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Biopesticides: The Future of Pest Control?
Have you ever marveled over the natural link among things that seem as totally disparate as stale beer, fox urine, fungi, canola oil, parasitic wasps, bacteria, garlic leaves and DDT? Well, if you said “yes” (and love doing lab work), you are all set to pursue a wonderful career in the newly budding field of “biopesticides”.
I found an interesting study by Wang et. al investigating how the current emotional state that we find ourselves in modulates the auditory response of speech early in the sensory processing stream at the cortical level. Here's their abstract.
The idealized scientist might start by questioning everything and assuming nothing. However, one usually has to make starting assumptions to get things going. For instance, David Hume proved that the notion that science works at all is founded on the un-provable assumption that the future will conform to the past (i.e., if e=mc2 yesterday, it will do so again tomorrow).
“Process” or axon outgrowth is a phenomenon well studied in neuronal cells, and is a process that requires, for the most part, a specialized structure at the tip of growing axons known as the neuronal growth cone.
According to Dick Morris, I've joined a cushy profession. Professors don't teach very much, which makes college expensive. He argues that by requiring faculty to work harder "approximating the work week the rest of us find normal" and holding down some administrative costs, the tuition can be cut in half!
It's been a month since the clamour and bustle about healthcare reform during the US Congress' summer break in August. The British blogosphere was then alight with spirited defenses of the NHS, like this piece from David Colquhoun. As Congress gets back to work, Obama is countering his critics with speeches on several of his main policy areas. Now that the dust has settled, I'd like to take a closer look at it. Please let us know what you think in the comments, either here on ScienceBlog or at Blue-Genes.net, where a spirited discussion has already started.
Scientists are people who learn from failures. No, wait, they grow from and even thrive on failures!
I'm constantly on the lookout for new research findings further substantiating sleep's significant effects on memory...perhaps in an attempt to finally convince myself that continuously misplacing my keys is NOT a normal part of young adulthood...and that 5 hours of shut-eye just isn't cutting it anymore (note to self: resist late night treks to Starbucks).
Ever fall in love with total abandon, experience mind-boggling sex, been sure you wanted to stay together forever -- and then notice recurring emotional friction arising? Does one of you sometimes becomes clingy or demanding while the other feels devoured and needs "space?"
This misery isn't necessarily due to bad luck or personality quirks. Quite possibly it's coming from an ancient genetic program running in a primitive part of your brain. It becomes more evident after lovers' initial booster shot of honeymoon neurochemistry wears off, so new lovers firmly believe they are immune -- as do people who aren't getting enough loving.
Atoms have the habit of jumping through solids - a practice that physicists have recently been able to follow for the first time using a brand new method. This scientific advance was made possible thanks to the utilisation of cutting-edge X-ray sources, known as electron synchrotrons.
What if one day we could disrupt unwanted consolidated memories like those of old traumatic experiences or even unforgettable heartbreaks and replace them with novel and more pleasant ones? Sounds like a tagline from the 2004 Oscar-winning film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind doesn't it?
Fractional quantum state hydrogen can only exists from a relativistic perspective . The Hydrino was dismissed by mainstream physicists because it was defined as having a ground state lower than the Bohr radius.
Magnetism, Gravity, and Energy
Up until the 1950’s, society believed that women only participated in sex either for the purposes of procreation or to satisfy their partner. There was shock and disbelief when Alfred Kinsey suggested that female sexuality might include women feeling sexual desire at all (‘Sexual behavior in the human female’ published 1953).
