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  1. Physics

    Stradivari’s secrets

    Three-dimensional imaging of a classic violin's vibrations explains the instrument's superior ability to direct sound to the audience.

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  2. Chemistry

    A sweet way to replace petroleum?

    Thanks to a new chemical process, many products now manufactured from petroleum could one day be made from sugar molecules.

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  3. Health & Medicine

    Nerves are key to longevity effect

    The life-extending effect that some animals get from calorie-restricted diets may depend on signals from the brain.

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  4. Earth

    Double-acting bacteria immobilize toxic nanoparticles

    Bacteria lurking in the bowels of an abandoned Wisconsin mine might help remove toxic metals from polluted water.

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  5. Animals

    West Nile virus hits bird populations

    West Nile virus has hammered populations of five common North American birds.

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  6. Planetary Science

    Eris dwarfs Pluto

    Ex-planet Pluto suffers another demotion, as observations show that it's much less massive than Eris, another distant denizen of the outer solar system.

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  7. Tech

    A computer in every cell

    Artificial genes inserted into cells make RNA molecules that can perform logical computations.

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  8. 19849

    With respect to this article on kimberlites, diamonds, and mantle fractures, may I suggest that the fractures in question emanate from hypervelocity bolide impacts on Earth. There is ample spatial correlation between impact craters formed by oblique impacts with crustal-fracture systems that propagated outward along the direction of impact. Gregory C. HermanNew Jersey Geological SurveyTrenton, […]

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  9. Earth

    A Gemstone’s Wild Ride

    Diamonds may be carried to the surface in explosions of gas and rock fizzing up from deep within Earth's mantle.

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  10. 19848

    Your review of Alex Vilenkin’s book Many Worlds in One: The Search for Other Universes, above, contained an often-made error. In Guth’s inflation model, during the first “zillionth of a second,” the universe did not inflate “to cosmic scale.” It inflated to about the size of a large grapefruit. Then it began its slow expansion. […]

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  11. Humans

    Summer Reading

    The staff of Science News presents wide-ranging recommendations of books for readers to pack for their summer vacations.

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  12. Humans

    Letters from the June 30, 2007, issue of Science News

    Hot and cold on the topic No mention was made in “In the Zone: Extrasolar planet with the potential for life” (SN: 4/28/07, p. 259) of the possibility that, being so close to its star and having a 13-day orbital period, the planet would keep the same surface to the star. Having one side baked […]

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