Uncategorized
- Paleontology
The first matrushka
A newly found fossil preserves one creature inside another that lies nestled inside yet another, a Paleozoic version of the Russian nesting dolls known as matrushkas.
- Materials Science
Printing scheme could yield 3-D photonic crystals
An innovative printing scheme makes three-dimensional crystal structures that could be used to control the flow of light.
- Anthropology
DNA to Neandertals: Lighten up
DNA analysis indicates that some Neandertals may have had a gene for pale skin and red hair.
- Astronomy
Gammas from Heaven
An orbiting gamma-ray observatory, set for launch next spring, will seek out the most violent events in the cosmos.
- Anthropology
Fossil Sparks
Two new fossil discoveries and an analysis of ancient teeth challenge traditional assumptions about ape and human evolution.
- Humans
Letters from the November 3, 2007, issue of Science News
Waste not, want not “Cellulose Dreams” (SN: 8/25/07, p. 120) ignored important research by David Tilman and Jason Hill of the University of Minnesota. They found that planting a crop of 18 different native prairie plants grown in highly degraded and infertile soil with little fertilizer or chemicals yielded substantially more bioenergy than a single […]
- Chemistry
Chemistry—Weird and Otherwise
During this—Chemistry Week—check out the “Who, What, When, Where, and Why of Chemistry.” The site’s periodic postings are offered up by Bryn Mawr College computational chemist Michelle M. Francl, who comments on events of the day—always inserting a gentle chemistry twist. She notes that her blog “began as part of an NSF grant to write […]
- Humans
From the October 23, 1937, issue
Soviet hydroelectricity powers electric farm equipment, breeding programs create rats with cancer resistance and rabbits with an extra rib, and artificial fertilization is made to work in fruit flies.
- Animals
Smells Funny: Fish schools break up over body odor
Just an hour's swim in slightly contaminated water can give a fish such bad body odor that its schoolmates shun it.
- Anthropology
Not So Clear-Cut: Soil erosion may not have led to Mayan downfall
Hand-planted maize, beans, and squash sustained the Mayans for millennia, until their culture collapsed about 1,100 years ago. Some researchers have suggested that the Mayans’ very success in turning forests into farmland led to soil erosion that made farming increasingly difficult and eventually caused their downfall. But a new study of ancient lake sediments has […]
- Astronomy
Odd Couples: Big black holes challenge star theory
The discovery of a black hole almost 16 times as massive as the sun, and the possible discovery of an even heavier one, challenge theories of how such black holes form.
- Physics
Let There Be Aluminum-42: Experiment creates surprise isotope
In experiments that created the heaviest isotope yet of magnesium, an unexpected isotope of aluminum also showed up.
