Humans
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Agriculture
Nation by nation, evidence thin that boosting crop yields conserves land
Intensifying agriculture may not necessarily return farmland to nature without policy help.
- Earth
Toxic playgrounds
No kid should ever play in arsenic. Especially at school. Yet many probably do, according to findings of a study presented today.
- Chemistry
PCBs: When green paint isn’t ‘green’
It seems we're literally painting the air -- from the Great Lakes to Antarctica -- with persistent pollutants. Including at least one whose safety has never been studied.
- Chemistry
Case of the toxic gingerbread man
Featured blog: A search for the source of some indoor-air anomalies turns up a surprising culprit.
- Humans
Visual illusion stumps adults but not kids
Finding suggests that sensitivity to visual context develops slowly.
- Earth
Where humans go, pepper virus follows
Plant pathogen could help track waters polluted with human waste.
- Climate
Climate might be right for a deal
The upcoming Copenhagen negotiations will take steps toward an international, climate-stabilizing treaty.
- Health & Medicine
Malaria shows signs of resisting best drug used to fight it
The frontline malaria medicine artemisinin shows gaps in effectiveness in Southeast Asia.
- Humans
Obese people can misjudge body size
Survey finds that many overweight individuals consider their body size normal and healthy despite having health problems
- Health & Medicine
Marathoners’ hearts stressed, but not necessarily by heart attacks
Detailed imaging of runners’ hearts before and after races doesn’t find signatures of heart attacks
- Health & Medicine
Mummies reveal heart disease plagued ancient Egyptians
CT scans of preserved individuals show hardening of arteries similar to that seen in people today.
- Health & Medicine
PCBs hike blood pressure
No one would choose to eat polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs — yet we unwittingly do. And a new study finds that the cost of their pervasive contamination of our food supply can be elevated blood pressure, a major risk factor for heart disease.
