Uncategorized
- Paleontology
Unexpected Archive: Mammoth hair yields ancient DNA
Hair from ancient mammoths contains enough genetic material to permit reconstruction of parts of the animal's genome.
- Health & Medicine
Distracted? Tea might help your focus
An amino acid in tea combines with the brew's caffeine to enliven brain cells that aid concentration.
- Health & Medicine
Tea compound aids dying brain cells
A constituent of green tea rescues brain cells damaged in a way that mimics the effect of Parkinson's disease.
- Health & Medicine
Malaria’s sweet spot
The malaria parasite's reliance on a sugar in the gut of mosquitoes may offer a way to block the disease's transmission.
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19885
Astronomer Masanori Iye of the National Observatory of Japan blames the blurry appearance of meteor trails at about 100 kilometers altitude on the fact that they were photographed with telescopes focused at infinity. But optics teaches that any object much farther away than the focal length of the telescope is essentially “at infinity.” Wouldn’t a […]
- Astronomy
Out-of-focus find
Blurry images yield estimates of the true width of glowing meteor vapor trails in Earth's upper atmosphere.
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- Animals
Honeybee mobs smother big hornets
Honeybees gang up on an attacking hornet, killing it by blocking its breathing.
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19884
A researcher cited in this article recommends that people at risk of heart attack should avoid exercising outdoors on highly polluted days. What an odd conclusion, on two counts: First, that avoidance, instead of elimination of the poison from the air we breathe, is the recommended course of action; and second, that only “at risk” […]
- Health & Medicine
Exhaust fumes might threaten people’s hearts
Nanoparticles in diesel fumes thwart proteins that dissolve blood clots, perhaps increasing the risk of heart attacks.
- Physics
Not flipping out
A single atom on a surface has favored magnetic orientations that could allow it to encode a data bit.
- Earth
Clearly Concerning
The toxicity of a chemical that leaches from a widely used plastic receives conflicting evaluations in two new reviews.
