Herds of wooly mammoths once shook the earth beneath their feet, sending humans scurrying across the landscape of prehistoric Ohio. But then something much larger shook the Earth itself, and at that point these mega [...]
NASA Builds Unusual Testbed for Analyzing X-ray Navigation Technologies
Pulsars have a number of unusual qualities. Like zombies, they shine even though they’re technically dead, and they rotate rapidly, emitting powerful and regular beams of radiation that are seen as flashes of light, blinking [...]
Asthma symptoms impair sleep quality, school performance in children
The negative effects of poorly controlled asthma symptoms on sleep quality and academic performance in urban schoolchildren has been confirmed in a new study. “While it has been recognized that missed sleep and school absences [...]
Child maltreatment increases risk of adult obesity
Children who have suffered maltreatment are 36% more likely to be obese in adulthood compared to non-maltreated children, according to a new study by King’s College London. The authors estimate that the prevention or effective [...]
‘Whodunnit’ of Irish potato famine solved
It is the first time scientists have decoded the genome of a plant pathogen and its plant host from dried herbarium samples. This opens up a new area of research to understand how pathogens evolve [...]
Resistance to last-line antibiotic colistin makes bacteria resistant to immune system
Bacteria resistant to the antibiotic colistin are also commonly resistant to antimicrobial substances made by the human body, according to a study in mBio®, the online open-access journal of the American Society for Microbiology. Cross-resistance [...]
Genetic predictors of postpartum depression uncovered
The epigenetic modifications, which alter the way genes function without changing the underlying DNA sequence, can apparently be detected in the blood of pregnant women during any trimester, potentially providing a simple way to foretell [...]
Timing of cancer radiation therapy may minimize hair loss
Discovering that mouse hair has a circadian clock – a 24-hour cycle of growth followed by restorative repair – researchers suspect that hair loss in humans from toxic cancer radiotherapy and chemotherapy might be minimized [...]
Practice makes perfect? Not so much
Turns out, that old “practice makes perfect” adage may be overblown. New research led by Michigan State University’s Zach Hambrick finds that a copious amount of practice is not enough to explain why people differ [...]
Apigenin: The compound in the Mediterranean diet that makes cancer cells ‘mortal’
New research suggests that a compound abundant in the Mediterranean diet takes away cancer cells’ “superpower” to escape death. By altering a very specific step in gene regulation, this compound essentially re-educates cancer cells into [...]
Human-like opponents lead to more aggression in video game players
Video games that pit players against human-looking characters may be more likely to provoke violent thoughts and words than games where monstrous creatures are the enemy, according to a new study by researchers at the [...]