More Stories from the December 1, 2012 issue
- Life
Fasting hormone helps mice live longer
A protein can trick the body into entering starvation mode.
- Earth
Spanish quake linked to groundwater pumping
Draining aquifers likely triggered 2011 tremor that killed nine people.
- Life
Hind wings gave four-winged dino flight control
Much-debated rear wings could have given Microraptor extra help in airborne maneuvers.
- Chemistry
Human blood types have deep evolutionary roots
The ABO system may date back 20 million years or more, a genetic analysis suggests.
- Paleontology
Earliest primate had tree-climber ankles
A creature known only from fossils of its teeth gets some more parts.
- Climate
Gulf Stream might be releasing seafloor methane
Greenhouse gas may be flowing into ocean waters off the U.S. east coast.
- Humans
Shoulder fossil may put Lucy’s kind up a tree
Fossils of an ancient child suggest the more than 3-million-year-old hominid mixed climbing with walking.
- Health & Medicine
Aspirin has selective benefit in colorectal cancer
Patients with a common gene mutation survive longer, which might enable doctors to predict who would get results from the drug.
- Health & Medicine
Same neurons at work in sleep and under anesthesia
Drugs boost activity in nerve cells that usually induce a slumber.
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- Earth
Ozone hole at smallest size in decades
Warm Antarctic temperatures help preserve UV-protecting layer.
- Health & Medicine
Smoking laws limit heart attacks
A county that banned smoking in bars, restaurants and other workplaces saw a one-third decrease, a new study finds.
- Life
Hunting dark matter with DNA
Particle physicists propose a new way to detect dark matter using the molecule of life.
- Life
Extensive bird family tree rewrites some history
Unexpected pattern of evolution found across hemispheres.
- Psychology
Too little money, too much borrowing
A contested study suggests that poverty contracts attention and detracts from financial decisions.
- Life
Seaweed-threatened corals send chemical SOS to fish
The cry for help summons allies to graze away the algal overgrowth.
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- Tech
Building robots that slither
Howie Choset is a roboticist, but his team’s creations bear little resemblance to C-3PO or R2-D2. Instead, Choset finds inspiration in nature — specifically, snakes.
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Science Future for December 1, 2012
December 15 Activities, films and demonstrations reveal physics principles at the Exploratorium in San Francisco. See bit.ly/SFfullspec December 17 Learn about supermassive black holes with astronomer Günther Hasinger at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. See bit.ly/SFgunther
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SN Online
ON THE SCENE BLOG Geneticists poke a little fun at themselves during a recent meeting. Read “Buzzword bingo.” Emanuel Soeding/Christian-Albrechts University, William Hay SCIENCE & SOCIETY Mapping U.S. votes for president according to state population gives a new view of politics. See “Red state, blue state.” EARTH Feedback loops are melting more ice than predicted, […]
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Measurement by Paul Lockhart
A mathematician untangles the basic concepts of symmetry, shapes and measurements in a reader-friendly way. Harvard Univ., 2012, 407 p., $29.95
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On a Farther Shore by William Souder
Fifty years after the publication of Silent Spring, a biographer creates a sensitive portrait of Rachel Carson’s life and research. Crown Publishers, 2012, 496 p., $30
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Living Color: The Biological and Social Meaning of Skin Color by Nina G. Jablonski
An anthropologist examines the evolution of human skin pigmentation, its relation to health and the role of skin color in social history. Univ. of California, 2012, 260 p., $29.95
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I, Lobster by Nancy Frazier
More than just a tasty meal — though this book does include recipes — the lobster is a star in history, art and science. Univ. of New Hampshire, 2012, 254 p., $24.95
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Book Review: How Ancient Europeans Saw the World by Peter S. Wells
Review by Tom Siegfried.
- Astronomy
Onward and Skyward
With new efforts aimed at the stars, China seeks to revive its astronomical reputation.
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Early Arrival
Premature puberty among girls poses scientific puzzle.
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Letters
To spot a planet “Planetary peekaboo” (SN: 9/22/12, p. 26) says that to hunt for faraway planets, the Kepler spacecraft “watches for blinks occurring when a planet dims a star’s light by passing in front of it.” For a star to dim when a planet moves in front of it requires us to be in […]
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Science Past from the issue of December 1, 1962
NEW DATING METHOD FOR MILLION-YEAR-OLD FOSSILS — A new radioactive dating method promises to close one of the major remaining gaps in methods of fixing dates on the geological and archaeological time scales. The new procedure, based on radioactive inequality in nature between uranium-234 and its parent U-238, was originated by David Turber of Columbia’s […]
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Stardust Revolution: The New Story of Our Origin in the Stars by Jacob Berkowitz
The author describes efforts by astrobiologists to put the origins of life into a cosmic context in this comprehensive history of “stardust science.” Prometheus, 2012, 376 p., $27
