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  1. Smarty Gene: Breast-fed kids show DNA-aided IQ boost

    Breast-feeding substantially boosts children's intelligence, but only if the youngsters possess a specific version of a gene involved in processing mothers' milk.

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  2. Doing the DNA shuffle

    DNA near the ends of people's chromosomes shows surprisingly large differences from the corresponding DNA in other great apes.

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  3. Health & Medicine

    Nongene DNA boosts AIDS risk

    People with a newly discovered genetic variation are more vulnerable to HIV infection.

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  4. Humans

    Burdens of knowledge

    Greater understanding of the role of genetics in human diseases presents scientists with ethical dilemmas.

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  5. Health & Medicine

    Salmonella seeks sweets

    A sugarlike substance in the roots of lettuce may attract food-poisoning bacteria.

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  6. 19899

    Soil water picks up carbon dioxide generated when soil organic matter decomposes, and this then escapes to the atmosphere. This study should give pause to those who insist that man-made materials be biodegradable. When biodegradable materials decompose they add CO2 back into the atmosphere more quickly than otherwise. Nonbiodegradable materials serve to keep organic carbon […]

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  7. Earth

    Groundwater use adds CO2 to the air

    Pumping out groundwater for crop irrigation or industrial purposes releases planet-warming carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

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  8. Health & Medicine

    Earache microbe shows resistance

    A strain of bacterium that causes middle ear infection is resistant to all antibiotics currently approved for the ailment.

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  9. Ecosystems

    Tortoise Genes and Island Beings

    Geneticists and conservation biologists are joining forces to untangle the evolutionary history of giant Galápagos tortoises and to safeguard the animals' future.

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  10. 19898

    You refer to Lonesome George, the Galápagos tortoise, as “misanthropic”—meaning a hater of people. He certainly has good reason to dislike humans, but I wonder how the investigators could tell. Or did you mean that George doesn’t like other tortoises, and is therefore antisocial? Roman KozakOmaha, Neb. Lonesome George’s lack of gregariousness extends across species: […]

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  11. Health & Medicine

    Mother Knows All

    Fragments of a fetus' genetic material that leak into a pregnant woman's bloodstream reveal details of early fetal development.

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  12. Tech

    Hooking up

    Cleverly designed molecules can self-assemble into networks and stay robustly connected.

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