"Imagine an inflated balloon attached to a pump, but much, much smaller. By pinching off the neck of the balloon with a noose, it is detached from the pump and is able to move about freely."
Vicious, winner-take-all competition in nature is an essential pillar of evolutionary theory, but it frequently describes the mindset people have about how, or whether, to teach the subject. Religious students sometimes come to class thinking that science and religion are in deliberate opposition, l...
News media and think tanks often call attention to achievement gaps in education, highlighting test-score differences between racial, ethnic and socio-economic groups. A related issue that gets little attention is the "excellence gap," the fact that minority and underprivileged students make up a di...
Alzheimer's disease drugs now being tested in clinical trials may have potentially adverse side effects, according to new Northwestern Medicine research. A study with mice suggests the drugs could act like a bad electrician, causing neurons to be miswired and interfering with their ability to send m...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration claims generic antiepileptic drugs have the same dosage, purity and strength as their brand-name counterparts and the two are interchangeable. But doctors and people with epilepsy remain concerned, citing widespread reports of individuals suffering seizures afte...
Unexpected new findings by a University of Maryland team of geochemists show that some portions of the Earth's mantle (the rocky layer between Earth's metallic core and crust) formed when the planet was much smaller than it is now, and that some of this early-formed mantle survived Earth's turbulent...
The galaxy Arp 220 is home to several giant star clusters—about 10 million solar masses—that are twice as massive as any comparable star cluster in the Milky Way Galaxy. McMaster University's Christine Wilson is captivated by this turbulent galaxy that provides such a target-rich envir...
Tinakula is a small, volcanic island in the South Pacific, located about 2,300 kilometers (1,400 miles) northeast of Brisbane, Australia. This natural-color satellite image (top) shows a plume of volcanic gas, possibly mixed with a bit of ash, rising above the island’s summit.
European-based speakers representing the fields of nuclear energy, genetically modified organisms, and harm reduction science in tobacco made the plea on 18 February at the Annual Meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science held in Vancouver, Canada. The panelists, each with p...
In the past few years, researchers at the University of Helsinki have made several breakthroughs in discovering how the brain of preterm babies work, in developing treatments to protect the brain, and in developing research methods suitable for hospital use.
An international team from the Nippon Foundation-University of British Columbia Nereus program has unveiled the first global model of life in the world's oceans, allowing scientists and policymakers to predict – and show through 3D visualizations – the state of life in the oceans of th...
Improving natural photosynthesis to make new fuels and boost crop production is the focus of Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) funded research presented at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Annual Meeting today. It could see us one step close...
