Uncategorized
- Physics
Jiggling the Cosmic Ooze
Spurred by the first tentative sightings after a decades-old search, physicists seeking the universe's mass-giving particle — the Higgs boson — have fired up the world's highest-energy particle collider to join the pursuit.
- Health & Medicine
Two genes tied to common birth defect
Researchers report that defects in either of two specific genes may be responsible for DiGeorge syndrome, the second most common cause of congenital heart defects in newborns.
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Baboon rumps signal quality of motherhood
The size of the swellings on a female baboon’s rump match her physical prowess for motherhood, a rare case of reproductive-quality advertisement in females.
- Earth
Is there a vent in the global greenhouse?
Satellite observations of ocean temperatures in tropical regions of the western Pacific suggest that when ocean temperatures there warm up, the amount of heat-trapping cirrus clouds decreases, possibly providing a heat-venting effect that could help reduce global warming.
- Planetary Science
Debate over life in Mars rock rekindles
Two recent studies could inject new life into the argument that a 4-billion-year-old Martian meteorite contains fossils of bacteria from the Red Planet but several scientists say the reports fall short of resurrecting that notion.
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18904
In regards to “Dinosaur fossil yields feathery structures,” the scattered feathery structures may have belonged to an antecedent of Archaeopteryx but not necessarily a Sinornithosaurus. Given the context and location of the fossils, it seems more likely they belonged to the raptor’s last meal before its untimely demise. Aaron Stough Roanoke, Va.
- Paleontology
Dinosaur fossil yields feathery structures
Researchers believe they have found primitive feathers on the remains of Sinornithosaurus millenii, a 124-million-year-old raptor dinosaur from Liaoning, China.
- Materials Science
Scientists belt out a novel nanostructure
Researchers have used metal oxides to make microscopic ribbonlike structures that could prove useful for developing future nanoscale devices.
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Self-illusions come back to bite students
College freshmen who greatly overestimate their academic potential feel confident and happy for a while, but as they move toward graduation, these students feel progressively worse about themselves and become less involved with their schoolwork, a new study finds.
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18903
One can question the basic assumptions of the people doing the study described in “Sedentary off-hours link to Alzheimer’s.” One would hope that going to church is not less an intellectual endeavor than others, though it may be less physical than knitting or gardening. Even TV can be intellectual if viewers are testing their ability […]
- Health & Medicine
Sedentary Off-hours Link to Alzheimer’s
People who have Alzheimer's disease in old age were generally less active physically and intellectually between the ages of 20 and 60 than were people who don't have the disease.
- Math
Mayan Mars
The curiously looping movements of the planets relative to the stars have presented all sorts of puzzles to keen, patient observers of the night sky. In 1601, Johannes Kepler (1571-1630) undertook the challenge of deciphering the orbit of Mars and developing a mathematical theory of its motion to fit observations of the planet’s changing position […]
