Uncategorized
- Health & Medicine
This roe’s got a fish-E surprise
Scientists discovered a potent, new form of vitamin E, an antioxidant, in fish adapted for life in cold water.
- Health & Medicine
The salmon that went moo
People allergic to milk products could face potentially life-threatening risks by eating casein-treated fish.
- Animals
Who’s on first with hummingbird bills
A survey of 166 hummingbird species links sex differences in bill length to sex differences in plumage and to breeding behavior.
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Handsome blue tit dads have more sons
A female blue tit with a particularly dashing mate is more likely to have sons than is a female matched with a ho-hum guy.
- Earth
The Importance of Being Electric
By coordinating measurements from telescopes, planes, balloons, and a battery of instruments, terrestrial and space scientists have now placed themselves on almost intimate terms with sprites—luminous shapes that fleetingly appear high above lightning storms.
- Health & Medicine
Boning Up
Biologists have discovered a mechanism for communication between two types of bone cell, and they're exploring the possible bone-growth-stimulating effect of popular cholesterol-lowering drugs called statins.
- Animals
Marine Mules: Near-sterile hyrids boost coral diversity
Reef corals that spawn in great mixed-up soups of many species may be maintaining their diversity because their hybrids are sterile mules.
- Health & Medicine
Hemispheric Cross Talk: Brains show two sides of language function
Some people coordinate language use with both sides of their brains, allowing them to retain verbal skills after damage to one side or the other.
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Evolution’s Death Row: Groups surviving mass extinction still go bust
Groups of species may persist through major extinction events only to die off in the aftermath.
- Materials Science
Wiregate: Metallic picket fence flips magnetic bits
Rather than relegate magnetic fields to the usual backup role of data storage for computers, a new microcircuit exploits those fields for computation, possibly leading to cheaper, lower-power chips than traditional electronic ones.
- Plants
Mirror Image: Flowers with opposite styles have a fling
Scientists have discovered a gene that controls whether flowers lean to the left or the right.
- Astronomy
Outlier Planet: Extrasolar places that are like home
A team of veteran hunters of planets outside the solar system has come up with a landmark finding: a Jupiterlike planet orbiting a Sunlike star at a Jupiterlike distance.
