Life
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Microbes
Airplane sewage may be helping antibiotic-resistant microbes spread
Along with drug-resistant E. coli, airplane sewage contains a diverse set of genes that let bacteria evade antibiotics.
- Life
Ocean acidification could degrade sharks’ tough skin
Nine weeks of exposure to acidic seawater corroded the toothlike denticles that make up a puffadder shyshark’s skin, a small experiment found.
- Life
Koalas aren’t primates, but they move like monkeys in trees
With double thumbs and a monkey-sized body, an iconic marsupial climbs like a primate.
- Archaeology
DNA from 5,700-year-old ‘gum’ shows what one ancient woman may have looked like
From chewed birch pitch, scientists recovered DNA from an ancient woman and her mouth microbes and hazelnut and duck DNA from a meal she’d consumed.
- Neuroscience
Mice watching film noir show the surprising complexity of vision cells
Only about 10 percent of mice’s vision cells behaved as researchers expected they would, a study finds.
- Animals
A year of big numbers startled the world into talking about nature
One million species are at risk. Three billion birds have been lost. Plus surges in Amazon burning.
- Genetics
The first U.S. trials in people put CRISPR to the test in 2019
Trials of the gene editor in people began in the United States this year, a first step toward fulfilling the technology’s medical promise.
- Health & Medicine
Surplus chromosomes may fuel tumor growth in some cancers
Extra copies of some genes on excess chromosomes may keep cancer cells growing. Without those extras, cancer cells form fewer tumors in mice.
- Animals
Texas has its own rodeo ant queens
New species of rodeo ants, riding on the backs of bigger ants, turned up in Austin, Texas.
- Animals
A biochemist’s extraction of data from honey honors her beekeeper father
Tests of proteins in honey could one day be used to figure out what bees are pollinating and which pathogens they carry.
- Animals
Why some whales are giants and others are just big
Being big helps whales access more food. But how big a whale can get is influenced by whether it hunts for individual prey or filter-feeds.
- Life
Prions clog cell traffic in brains with neurodegenerative diseases
Prions may derail cargo moving inside brain cells, perhaps contributing to cell death in prion diseases.
