drug helps some people recover from a bleeding stroke.
By Nathan Seppa - Physics
Electronic Soup: Molecules in acid broth act as circuit parts
An electronically promising molecule functions well in acid as a tiny amplifier, underscoring the importance of controlling molecules' electrochemical environments to achieve predictable performance.
By Peter Weiss -
Shrinking at Sea: Harvesting drives evolution toward smaller fishes
In response to fishing, numerous fish species have evolved to be smaller and to grow more slowly, creating populations of fish that are poor at reproducing and inefficient at bulking up.
By Ben Harder - Astronomy
Big Flash: Record-breaking explosion in outer space
The brightest flash of light ever recorded from beyond the solar system could help account for a puzzling group of extremely short-lived gamma-ray bursts from distant galaxies.
By Ron Cowen - Animals
The Old Crowd: Minke whales have long thrived in Antarctic seas
Genetic studies of whale meat from Tokyo grocery stores appear to strengthen the case for protecting Antarctica's minke whales against renewed hunting.
By Susan Milius - Astronomy
Ghostly Galaxy: Massive, dark cloud intrigues scientists
Astronomers say they have found the only known galaxy devoid of stars.
By David Shiga -