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Top Science News

September 7, 2016

Rare Fossil Relic of Early Milky Way

Largest Reforestation Program: Harm Wildlife?

Making Long-Lasting Memories Easily

Reconciling Dwarf Galaxies With Dark Matter

Sep. 7, 2016 — A fossilized remnant of the early Milky Way harboring stars of hugely different ages has been revealed by an international team of astronomers. This stellar system resembles a globular cluster, but ... read more

Sep. 7, 2016 — New research found that China's reforestation program, the world's largest, overwhelmingly leads to the planting of monoculture forests that fall ... read more

Sep. 7, 2016 — Imagine if playing a new video game or riding a rollercoaster could help you prepare for an exam or remember other critical information. A new study in mice shows this link may be ... read more

Sep. 7, 2016 — Dwarf galaxies are enigmas wrapped in riddles. Although they are the smallest galaxies, they represent some of the biggest mysteries about our universe. While many dwarf galaxies surround our own ... read more

Latest Top Headlines

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Experimental Drug Could Stop Melanoma, Other Cancers, Research Suggests

Sep. 7, 2016 — An experimental cancer drug works differently than intended and shows significant promise for stopping melanoma and possibly other forms ... read more

Driving or Talking? The Brain Concentrates on One Thing at a Time

Sep. 7, 2016 — When we are busy with something that requires the use of sight, the brain reduces hearing to make it easy for us, concludes a new study. The results give researchers a deeper understanding of what happens in the brain when we concentrate ... read more

Maternal Smoking Could Lead to an Increased Risk for Tourette Syndrome, Tic Disorders

Sep. 7, 2016 — An association between maternal smoking during pregnancy and an increased risk for Tourette syndrome and other chronic tic disorders has been uncovered by researchers. The link seems especially strong for complex presentations of Tourette syndrome ... read more

Zika Virus May Persist in Eyes: Disease May Spread from Infected Eyes

Sep. 6, 2016 — Zika virus is capable of infecting the eye, according to a new study. The study, in mice, helps explain why some people with Zika virus develop eye disease, and suggests that contact with infected eyes may play a role in spreading ... read more

Expanding When It Shouldn't: New Material With Exceptional Negative Compressibility

Sep. 7, 2016 — Our intuition tells us that a sample of material compressed uniformly from all sides should reduce its dimensions. Only a few materials subjected to hydrostatic compression exhibit the opposite behavior, expanding slightly in one or two directions. ... read more

Atomic Scale Pipes Available on Demand and by Design

Sep. 7, 2016 — Researchers have discovered how to create the smallest ever water and gas pipes that are only one atom ... read more

Scientists Discover What Extraordinary Compounds May Be Hidden Inside Uranus and Neptune

Sep. 6, 2016 — Scientists have discovered that the depths of Uranus, Neptune and their satellites may contain extraordinary compounds, such as Carbonic and Orthocarbonic acids (the latter also known as Hitler's acid).It is no accident researchers have chosen these ... read more

Earth's Carbon Points to Planetary Smashup

Sep. 5, 2016 — Research suggests that virtually all of Earth's life-giving carbon could have come from a collision about 4.4 billion years ago between Earth and an embryonic planet similar ... read more

Increased Ocean Acidification Is Due to Human Activities, Say Scientists

Sep. 7, 2016 — Oceanographers report that the northeast Pacific Ocean has absorbed an increasing amount of anthropogenic carbon dioxide over the last decade, at a rate that mirrors the increase of carbon dioxide emissions pumped into ... read more

Life History of the 360-Million-Year-Old Tetrapod Acanthostega Rewrites the Tetrapod Move to Land

Sep. 7, 2016 — Researchers have shown that fossils of the 360 million-year-old tetrapod Acanthostega, one of the iconic transitional forms between fishes and land animals, are not adults but all juveniles. This conclusion based on high-resolution synchrotron X-ray ... read more

Snake Eats Lizard Eats Beetle: Fossil Food Chain from the Messel Pit Examined

Sep. 7, 2016 — Scientists have examined a spectacular discovery from the UNESCO World Heritage site Messel Pit: A fossil snake in whose stomach a lizard can be seen, which in turn had consumed a beetle. The discovery of the approximately 48-million-year-old ... read more

Tuning the Instrument: Spider Webs as Vibration Transmission Structures

Sep. 6, 2016 — Two years ago, scientists revealed that, when plucked like a guitar string, spider silk transmits vibrations across a wide range of frequencies, carrying information about prey, mates and even the structural integrity of a web. Now, a new collaboration has confirmed that spider webs are superbly ... read more

Italy Quake Death Toll Nears 250, Rescue Work Intensifies

'Earth-Like' Planet Found Just Outside Solar System

Arctic Ice Melting in 2016 Heat: NASA

The Real Culprit Behind The Common Cold Might Be ... Camels?

Deaths from Ovarian Cancer Down Due to the Pill

Antibiotics in Early Life, Allergies Later?

Vaccine Against 'Flesh-Eating' Bacteria?

Biobank Storage Time Affects Blood Test Results

Sep. 6, 2016 — Deaths from ovarian cancer fell worldwide between 2002 and 2012 and are predicted to continue to decline in the USA, European Union and, though to a smaller degree, in Japan by 2020, according to new ... read more

Sep. 6, 2016 — New research shows that exposure to antibiotics early in life is related to increased risk of developing allergies later in ... read more

Sep. 5, 2016 — Biochemists have uncovered patterns in the outer protein coat of group A Streptococcus that could finally lead to a vaccine against this highly ... read more

Sep. 5, 2016 — The amount of time a blood sample used for medical research has been stored at a biobank may affect the test results as much as the blood sample provider's age, new research finds. Until now, medical ... read more

Latest Health Headlines

updated 7:28pm EDT

Other Layers of Immunity in TB/HIV Co-Infections Discovered

Sep. 6, 2016 — Researchers found some monkeys whose immune systems are depleted by the simian strain of HIV have a second line of defense against tuberculosis. The discovery could have significant impacts on future vaccines ... read more

Protein Subunit Found to Rescue Afflicted Neurons in Huntington's Disease

Sep. 6, 2016 — Using an experimental co-culture approach in which two different types of neurons from a mouse model of Huntington's disease (HD) are grown side-by-side, connecting to form critically impacted circuits, researchers have identified a subunit of a protein that, when expressed, reverse the mutated gene effects responsible for ... read more

Strong Social Support Is Related to Shorter Stay in Inpatient Rehab After Hospitalization

Sep. 7, 2016 — A recent study showed that patients with strong social support from family and friends spend less time in an inpatient rehabilitation facility. 'Without the social support of family and friends, patients take longer to return home to the community. We believe that support from loved ones may lead to better recovery and better quality of life,' ... read more

Sugar Transforms a Traditional Chinese Medicine Into a Cruise Missile

Sep. 7, 2016 — Chemical biologists report that tests of triptolide in human cells and mice are vastly improved by the chemical attachment of glucose to the triptolide ... read more

Posting Personal Experiences on Social Media May Help You Remember Them in the Future

Sep. 7, 2016 — Posting personal experiences on social media makes those events much easier to recall, a new study -- the first to look at social media's effect on memory -- has ... read more

Brain Peptide Research May Lead to Promising New Treatments for Mental Illnesses

Sep. 7, 2016 — Recent research points to the importance of a molecule called relaxin-3 in the brain, with effects on various processes and behaviors such as mood, stress, and cognition. Because these are often aberrant in mental illnesses, investigators are studying the potential of relaxin-3-based interventions to treat depression, anxiety, and other ... read more

Emotionally Invested Parents Give Children a Leg Up in Life

Sep. 7, 2016 — Children with emotionally invested parents are more likely to be successful, a study ... read more

Scientists Reverse Alcohol Dependence in Animal Models

Sep. 6, 2016 — The more a person drinks, the more they reinforce activation in the neuronal "circuit," which then drives further alcohol use and addiction. It's as if the brain carves a special path between alcohol and reward. Now researchers report that there may be a way to switch off the urge for compulsive drinking, based on a new study in animal ... read more

Extra Physical Education Classes May Benefit Bone Health in Girls, Study Shows

Sep. 7, 2016 — A long-term study carried out in four Swedish schools evaluated whether extra physical education classes (200 minutes weekly as opposed to 60 minutes weekly) would have an impact on bone parameters in growing children. The seven-year study specifically measured the impact of school-based exercise on tibia cortical bone mass distribution, finding ... read more

Early-Life Language Stimulation, Skills May Prevent Childhood Depression

Sep. 7, 2016 — Children who experience low levels of language learning stimulation beginning at three years of age are more likely to experience language delays by first grade and are three times more likely to develop depression by third grade, new research ... read more

Acetaminophen Not Associated With Worse Asthma in Kids

Sep. 7, 2016 — Children with mild, persistent asthma did not have worse asthma symptoms after taking acetaminophen (e.g., Tylenol) for pain or fever, compared to using ibuprofen (e.g., Advil), according to the results of a randomized, double-blind clinical ... read more

Antimicrobial Chemicals Found With Antibiotic-Resistance Genes in Indoor Dust

Sep. 7, 2016 — University of Oregon researchers have found links between the levels of antimicrobial chemicals and antibiotic-resistance genes in the dust of an aging building used for athletics and academics. One of the antimicrobials seen in the study is ... read more

In Iran, Kidney Donors Get Paid

Pfizer Buys Antibiotics Business

British Officials Want A Worldwide Ban On Microbeads In Cosmetics

How A Florida Teen Survived A Rare Brain-Eating Amoeba Infection

First Gravitational Waves Form Quickly

Supernova That Wasn't: Tale of 3 Cosmic Eruptions

Advancing 'Materials That Compute'

Building 'One-Handed' Drugs Easier Than Ever

Sep. 5, 2016 — If two galaxies collide, the merging of their central black holes triggers gravitational waves, which ripple throughout space. An international research team has now calculated that this occurs ... read more

Sep. 2, 2016 — Long-term observations with the Hubble Space Telescope revealed that Eta Carinae, a very massive star system that has puzzled astronomers since it erupted in a supernova-like event in the mid 19th ... read more

Sep. 2, 2016 — The potential to develop 'materials that compute' has taken another leap, after researchers for the first time have demonstrated that the material ... read more

Sep. 1, 2016 — Chemists have invented a new technique for constructing one-handed or 'chiral' drug molecules. The new method is already being adopted by pharmaceutical ... read more

Latest Physical/Tech Headlines

updated 7:28pm EDT

Team of Robots Learns to Work Together, Without Colliding

Sep. 7, 2016 — When you have too many robots together, they get so focused on not colliding with each other that they eventually just stop moving. Georgia Tech's new algorithms are different: they allow any number of robots to move within inches of each other, without colliding, to complete their task -- swapping locations on his lab floor. The roboticists are the first researchers to create such minimally ... read more

Tapping the Unused Potential of Photosynthesis

Sep. 7, 2016 — Scientists have reengineered the fundamental process of photosynthesis to power useful chemical reactions that could be used to produce biofuels, pharmaceuticals and ... read more

Humans May Be Uniquely Identified by the Proteins in Their Hair

Sep. 7, 2016 — Unique protein markers in hair could be used alongside DNA profiling for human identification, according to a new ... read more

Fuel Cell Membrane Outperforms Market: 'Goldilocks' Membrane Is Just About Right

Sep. 7, 2016 — Industrial interest is expected in a vehicular fuel cell membrane able to excrete protons at the most effective temperature ranges, allowing electrons to form an unimpeded ... read more

Detailed Age Map Shows How Milky Way Came Together

Sep. 6, 2016 — Using colors to identify the approximate ages of more than 130,000 stars in the Milky Way's halo, astronomers have produced the clearest picture yet of how the galaxy formed more than 13.5 billion years ... read more

Nanotubes Morphed Into Tougher Carbon for Spacecraft, Satellites

Sep. 6, 2016 — Researchers turn nanotubes into nanodiamonds and other forms of carbon by smashing them into a target at hypervelocity. The results will help in the design of light, strong materials for ... read more

NASA's SDO Witnesses a Double Eclipse

Sep. 2, 2016 — Early in the morning of Sept. 1, 2016, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, or SDO, caught both Earth and the moon crossing in front of the sun. SDO keeps a constant eye on the sun, but during SDO's semiannual eclipse seasons, Earth briefly blocks SDO's line of sight each day -- a consequence of ... read more

New Light on the Complex Nature of 'Hot Jupiter' Atmospheres

Sep. 2, 2016 — A team of international researchers used state-of-the-art modelling techniques to extensively study the atmosphere of a 'hot Jupiter' found 150 light-years from Earth. The scientists adapted the state-of-the art computer model used by the Met Office to study Earth's atmosphere to perform ... read more

Introducing Diversity in Online Language Analysis

Sep. 7, 2016 — For the past 30 years, computer science researchers have been teaching their machines to read standard English -- for example, by assigning back issues of the Wall Street Journal -- so computers can learn the English they need to run search engines like Google. But using only standard English has left out whole segments of society who use dialects and non-standard varieties of English, and the ... read more

New Service Improves Cloud Storage Usage on Mobile Devices

Sep. 7, 2016 — Researchers designed and developed StoArranger, a service to intercept, coordinate and optimize requests made by mobile apps and cloud storage services. StoArranger works as a 'middleware system,' so there is no change to how apps or an iPhone or Android-device run, just improved performance of both the device and the network ... read more

Discovery Creates Future Opportunity in Quantum Computing

Sep. 6, 2016 — Perovskite systems have been shown to be highly efficient at converting sunlight to electricity. Now, scientists have discovered a new use for perovskites that runs counter to the intended usage of the hybrid organic-inorganic ... read more

Computer Simulation to Spare Children from Heart Surgery

Sep. 6, 2016 — Children with congenital heart defects often undergo a battery of strenuous examinations and interventions. Now, researchers have developed software to simulate certain interventions in advance. Preliminary results point to a reduced need to perform ... read more

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'Robo-Taxis' Roam Around the Streets of Singapore

British Officials Want A Worldwide Ban On Microbeads In Cosmetics

Wearable Device Delivers Automatic Support for Weak Muscles

The First Star-Visiting Probe Will Need Some Ambitious Engineering

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Environment News

September 7, 2016

Ocean Warming: Impacts On Nature and Humans

Grasslands Will Suffer in a Warmer Future

Bees: Flowers a Link to Bacteria Transmission

How Ancient and Modern Fish Survived Youth

Sep. 6, 2016 — Ocean warming is affecting humans in direct ways and the impacts are already being felt, including effects on fish stocks and crop yields, more extreme weather events and increased risk from ... read more

Sep. 6, 2016 — Scientists said data from one of the world's longest-running climate-change experiments show that California grasslands will become less productive if the temperature or precipitation increases ... read more

Sep. 6, 2016 — Flowers are a hot spot of transmission of bacteria that end up in the microbiome of wild bees, new research has found. The work shows for the first time that multiple flower and wild bee species ... read more

Sep. 6, 2016 — The discovery of a group of young, prehistoric fish fossils provides some insights into the way the extinct creatures survived their youth -- and how fish today might be similar to ... read more

Latest Environment Headlines

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Elucidating Structure of Bacterial Flagellar Motor Protein

Sep. 7, 2016 — Researchers used biochemical techniques and electron microscopy to uncover the structure of the bacterial MotA protein, which forms part of the propeller motor (flagellum). Three-dimensional analysis found it is composed of a transmembrane component and cytoplasmic domain, while MotA molecules were ... read more

Pushing a Parasite from Land to Sea

Sep. 6, 2016 — Higher levels of rainfall and coastal development increase the risk of disease-causing organisms flowing to the ocean, according to a study. The work advances earlier work by tracking the parasite T. gondii to see how human-driven land-use change and rainfall might be impacting pathogen movement from land to ... read more

Crab from the Chinese Pet Market Turns out to Be a New Species of a New Genus

Sep. 7, 2016 — Shimmering carapaces make crabs attractive to pet owners. To answer the growing demand, fishermen collect and trade crustaceans, often not knowing what exactly they have handed over to their clients. Luckily for science and nature alike, however, ... read more

Historical Coexistence With Dingoes May Explain Bandicoot Avoidance of Domestic Dogs

Sep. 7, 2016 — Domestic dogs and cats were introduced to Tasmania two centuries ago, but bandicoots still fail to recognize these introduced predators as threats, according a ... read more

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Sep. 7, 2016 — Want to help mitigate global climate change? Grow some veggies. According to a new study, turning lawn into a vegetable garden can reduce greenhouse ... read more

New Perovskite Research Discoveries May Lead to Solar Cell, LED Advances

Sep. 7, 2016 — 'Promising' and 'remarkable' are two words a scientist has used to describe recent research results on organolead mixed-halide perovskites. Perovskites are optically active, semiconducting compounds that are known to display intriguing electronic, light-emitting and ... read more

In Eastern Tibetan Forest, Signs of Tree Growth Amid Climate Change

Sep. 7, 2016 — Word of mouth from nomadic herders led Lucas Silva into Tibetan forests and grasslands. What his team found was startling: rapid forest growth in tune with what scientists had been expecting from climatic changes triggered by rising levels of ... read more

Incubating Climate Change Research

Sep. 7, 2016 — A group of scientists have designed and built an inexpensive incubator that could boost research into how animals and plants will be affected by climate ... read more

13th Century Maya Codex, Long Shrouded in Controversy, Proves Genuine

Sep. 7, 2016 — The Grolier Codex, an ancient document that is among the rarest books in the world, has been regarded with skepticism since it was reportedly unearthed by looters from a cave in Chiapas, Mexico, in the 1960s. But a meticulous new study of the codex has yielded a startling conclusion: The codex is ... read more

An Exceptional Palaeontological Site Going Back 100,000 Years Is Unearthed in Arrasate

Sep. 6, 2016 — An important site containing at least 40 species reflecting fauna during the Upper Pleistocenewas discovered in 2012 by quarry workers after carrying out a blasting operation. When they spotted the presence of a great many fossil remains in the clay ... read more

Scientists Unearth Centuries-Old Crocodile Stone

Sep. 1, 2016 — The discovery of a carved stone crocodile by archaeologists has provided a key to revising long-held ideas about the ruins of the ancient city of Lambityeco in what is now ... read more

Clues in Ancient Mud Hold Answers to Climate Change

Sep. 1, 2016 — New research suggests that Africa has gradually become wetter over the past 1.3 million years -- instead of drier as was ... read more

Italy Quake Kills 159 as Rescuers Race to Find Survivors

Italy Quake Death Toll Nears 250, Rescue Work Intensifies

Cleanup Begins After Devastating Indiana Tornadoes

Quake Reduces Italian Village to Ruins

Learning Foreign Languages Sharpens Our Minds

Pain from Childhood Bullying Persists For Decades

LED-Lighting Influences the Activity of Bats

People Enhanced Environment Over 13,000 Years

Sep. 2, 2016 — Scientists say the more foreign languages we learn, the more effectively our brain reacts and processes the data accumulated in the course of ... read more

Sep. 1, 2016 — Childhood bullying inflicts the same long-term psychological trauma on girls as severe physical or sexual abuse, suggests a new survey of college students led by bullying ... read more

Sep. 1, 2016 — The widespread replacement of conventional bulbs in street lighting by energy-saving light-emitting diodes (LEDs) has considerable influence on bats as urban nocturnal hunters. Opportunistic bats ... read more

Aug. 30, 2016 — Human occupation is usually associated with deteriorated landscapes, but new research shows that 13,000 years of repeated occupation by British Columbia's coastal First Nations has had the opposite ... read more

Latest Society/Education Headlines

updated 7:28pm EDT

Americans Are More Politically Independent, More Polarized Than Ever

Sep. 7, 2016 — Today's young millennial voters are seen as a key demographic for political victory in many races this fall. Now, new research suggests that millennials' political views differ significantly from young people from previous ... read more

Earned Income Tax Credit Program Is a Boon for Health, Report Suggests

Sep. 7, 2016 — The Earned Income Tax Credit program is not only good for people's pocketbooks, but also for their health, new research shows. Findings of a new suggest that the program is much more cost-effective than many health interventions and has the added benefit of reversing mortality trends among low-income Americans in some states that have been experiencing increases in mortality in recent ... read more

White Racism Tied to Fatal Heart Disease for Blacks and Whites

Sep. 7, 2016 — Living in unabashedly racist communities can shorten the lives of both blacks and whites, according to new research. Researchers compared the racial biases of nearly 1.4 million people nationwide to death rates in more than 1,700 U.S. counties. Their findings suggest that blacks and, to a lesser degree, whites who reside in overtly racist communities are more prone to dying from heart disease and ... read more

Recessions Are Harmful to Health

Sep. 6, 2016 — A review of studies investigating the 2008 recession in Europe show it was associated with adverse health outcomes, particularly for suicides and mental health problems, finds a ... read more

Mobile Media, Visual Art Making Boost School Engagement

Aug. 31, 2016 — Keeping teens focused on what's happening in class rather than their electronic device is a tall order, given that 73 per cent of them have access to a smartphone -- and most would prefer to be on Instagram than at school. But what if making, sharing, liking and commenting on photos was part of the curriculum instead of a forbidden ... read more

Parents' Math Skills 'Rub Off' on Their Children

Sep. 1, 2016 — Parents who excel at math produce children who excel at math. This is according to a recent study that shows a distinct transfer of math skills from parent to child. The study specifically explored intergenerational transmission -- the concept of parental influence on an offspring's behavior or psychology -- in mathematic ... read more

Fair or Unfair? Facial Cues Influence How Social Exclusion Is Judged

Aug. 29, 2016 — People are often excluded from social groups. Whether uninvolved observers find this acceptable or not may depend on the facial appearances of those excluded. The exclusion of cold and incompetent looking people is more likely to ... read more

For Teens, Feeling Safe at School Means Increased Academic Success

Aug. 24, 2016 — Parents across North America are prepping their teens to head back to high school, hoping they will study hard to get straight A's. But new research shows that good grades aren't just based on smarts -- high marks also depend on a student's feelings of ... read more

Women Do Ask for Pay Rises but Don’t Get Them

Sep. 5, 2016 — New research shows that women ask for wage rises just as often as men, but men are 25 per cent more likely to get a raise when they ... read more

Nonwork Orientations Are Related to Higher Career and Life Satisfaction

Aug. 31, 2016 — When planning a career, many people take nonwork orientations into account, such as family, personal interests and civic engagement. Psychologists have found out that people who strongly consider the role of the family in career planning report more satisfaction with their career and their lives in general. Surprisingly, nonwork orientations also showed no negative effects on ... read more

How Telecommuting Can Cause Leadership Issues

Aug. 25, 2016 — Wherever your organization falls on the spectrum of telecommuting and virtual teams, new research reveals something about leadership and telecommuting that everyone should take ... read more

Music at Work Increases Cooperation, Teamwork

Aug. 23, 2016 — Music can have important effects on the cooperative spirits of those exposed to music, researchers report. A new article describes two studies they conducted to test the effect of different types of music on the cooperative behavior of individuals working as ... read more

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