Uncategorized
- Earth
Big Bergs Ahoy!
Although the break-up of Antarctica's northernmost ice shelves has been linked to warmer temperatures in the area, the cause of the unusual number of large icebergs calving from the continent's southern ice shelves last year was likely not global warming.
- Physics
Lead blocks may catch nuclear killer
New measurements of neutron bursts from blocks of lead may help researchers solve a decades-old cosmic whodunit.
- Physics
Maybe this watched pot already boiled
Researchers smashing nuclei in hopes of producing a primordial state of matter called the quark-gluon plasma may have already made the stuff without realizing it.
- Health & Medicine
Death of a theory
Three separate analyses of oral polio vaccine used in the 1950s in Africa deflate the theory that such a vaccine could have ignited the AIDS epidemic by containing virus-infected chimpanzee cells.
- Health & Medicine
Gene therapy cures blindness in dogs
Gene therapy to replace a defective RPE65 gene succeeds in bringing sight to three blind dogs, suggesting such therapy might reverse Leber congenital amauosis, a rare condition in which children are blind from birth.
- Health & Medicine
New anthrax treatment works in rats
By distorting a protein in the toxin that makes the anthrax bacterium deadly, scientists have discovered a promising way to treat the disease and possibly even to prevent it with a vaccine.
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Parasitic Charms
An extensive collection of photographs from around the world demonstrate the full weirdness of parasitic plants. For sheer size, try the Rafflesia, with buds the size of footballs and individual flowers that outsprawl a straw hat. For sci-fi charm, visit the fleshy Hydnora blooms reaching out of the dirt or the crusty lumps of Prosopanche […]
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World Science Fair
Catch glimpses of people, activities, and projects at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair, held May 5-11 in San Jose, Calif. A team of students from Mt. Diablo High School in Concord, Calif., created this site as events unfolded at the science fair, from project setup to presentation of the grand awards. Go to: […]
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From the May 9, 1931 issue
PYTHON LIKES NEW HOME: LAYS CLUTCH OF EGGS One of the big pythons in the U.S. Zoological Park recently celebrated her transfer to the more comfortable and homelike quarters of the new reptile house there by laying a clutch of 20 eggs. The picture on the cover of this issue of the SCIENCE NEWS LETTER […]
- Math
Lava Lamp Randomness
Sealed within a transparent, tapered, liquid-filled cylinder, illuminated colored globs slowly rise and fall. Meandering and deforming, their shapes and paths change unpredictably. Invented in 1963, a decorative fixture in many homes during the 1970s, and still in production, Lava Lite lamps are now the object of renewed curiosity. Indeed, researchers have come up with […]
- Math
Lava Lamp Randomness
Sealed within a transparent, tapered, liquid-filled cylinder, illuminated colored globs slowly rise and fall. Meandering and deforming, their shapes and paths change unpredictably. Invented in 1963, a decorative fixture in many homes during the 1970s, and still in production, Lava Lite lamps are now the object of renewed curiosity. Indeed, researchers have come up with […]
- Health & Medicine
Tamoxifen dilates arteries in men
The breast cancer drug tamoxifen can widen a narrowed coronary artery in men with heart problems.
