Life
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We summarize the week's science breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Life
Nanoparticles: size and charge matter
Nanoparticles can be designed for targeted delivery of drugs or genes into the body. New work reveals details of how blood proteins respond to these particles.
- Life
FDA releases guidelines for genetically modified animals
Draft rules lay out policies for approving altered animals, including those used for food.
- Life
First lipid hormone discovered
An omega-7 fatty acid made by fat and liver cells acts as a hormone, even mimicking the health benefits of insulin.
- Climate
Heat waves stunt grassland growth
An abnormally hot year can significantly suppress growth in grasslands, a stifling effect that lingers well into the next year even if temperatures return to normal. It can also hinder how well the grasslands absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
By Sid Perkins - Life
Fastest spores in the West (or anywhere)
SEE THE VIDEO: Researchers film a fungus catapulting its spores with an acceleration greater than what astronauts feel.
- Life
Fish glowing red
Plenty of reef creatures fluoresce red, even where seawater absorbs red sunlight.
By Susan Milius - Life
New ant species found
One weird ant suggests lost world of ancient ants living underground
By Susan Milius - Neuroscience
Breaking the Barrier
A technique combining ultrasound pulses with microbubbles may help scientists move therapeutic drugs across the brain’s protective divide.
By Tia Ghose - Life
Sting Operation
Scientists use bees and wasps to sniff out the illicit and the dangerous.
By Susan Gaidos -
- Life
This bite won’t hurt a bit
A team dissects the physics of a mosquito bite, working to find a way to design gentler needles.
- Paleontology
Dino domination was in the cards, maybe
A new study finds that early dinosaurs coexisted with and were outnumbered by a competing species. Dinosaurs eventually reigned supreme anyway, but perhaps not because they were better.