Uncategorized
-
19577
I’m currently writing a biography of RAF Squadron Leader Roger Bushell, the instigator of the plan to construct the three tunnels in Stalag Luft III. Last fall, I visited the site. Amazingly, it was difficult to see where the excavation team had been. I have also spoken to dozens of men who either helped build […]
-
- Humans
From the July 20, 1935, issue
A warning sign for pilots, better methods for producing radioactive substances, and making potatoes grow better with ultrasound.
-
Animal Skulls
High school biology teacher DeLoy Roberts and his students have, over the years, assembled a large collection of animal skulls. This Web site provides dramatic images of the skulls, ranging, for example, from the armadillo to the wood rat among the mammals. Various birds, fish, sharks, reptiles, amphibians, and crustaceans are also represented. Go to: […]
- Health & Medicine
Tumors in Touch: Cancer cells spur vessel formation through contact
Some tumor cells use a newfound mechanism to prompt neighboring cells into forming blood vessels that then nourish the cancer.
-
19576
That monkeys get “weirded out” by seeing themselves in mirrors doesn’t seem unexpected. Were a familiar or an unfamiliar same-sex capuchin seen, the test subject would be bombarded not just by visual images but also by smells generated from the normal interactions of monkeys. What makes them act strangely is not seeing themselves, which they […]
-
Reflections of Primate Minds: Mirror images strike monkeys as special
Capuchin monkeys don't react to their own mirror images as they do to strangers, perhaps reflecting an intermediate stage of being able to distinguish oneself from others.
- Astronomy
Crater Shake: Tremors erased asteroid’s topography
Seismic shock waves from a large meteor impact on the asteroid Eros might have rearranged surface rubble, destroying crater structures over much of the asteroid.
- Tech
Tapping Tiny Pores: Nanovalves control chemical releases
After creating arrays of nanovalves, each made from a single molecule, chemists used them to generate minuscule chemical discharges.
- Earth
Under Pressure: High-stress tests show surprising change in a mantle mineral’s behavior
Compressing a common iron-bearing mineral to the pressures found deep within Earth makes the material much stiffer, which might explain why seismic waves travel particularly fast through some zones of rock.
-
Bacterial Snitch: Species competes by telling on another
A bacterial species that typically colonizes people's noses may win out over another bacterium by tattling to the host's immune system.
- Animals
Meat-Eating Caterpillar: It hunts snails and ties them down
A newly named species of Hawaiian caterpillar sneaks up on a resting snail and quickly spins silk strands around it, lashing it to the spot, and then eats it.
