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HumansChasing money for science
Stagnant funding for the National Institutes of Health is forcing scientists to downsize their labs and abandon some of their most promising work.
By Janet Raloff -
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PaleontologyBirds’ ancestors had small genomes too
Among mammals, reptiles, and related animals, today's birds have the smallest genomes, and the dinosaurs that gave rise to birds had small genomes as well.
By Sid Perkins -
Planetary ScienceRadar probes frozen water at Martian pole
If all the frozen water stored near the south pole of Mars suddenly melted, it would make a planetwide ocean 11 meters deep.
By Ron Cowen -
MathBig prize for unlikely research
A New York University mathematician has won one of the highest prizes in mathematics for figuring out the likelihood of unlikely events.
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How smart are amoebas?
Amoebas seem to possess a rudimentary form of memory that keeps them from walking around in circles.
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PlantsOld plants were lost in the grass
An obscure family of plants long thought to be relatives of grasses turns out to represent one of the most ancient surviving lineages of flowering plants.
By Susan Milius -
Health & MedicineWorking in a cotton mill has bright side
People who work amid bales of raw cotton are less likely to get lung cancer than are people in the general population, a study of Chinese women indicates. While past research has shown that workers in a cotton mill tend to develop shortness of breath, chronic cough, and other health problems, some scientists also noted […]
By Nathan Seppa -
EarthFits and Starts
New data identify some factors that influence the highly variable flow rates of ice streams, the megaglaciers that carry most of Antarctica's ice to the sea.
By Sid Perkins -
AnimalsHoney, I Ate the Kids
Some of the most devoted parents in the animal kingdom routinely devour some of their own children.
By Susan Milius -
HumansLetters from the March 31, 2007, issue of Science News
On the hoof Do cows and other domestic-herd animals really emit more methane than bison and other wild-herd animals emitted before people came along? Do grass, alfalfa, and other pasture plants remove less carbon dioxide than do forests? There were open grasslands before pastures replaced some forests. I hope the people who are researching these […]
By Science News -
Science & SocietyFrom the March 20, 1937, issue
The real Groundhog Day, microfilm book storage, and turning farm waste into chemical products.
By Science News