Uncategorized

  1. Humans

    Letters from the March 1, 2008, issue of Science News

    Big evolvers Regarding “Whales Drink Sounds: Hearing may use an ancient path” (SN: 2/9/08, p. 84), I have heard that whales evolved millions of years ago into their present form, including their very large brains. We humans must be relatively recent in terms of our brain structures. Are there data concerning evolutionary development in whales? […]

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  2. Math

    An Attack on Fermat

    The first female research mathematician had a program to solve Fermat's Last Theorem, and it was almost lost to history.

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  3. Astronomy

    New Worlds Atlas

    Keep track of the ever-expanding list of newly discovered planets orbiting distant suns at PlanetQuest 2.0, a revamped Website developed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It has images, “planet system visualizations,” movies and games that simulate interstellar exploration, and even lets you install a desktop planet counter so that your computer always displays the latest […]

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  4. Humans

    From the February 19, 1938, issue

    A rough, tough charioteer from ancient Sumer, Americans' poor eating habits, and digging up an early industrial town.

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  5. Internet Seduction: Online sex offenders prey on at-risk teens

    Most online sex crimes involve adults seducing psychologically vulnerable teenagers into sexual relationships, a finding at odds with public fears of Internet-using children falling prey to deceptive, violent sexual predators.

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  6. Earth

    Defining Toxic: Federal agencies look to cells, not animals, for chemical testing

    Government scientists are collaborating to shift the testing of potentially toxic chemicals away from animals to methods that use high-speed automated robots, which should generate data relevant to humans faster and more cheaply than current methods.

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  7. On Top of Words: Spatial language spurs kids’ reasoning skills

    Recent studies of spatial reasoning in deaf children support the notion that language helps people encode certain concepts and suggest that using spatial language with children may boost overall reasoning skills.

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  8. Health & Medicine

    Eye Protection: Antibiotic knocks back blinding disease

    Twice-a-year administration of the antibiotic azithromycin to Ethiopian villagers greatly reduces cases of trachoma, a blinding eye disease.

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  9. Astronomy

    Stellar Switch: Sun not alone in making magnetic flip-flops

    After years of searching, researchers have for the first time documented that a star other than the sun flips its magnetic poles.

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  10. Earth

    Going Down: Climate change, water use threaten Lake Mead

    If climate changes as expected and future water use is not curtailed, there's a 50 percent chance that Arizona's Lake Mead, one of the southwestern United States' key reservoirs, will become functionally dry in the next couple of decades.

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  11. 19929

    In reference to this article, scarcity requires society to allocate. Usually markets do a better job than law at allocating efficiently and fairly. Lake Mead could remain full to the brim regardless of pending climate change. The quoted “demand” for 16.6 km3 of Lake Mead water in Southern California and Arizona is not some fixed […]

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  12. Health & Medicine

    Benign—Not: Unexpected deaths in probiotics study

    Acute pancreatitis patients provided nutrition laced with supposedly beneficial gut microbes died at far higher rates than did patients who received just the nutrients.

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