It has been one of the great murder mysteries of the garden: what is killing off the honeybees?
Since 2006, 20 to 40 percent of the bee colonies in the United States alone have suffered colony collapse
. Suspected culprits ranged from pesticides to genetically modified food.
Now, a unique partnership – of military scientists and entomologists – appears to have achieved a major breakthrough: identifying a new suspect, or two — via redwolf.newsvine.com
When it comes to genomes, size matters — and British scientists say a rare and striking plant native to Japan is in a perilous position.
Researchers at Britain’s Kew Botanical Gardens say the plant, Paris japonica, has the largest genome yet recorded, putting it at high risk of extinction — via redwolf.newsvine.com
A new chemical process may help unlock biofuels from trees and plant waste in a shift from using food crops such as sugar cane to generate fuel, scientists said Thursday — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Super-strong, highly conductive yarns made from extraordinarily thin carbon tubes could one day find use in spacesuits, bulletproof vests and radiation suits, researchers now suggest.
Carbon nanotubes are hollow pipes just nanometers or billionths of a meter in diameter – dozens to hundreds of times thinner than a wavelength of visible light. They can possess a range of extraordinary physical and electrical properties, such as being roughly 100 times stronger than steel at one-sixth the weight– via redwolf.newsvine.com
The formation of Saturn’s rings has been one of the classical if not eternal questions in astronomy. But one researcher has provided a provocative new theory to answer that question. Robin Canup from the Southwest Research Institute has uncovered evidence that the rings came from a large, Titan-sized moon that was destroyed as it spiraled into a young Saturn — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Researchers in the Midwest are developing microelectronic circuitry to guide the growth of axons in a brain damaged by an exploding bomb, car crash or stroke. The goal is to rewire the brain connectivity and bypass the region damaged by trauma, in order to restore normal behavior and movement — via redwolf.newsvine.com
In a study that could eventually restore movement to humans’ paralyzed limbs, researchers at California’s Stanford University have used light to induce muscle contractions in mice. A gene derived from algae was inserted into the mice, encoding a light-sensitive protein which adhered to their nerve cell surfaces. Scientists then placed an optical cuff
lined with tiny, inwards-facing LEDs around the mice’s sciatic nerves. By penetrating those nerves with brief, high-intensity bursts of blue light, they were able to produce muscle contractions similar to those that would occur naturally. The technology is called optogenetics
— via redwolf.newsvine.com
Scientists have invented an efficient way to produce apparently safe alternatives to human embryonic stem cells without destroying embryos, a long-sought step toward bypassing the moral morass surrounding one of the most promising fields in medicine.
A team of researchers at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute in Boston published a series of experiments Thursday showing that synthetic biological signals can quickly reprogram ordinary skin cells into entities that appear virtually identical to embryonic stem cells. Moreover, the same strategy can then turn those cells into ones that could be used for transplants — via silentrebellion.newsvine.com
Astronomers have discovered a potentially habitable planet of similar size to Earth in orbit around a nearby star.
A team of planet hunters spotted the alien world circling a red dwarf star called Gliese 581, 20 light years away.
The planet is in the “Goldilocks zone” of space around a star where surface temperatures are neither too hot nor too cold for liquid water to form — via redwolf.newsvine.com
The mysteries of bat sex and whale snot and an unusual way to deal with human pain were the focus on Thursday of the annual tongue-in-cheek Ig Nobel Prizes.
ENGINEERING: Karina Acevedo-Whitehouse, Agnes Rocha-Gosselin and Diane Gendron for developing a method to collect whale snot using a remote control helicopter.
MEDICINE: Simon Rietveld, Ilja van Beest for investigating asthma on a rollercoaster.
TRANSPORTATION PLANNING: Toshiyuki Nakagaki, Atsushi Tero, Seiji Takagi, Tetsu Saigusa, Kentaro Ito, Kenji Yumiki, Ryo Kobayashi, Dan Bebber, Mark Fricker for using slime mould to determine the optimal routes for railroad tracks.
PHYSICS: Lianne Parkin, Sheila Williams and Patricia Priest for demonstrating that wearing socks on the outside of your shoes helps prevent slipping on ice.
PEACE: Richard Stephens, John Atkins and Andrew Kingston for confirming that swearing helps relieve pain.
PUBLIC HEALTH: Manuel Barbeito, Charles Mathews and Larry Taylor for determining that microbes cling to bearded scientists.
ECONOMICS: The executives and directors of Goldman Sachs, AIG, Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch, and Magnetar for creating and promoting new ways to invest money that maximize financial gain and minimize financial risk.
CHEMISTRY: Eric Adams, Scott Socolofsky and Stephen Masutani for disproving the belief that water and oil don’t mix.
MANAGEMENT: Alessandro Pluchino, Andrea Rapisarda and Cesare Garofalo for demonstrating mathematically that organizations would become more efficient if promotions were made at random.
BIOLOGY: Libiao Zhang, Min Tan, Guangjian Zhu, Jianping Ye, Tiyu Hong, Shanyi Zhou, Shuyi Zhang of China and Gareth Jones for scientifically documenting fruit bat fellatio — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Scientists have identified a genetic defect linked to migraine which could point the way to new avenues of research and treatment targets — via redwolf.newsvine.com
A swarm of thousands of earthquakes that struck the corner of Saudi Arabia nearest to Egypt in 2009 helped reveal that the area is unexpectedly volcanically active, scientists now report — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Quadbeck and colleagues have created a titanium implant with a foam-like structure, inspired by the spongy nature of bone — via redwolf.newsvine.com
A German study has found that European brown hares are capable of being pregnant twice at the same time, and can potentially be permanently pregnant — via redwolf.newsvine.com
There are plenty of studies which show that dogs act as social catalysts, helping their owners forge intimate, long-term relationships with other people. But does that apply in the workplace? Christopher Honts and his colleagues at Central Michigan University in Mount Pleasant were surprised to find that there was not much research on this question, and decided to put that right. They wondered in particular if the mere presence of a canine in the office might make people collaborate more effectively. And, as they told a meeting of the International Society for Human Ethology in Madison, Wisconsin, on August 2nd, they found that it could — via redwolf.newsvine.com
The heavy rain across much of Queensland might be causing flash flooding, cutting off towns and grounding flights, but it is also causing some people to rejoice — via redwolf.newsvine.com
World leaders will next week consider a target for halting extinctions of animals and plants by 2020 that many experts rate impossibly ambitious given mounting threats such as climate change and loss of habitats — via redwolf.newsvine.com
New self-assembling photovoltaic technology can keep repairing itself to avoid any loss in performance — via redwolf.newsvine.com
Researchers in Perth are hoping a new vaccine against the potentially deadly dengue fever will be available within five years — via redwolf.newsvine.com
A “lost” population of tigers has been caught on camera living in the mountains of Bhutan, a discovery that could be crucial for the big cats’ survival. Their discovery has stunned experts, as the tigers are living at a higher altitude than any others known and appear to be successfully breeding. Their presence in the Bhutan highlands has been confirmed by footage taken by a BBC natural history camera crew — via richardfarner.newsvine.com
RSS – Posts