Humans
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Agriculture
AAAS: Stress Can Make Plants More Nutritious
People who aren't veggie lovers might want to seek out types of produce that deliver an especially big nutrient bang for the gram.
- Humans
Nation needs recovery plan for science faculty jobs
Over the past few months, many graduate students and postdocs have been receiving letters from department chairs apologetically explaining that the faculty job search at Institution X has been canceled. State and private universities are facing declining tax revenues and falling endowments, and are unwilling to raise tuition on newly impoverished families. From Harvard to […]
- Chemistry
Supergoo Erases ‘Monument-al’ Nuclear Fallout
From disposable diapers comes a technology that can be used to extract radionuclides off of the porous surfaces of buildings.
- Science & Society
Kids’ gestures foretell better vocabularies
Toddlers who gesture more at age 14 months possess larger vocabularies when entering school, new research finds.
- Humans
Bloggers Need News Too
News media are ailing, and even bloggers realize that's a big problem.
- Humans
First rough draft of Neandertal genome released
A rough draft of the Neandertal genome is complete, scientists announced on Darwin’s 200th birthday.
- Health & Medicine
Sequencing virus genome to cure the common cold
The genomes of all known common cold viruses have been sequenced, providing new information on how the different strains are related, how they replicate and how to predict their virulence.
- Health & Medicine
Bigger rewards boost tobacco quit rate
Smokers who are offered several hundred dollars are three times as likely to quit as those offered no reward.
- Humans
For gamblers’ brains, almost counts
In an experiment mimicking slot machines, people’s brains reacted similarly to almost winning as to winning, possibly explaining why gambling can be addictive.
- Health & Medicine
A better test for prostate cancer
Elevated urine concentrations of a compound called sarcosine in men with prostate cancer may signal an aggressive malignancy.
- Psychology
Fatal fallout of financial failure
Using population data, researchers have linked a widespread Asian economic crisis in 1997 to an abrupt increase in suicide rates the following year in hard-hit places.
- Health & Medicine
Postpartum psychosis most likely in month after childbirth
Mothers who develop postpartum psychosis are at greatest risk during the first month after childbirth, and even mothers with no previous history of mental illness could develop the condition
