The happiest young couples may be involved in a different kind of engagement....
Recent News
Sweet News About Chocolate
Several recent large-scale research reviews have provided the best evidence yet that chocolate, derived from the seeds of the cocoa tree (Theobroma cacao), is good for your heart. In one review, in the British journal BMJ in August, researchers analyzed data from seven observational studies, which included more than 100,000 people. Those who ate the [...]
Diamond light, brighter than the sun
Imagine that the only thing limiting you is your imagination – that the physical means of achieving what you see in your mind’s eye is right in front of you. That, according to Professor Mark Hodson, is how it is for scientists at the Diamond synchrotron in Oxfordshire. With its curving walls, lined with walkways, [...]
This is your brain on games
Philosopher Sun Tzu once wrote that to know oneself and one’s opponent is to ensure victory in 100 battles. University of Alberta psychology researcher Kyle Mathewson’s research shows that the Chinese general may have been on to something. Mathewson and colleagues from the University of Illinois and University of California Berkeley were looking at how the [...]
Can fish oil can help prevent psychiatric disorders?
Researchers at Zucker Hillside Hospital’s Recognition and Prevention (RAP) Program who have worked with teenagers at risk for serious mental illness for the past decade are now studying the effectiveness of Omega 3 fatty acids (fish oil) for treating psychiatric symptoms. This new study is a National Institute of Mental Health-funded randomized double-blind trial that [...]
Milky Way’s black hole grazing on asteroids
The giant black hole at the center of the Milky Way may be vaporizing and devouring asteroids, which could explain the frequent flares observed, according to astronomers using data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory. For several years Chandra has detected X-ray flares about once a day from the supermassive black hole known as Sagittarius A*, [...]
Modern, low-energy ammunition can cause deep tissue damage
Gunshot injuries are typically categorized as low- or high-energy based on the weapon’s missile velocity and mass. Typically, low energy injuries are treated with simple wound care, with or without antibiotics, regardless of the presence of a fracture. In contrast, high energy injuries are treated more aggressively. A new study, “Handgun Injuries in 2012: What [...]
Fall of Communism changed mathematics in US
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1992 brought an influx of Soviet mathematicians to U.S. institutions, and those scholars’ differing areas of specialization have changed the way math is studied and taught in this country, according to new research by University of Notre Dame Economist Kirk Doran and a colleague from Harvard. Titled “The [...]
How stimulants calm hyperactivity
It has long been known that psychostimulant drugs have the paradoxical effect of reducing hyperactivity. [Psychostimulant drugs include methylphenidate – known by the trade names Ritalin, Concerta, and Methylin – and methamphetamine]. Since the mid-1950s, millions of children and adults have been prescribed stimulant medications to control attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). But for more [...]
Coffee grounds can make sewage less stinky
For coffee lovers, the first cup of the morning is one of life’s best aromas. But did you know that the leftover grounds could eliminate one of the worst smells around – sewer gas? In research to develop a novel, eco-friendly filter to remove toxic gases from the air, scientists at The City College of [...]
Satellite telephony is insecure
Satellite telephony was thought to be secure against eavesdropping. Researchers at the Horst Görtz Institute for IT-Security (HGI) at the Ruhr University Bochum (RUB) have cracked the encryption algorithms of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), which is used globally for satellite telephones, and revealed significant weaknesses. In less than an hour, and with simple [...]
People with easy to pronounce names win friends and favour
In the first study of its kind, and published in the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, researchers analysed how the pronunciation of names can influence impression formation and decision-making. In particular, they demonstrated “the name pronunciation effect,” which occurs when people with easy–to-pronounce names are evaluated more positively than those with difficult-to-pronounce names. The study [...]
‘Fracture putty’ to repair broken bone in days
Broken bones in humans and animals are painful and often take months to heal. Studies conducted in part by University of Georgia Regenerative Bioscience Center researchers show promise to significantly shorten the healing time and revolutionize the course of fracture treatment. “Complex fractures are a major cause of amputation of limbs for U.S. military men [...]
Entire genome of close human relative decoded from fossil
The Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, in Leipzig, Germany, has completed the genome sequence of a Denisovan, a representative of an Asian group of extinct humans related to Neandertals. In 2010, Svante Pääbo and his colleagues presented a draft version of the genome from a small fragment of a human finger bone discovered in [...]
How the brain detects an imminent collision
When you are about to collide into something and manage to swerve away just in the nick of time, what exactly is happening in your brain? A new study from the Montreal Neurological Institute and Hospital – The Neuro, McGill University shows how the brain processes visual information to figure out when something is moving [...]
Add dessert to menu to improve weight loss
When it comes to diets, cookies and cake are off the menu. Now, in a surprising discovery, researchers from Tel Aviv University have found that dessert, as part of a balanced 600-calorie breakfast that also includes proteins and carbohydrates, can help dieters to lose more weight — and keep it off in the long run. [...]
Viking apocalypse linked to elite killers of the medieval world
A crew of Viking mercenaries – some of the fiercest and most feared killers in the medieval world – could be the occupants of a mysterious mass grave in the south of England, according to a new theory. The intriguing hypothesis is being put forward in a documentary, Viking Apocalypse, which will premiere on National [...]
Brain cells created from patients’ skin cells
Cambridge scientists have, for the first time, created cerebral cortex cells – those that make up the brain’s grey matter – from a small sample of human skin. The researchers’ findings, which were funded by Alzheimer’s Research UK and the Wellcome Trust, were published today in Nature Neuroscience. Diseases of the cerebral cortex range from [...]
Surface of Mars an unlikely place for life after 600 million year drought
Mars may have been arid for more than 600 million years, making it too hostile for any life to survive on the planet’s surface, according to researchers who have been carrying out the painstaking task of analysing individual particles of Martian soil. Dr Tom Pike, from Imperial College London, will discuss the team’s analysis at [...]
Scientists to watch cancer cells in action at unprecedented resolution
A photograph of a polar bear in captivity, no matter how sharp the resolution, can never reveal as much about behavior as footage of that polar bear in its natural habitat. The behavior of cells and molecules can prove even more elusive. Limitations in biomedical imaging technologies have hampered attempts to understand cellular and molecular [...]
How New Viruses Evolve, and in Some Cases, Become Deadly
In the current issue of the journal Science, researchers at Michigan State University, the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of Texas at Austin demonstrate how a new virus evolves, which sheds light on how easy it can be for diseases to gain dangerous mutations. The scientists showed for the first time how the [...]
