Researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have, for the first time, taken chimpanzee and bonobo skin cells and turned them into induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), a type of cell that has the ability to form any other cell or tissue in the body.
Texas A&M University and the University of Texas at Austin may be former football rivals, but the Lone Star State’s two research giants have teamed up to detect the most distant spectroscopically confirmed galaxy ever found — one created within 700 million years after the Big Bang.
Solar cells that produce electricity 24/7. Cell phones with built-in power cells that recharge in seconds and work for weeks between charges: These are just two of the possibilities raised by a novel supercapacitor design invented by material scientists at Vanderbilt University.
A study of the full genetic code of a common human virus offers a dramatic confirmation of the “out-of-Africa” pattern of human migration, which had previously been documented by anthropologists and studies of the human genome.
Researchers, using quantitative methods focused on the shape of dental fossils, find that none of the usual suspects fits the expected profile of an ancestor of Neanderthals and modern humans.
In this week’s issue of Nature Photonics scientists at the Joint Quantum Institute (*) report the first observation of topological effects for light in two dimensions, analogous to the quantum Hall effect for electrons. To accomplish this, they built a structure to guide infrared light over the surface of a room temperature, silicon-on-insulator chip.
A UCLA study is the first to identify a biological clock able to gauge the age of most human tissues. Some parts of the anatomy, like a woman’s breasts, age faster than the rest of the body.
Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have identified the key genes required for oil production and accumulation in plant leaves and other vegetative plant tissues. Enhancing expression of these genes resulted in vastly increased oil content in leaves, the most abundant sources of plant biomass-a finding that could have important implications for increasing the energy content of plant-based foods and renewable biofuel feedstocks.
A new image of the sunward plunging Comet ISON taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope on October 9, 2013, suggests that the comet is intact despite some predictions that the fragile icy nucleus might disintegrate as the Sun warms it. The comet will pass closest to the Sun on November 28.
A new study by researchers at North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND USA and the Universidad de Costa Rica shows that the furled leaves of Heliconia and Calathea plants where Spix’s disc-winged bats make their home actually help to amplify and transmit the social calls of the bats. The findings of Dr. Erin Gillam of NDSU and Dr. Gloriana Chaverri appear in the latest issue of the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
The investigators found that brain connectivity data from 19 paths in brain scans predicted whether the participants had autism, with an accuracy rate of 95.9 percent.
Team discovers first early-stage images from a stripped-envelope supernova.
An ambitious new study that includes Lisa Levin of Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego describes the full chain of events by which ocean biogeochemical changes triggered by manmade greenhouse gas emissions may cascade through marine habitats and organisms, penetrating to the deep ocean and eventually influencing humans.
A new species of the giant fish arapaima has been discovered from the Amazon, raising questions about what other species remain to be found and highlighting the potential for ecological problems when animals are relocated from their native habitats.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins have succeeded in making flattened, football-shaped artificial particles that impersonate immune cells. These football-shaped particles seem to be better than the typical basketball-shaped particles at teaching immune cells to recognize and destroy cancer cells in mice.
A new technology invented to automate the laborious process of preparing plant roots for phenotyping has morphed into a powerful tool for exploring the three-dimensional structure of small objects.
The global wheat industry sometimes loses as much as $1 billion a year because prolonged rainfall and high humidity contribute to grains germinating before they are fully mature. This phenomenon, known as pre-harvest sprouting or PHS, has such important economic repercussions for farmers around the world that scientists have been working on finding a solution to the problem for at least a couple of decades. Findings by a McGill team now suggest that the solution may lie not with genetics alone, but rather with a combination of genetic and epigenetic factors.
A study finds that hollow, land-based lava pillars in Iceland likely formed in a surprising reaction where lava met water without an explosion. Such formations are common deep under the ocean, but have not been described on land, the lead researcher says.
For years scientists have been working to fundamentally understand how nanoparticles move throughout the human body. One big unanswered question is how the shape of nanoparticles affects their entry into cells. Now researchers have discovered that under typical culture conditions, mammalian cells prefer disc-shaped nanoparticles over those shaped like rods.
When you heat a tiny droplet of liquid tin with a laser, plasma forms on the surface of the droplet and produces extreme ultraviolet (EUV) light, which has a higher frequency and greater energy than normal ultraviolet. Now, for the first time, researchers have mapped this EUV emission and developed a theoretical model that explains how the emission depends on the three-dimensional shape of the plasma. In doing so, they found a previously untapped source of EUV light, which could be useful for various applications including semiconductor lithography, the process used to make integrated circuits.
The left and right hemispheres of Albert Einstein’s brain were unusually well connected to each other and may have contributed to his brilliance.
A new study of an April 2011 tornado outbreak apparently affirms some new theories about factors that might enhance tornado development.
Examining a long-lived forest, researchers have measured mortality of Black Spruce trees in the northern forests of North America, and have found the dead trees aren’t being replaced by new ones. The result suggests trees might be storing more carbon than currently estimated.
The dramatic explosion of flowering plant species that occurred about 100 million years ago was thought to have been good news for evolving mammals. But new research suggests that wasn't necessarily the case.
New psychology research shows how genes can be stimulated or suppressed depending on the child's environment and could help bridge the achievement gap between rich and poor students.
A new study has found that “waviness” in forests of carbon nanotubes dramatically reduces their stiffness. Instead of being a detriment, the waviness may make the nanotube arrays more useful as thermal interface material for conducting heat away from integrated circuits.
New research shows that humans distinguish the difference between fine textures, such as silk or satin, through vibrations, which are picked up by two separate sets of nerve receptors in the skin and relayed to the brain.
Water vapor changes in the stratosphere contribute to warmer temperatures and likely play an important role in the evolution of Earth’s climate, says a research team led by a Texas A&M University professor.
A problem developing more efficient organic LED light bulbs and displays is that much of the light is trapped within the light-emitting diode, or LED. University of Utah physicists believe they have solved the problem by creating a new organic molecule that is shaped like rotelle – wagon-wheel pasta – rather than spaghetti.
A diagnosis of multiple sclerosis (MS) is a hard lot. Patients typically get the diagnosis around age 30 after experiencing a series of neurological problems such as blurry vision, wobbly gait or a numb foot. From there, this neurodegenerative disease follows an unforgiving course.
Certain anabolic steroids and pharmaceutical products last longer in the environment than previously known, according to a new study led by the University of Iowa. The researchers found that the steroid trenbolone acetate, along with some other pharmaceutical products, never fully degrade in the environment, and in fact can partially regenerate themselves. Results published online in the journal Science Express.
Drexel University researchers are continuing to expand the capabilities and functionalities of a family of two-dimensional materials they discovered that are as thin as a single atom, but have the potential to store massive amounts of energy. Their latest achievement has pushed the materials storage capacities to new levels while also allowing for their use in flexible devices.
Researchers from UNC School of Medicine have pinpointed the precise cellular connections responsible for triggering binge eating. The finding, published in Science, lends insight into a cause for obesity and could lead to treatments for anorexia, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder – the most prevalent eating disorder in the U.S.
The first scoop of soil analyzed by the analytical suite in the belly of NASA’s Curiosity rover reveals that fine materials on the surface of the planet contain several percent water by weight. The results were published today in Science as one article in a five-paper special section on the Curiosity mission. Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Dean of Science Laurie Leshin is the study’s lead author.
Researchers have found that the skeleton, acting through the bone-derived hormone osteocalcin, exerts a powerful influence on prenatal brain development and cognitive functions such as learning, memory, anxiety, and depression in adult mice. Findings from the mouse study could lead to new approaches to the prevention and treatment of neurologic disorders. The study was published today in the online edition of Cell.
UT Austin anthropologists confirm a direct link between upright two-legged (bipedal) walking and the position of the foramen magnum, a hole in the base of the skull that transmits the spinal cord.
A space-based laser system proposed to NASA by University of Alabama in Huntsville researchers could be a cost-effective way to nudge small asteroids away from a collision course with Earth.
Astronomers have uncovered the strange case of a neutron star with the peculiar ability to transform from a radio pulsar into an X-ray pulsar and back again. This star's capricious behavior appears to be fueled by a nearby companion star and may give new insights into the birth of millisecond pulsars.
In evolutionary terms, smell is among the oldest of the senses. In animals ranging from invertebrates to humans, olfaction exerts a primal influence as the brain continuously and subconsciously processes the steady stream of scent molecules that waft under our noses.
The dream of igniting a self-sustained fusion reaction with high yields of energy, a feat likened to creating a miniature star on Earth, is getting closer to becoming reality, according the authors of a new review article in the journal Physics of Plasmas.
Candida albicans is a double agent: In most of us, it lives peacefully, but for people whose immune systems are compromised by HIV or other severe illnesses, it is frequently deadly. Now a new study from Johns Hopkins and Harvard Medical School shows how targeting a specific fungal component might turn the fungus from a lion back into a kitten.
A University of Alabama in Huntsville graduate student and a recent UAH doctoral graduate are exploring surprising data from Voyager 1’s crossing of the heliopause into the interstellar medium of our galaxy.
GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Many ancient crustaceans went extinct following a massive collapse of reefs across the planet, and new University of Florida research suggests modern species living in rapidly declining reef habitats may now be at risk.
A camera trap set out for endangered Siberian (Amur) tigers in the Russian Far East photographed something far more rare: a golden eagle capturing a young sika deer.
With advances in neurofeedback techniques, the signal-to-noise ratio of the brain activity underlying our thoughts can be remastered, according to a recent discovery by a research team led by Stephen LaConte of the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute.
When we’re born, our brains aren’t very organized, but as we grow and learn, things get a bit more stable. How and why does this happen -- and what happens when it doesn’t go normally? Researchers have made a major stride in understanding this process, called synapse maturation.
A team of scientists from Canada and Australia has discovered that a decline in shark populations is detrimental to coral reefs. “Where shark numbers are reduced due to commercial fishing, there is also a decrease in the herbivorous fishes which play a key role in promoting reef health,” said Jonathan Ruppert, a recent University of Toronto PhD graduate. Ruppert was part of a team engaged in long-term monitoring of reefs off Australia's northwest coast.
In an article published on Wednesday, September 18, 2013, in the journal PLOS ONE, researchers at Cornell University’s Laboratory of Ornithology report that in some environments, songbirds exhibit inconsistency in their songs which may be caused by non-lethal levels of contaminants that persist in the sediments of the Hudson River region.
Brookhaven Lab scientists use simple, ‘green’ process to create novel core-shell catalyst that tolerates carbon monoxide in fuel cells and opens new, inexpensive pathways for zero-emission vehicles
Fossil data show scaling of limbs altered as birds originated from dinosaurs
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