Uncategorized
- Earth
Greaseball Challenge
And they’re off! The participants in this charity biofuel car rally are on their way from the U.S. East Coast to San Jose, Costa Rica. Powered by biodiesel, vegetable oil, waste grease, and other alternative fuels, the vehicles will all be donated to local communities at the end of the rally, which runs until April […]
- Anthropology
Disinherited Ancestor: Lucy’s kind may occupy evolutionary side branch
A controversial analysis of a recently discovered jaw from a 3-million-year-old Australopithecus afarensis puts Lucy's species on an evolutionary side branch that eventually died out.
- Health & Medicine
Agents of Metastasis: Four proteins conspire in breast cancer spread
Four proteins work together to assist cancer growth and metastasis, and drugs against them inhibit both processes, tests in mice suggest.
- Physics
Quantum Capture: Photosynthesis tries many paths at once
The wavelike behavior of energy in chlorophyll might explain how plants are so efficient at using solar energy.
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Female Stem Cells Flourish: Sex difference could affect therapies
Certain adult stem cells from female mice regenerate better than those from males, indicating that not all stem cells are created equal.
- Paleontology
Ancient Extract: T. rex fossil yields recognizable protein
New analyses of a Tyrannosaurus rex leg bone reveal substantial remnants of proteins that strengthen the link between modern birds and dinosaurs.
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The existence of ancient proteins is no surprise. Evidence of remnants of durable, skeleton-associated proteins such as collagen are not uncommon in the fossil record long before Tyrannosaurus rex. For example, remains of bivalve ligaments are known from the mid-Ordovician, over 400 million years ago. Other durable but pliable organic materials, such as protist resting […]
- Health & Medicine
Bug versus Bug: Insect virus makes a viable flu vaccine
A new influenza vaccine churned out by caterpillar cells infected with a genetically engineered virus effectively prevents the flu.
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Primate’s Progress: Macaque genome is usefully different
A group of 35 labs has unveiled a draft of the genome of the rhesus macaque, the most widely used laboratory primate and a cousin to people.
- Chemistry
Gene dispensers
A new gene therapy technique releases genetic material from successive nanoscale layers of DNA as sheets of polyester that hold them in place slowly degrade.
- Materials Science
Color-tunable sunglasses
Engineers have developed sunglasses that can change from dark, filtering hues to clear—and back—at the flip of a switch.
- Health & Medicine
New agent to spy clogged arteries
To improve the detection of harmful arterial plaques, researchers have modeled a nanoparticle on a natural material: good cholesterol.
