Uncategorized
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Shifty Talk: Probing the process of word evolution
Words change more quickly over the millennia the less frequently they are used, a quantitative result that may aid in reconstructing old languages and predicting future changes.
- Animals
Eat a Killer: Snake dines safely with strategic delays
An Australian snake kills dangerous frogs then waits for their defensive chemicals to degrade before eating them.
- Physics
Light does some weird math
Adding a photon to a light pulse then taking one out gives a different result from doing the same operations the other way around.
- Health & Medicine
Antibiotic improves recovery from stroke
An antibiotic called minocycline seems to limit brain damage and disability in stroke patients.
- Earth
Arctic sea ice falls to modern low
The area of sea ice in the Arctic is at its lowest in nearly three decades of satellite monitoring.
- Anthropology
Ancient DNA moves Neandertals eastward
Evidence from mitochondrial DNA indicates that Neandertals lived 2,000 kilometers farther east than previously thought.
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19890
The DNA analysis indicating that some south Siberian bones from the Pleistocene age are from Neandertals matches very well with my interpretation of teeth from those same caves. I proposed in 1990 that the teeth were more like those of Neandertals than any other fossil or modern teeth. Furthermore, it is doubtful that these south […]
- Health & Medicine
Diabetes precursor may be checked by omega-3 fatty acids
Omega-3 fatty acids in the diet might fend off diabetes in children prone to the disease.
- Earth
A different spin
A change in the properties of Earth's mantle at high pressure and temperature may influence seismic waves in a novel way.
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Exercise steps up as depression buster
Aerobic exercise, done alone or in a group, eases depression almost as well as a common antidepressant does.
- Planetary Science
Martian rovers survive storm
Three months after being stymied by a planet-wide dust storm, NASA's twin Mars rovers are back in action.
- Humans
It’s About Time
What’s a year? Why do we measure it in days and weeks? How do calendars differ? What’s the earliest known date? (Hint: It’s the year Egyptians invented the calendar.) Learn answers to these and other timely questions at Calendars from the Sky, a site developed in part with support from the National Institute for Standards […]
