Curated News: Staff Picks

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The move from life on land to life in the sea has led to the evolution of a new sense for sea snakes, a University of Adelaide-led study suggests.

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Overall impact of recreation on wildlife was minor compared with factors such as large undisturbed forest habitat and local housing density.

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Researchers describe the use of chemical analysis of ear-stones or “otoliths” to tease out details of a fish’s life story, potentially revealing the migratory routes and environments the fish encountered in its travels.

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New research reports that, contrary to popular belief, mammals began their massive diversification 10 to 20 million years before the extinction of the dinosaurs.

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It's common now to see people snubbing social companions to concentrate on their smartphone. But what causes this behaviour - known as 'phubbing' - and how did it come to be regarded as normal?

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Our Earth consists of silicate rocks and an iron core with a thin veneer of water and life. But the first potentially habitable worlds to form might have been very different. New research suggests that planet formation in the early universe might have created carbon planets consisting of graphite, carbides, and diamond. Astronomers might find these diamond worlds by searching a rare class of stars.

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One of the longest and largest studies of coral reef health ever undertaken finds that corals are declining worldwide because a variety of threats -- overfishing, nutrient pollution and pathogenic disease -- that ultimately become deadly in the face of higher ocean temperatures.

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Cheap cameras on drones can be used to measure environmental change which affects billions of people around the world, new research from the University of Exeter shows.

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Chronic marijuana use disrupts the brain's natural reward processes, according to researchers at the Center for BrainHealth at The University of Texas at Dallas.

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Most parents will admit that talking with a teenage child can be difficult. It's even more challenging when they don’t speak the same language – a reality for a growing number of immigrant families. New research suggests this language barrier can have negative consequences.

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A new disposable battery that folds like an origami ninja star could power biosensors and other small devices for use in challenging field conditions, says an engineer at Binghamton University, State University of New York. Seokheun “Sean” Choi, assistant professor of computer and electrical engineering at Binghamton University, along with two of his students, developed the device, a microbial fuel cell that runs on the bacteria available in a few drops of dirty water. They report on their invention in a new paper published online in the journal Biosensors and Bioelectronics.

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Australian researchers at the University of Adelaide have developed a method for embedding light-emitting nanoparticles into glass without losing any of their unique properties – a major step towards ‘smart glass’ applications such as 3D display screens or remote radiation sensors.

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New research from the University of British Columbia finds that rogue fishing vessels are able to secure insurance including those that have been flagged by international watchdogs for unlawful activity.

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A radical new process that allows hydrogen to be efficiently sourced from liquid formic acid could be one step forward in making the dream of hydrogen-powered cars an economic reality.

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Research has found that hearing loss has wide-ranging impacts not only on older people's ability to communicate, but also on their ability to move about and participate in different hobbies and activities. This has been revealed in studies funded by the Academy of Finland whose results have been published in international scientific journals.

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People disabled by a stroke demonstrated substantial recovery long after the event when modified adult stem cells were injected into their brains.

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An innovative wearable technology for standing desks that creates a new way of interacting with your computer could reduce cyberslacking and increase healthy movement.

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Women are almost twice as likely to experience anxiety as men, according to a review of existing scientific literature, led by the University of Cambridge. The study also found that people from Western Europe and North America are more likely to suffer from anxiety than people from other cultures.

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New research into the ringing-ear condition known as tinnitus indicates an alarming level of early, permanent hearing damage in young people who are exposed to loud music, prompting a warning from a leading Canadian researcher in the field.

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NYU Langone researchers publish first study to quantify nutritional quality of food and drinks endorsed by music celebrities popular among teens.

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New research from University of Utah researcher Nicholas H. Wolfinger explores counterintuitive trends in the link between premarital sex and marital stability.

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It's time to say goodbye to ineffective and costly cancer treatments. Japanese scientists have found unique genetic alterations that could indicate whether expensive immune checkpoint inhibitors would be effective for a particular patient.

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It has been known for years that personality traits of animals, such as aggressiveness, risk-taking, curiosity or sociality, may have far-reaching consequences for reproduction and survival. However, separating the effect of personality from other factors, such as environmental conditions, is not easy. If the natural environment of the animals is subjected to strong fluctuations, the different personalities may have different consequences depending on the prevailing situation.

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Dartmouth College scientists have discovered that marine microalgae can completely replace the wild fish oil currently used to feed tilapia, the second most farmed fish in the world and the most widely farmed in the United States.

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Scientists at the University of British Columbia and Vancouver Coastal Health have proven that multiple sclerosis (MS) can be caused by a single genetic mutation – a rare alteration in DNA that makes it very likely a person will develop the more devastating form of the neurological disease.

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Bosses play no role in fostering a sense of meaningfulness at work - but they do have the capacity to destroy it and should stay out of the way, new research shows.

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In collaboration with Alexion Pharmaceuticals, Inc., scientists from Aarhus University have used X-rays to understand how the therapeutic antibody eculizumab prevents our immune system from destroying red blood cells and damaging kidney tissue.

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Research shows that the human protein, IFITM3, blocks Zika virus replication and prevents cell death.

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New research suggests that early severe social deprivation may impact DNA modifications that affect the expression of stress-related genes. These nongenetic (or epigenetic) modifications occur when molecules called methyl groups are added to components of DNA.

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Click to visit the DOE Office of Science channel

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Malicious hacking online costs the private and corporate sectors up to $575 billion annually, according to internet security firm McAfee. While security agencies seek out "ethical" hackers to help combat such attacks, little is known about the personality traits that lead people to pursue and excel at hacking. A recent study published on Frontiers in Human Neuroscience now shows that a characteristic called systemizing provides insight into what makes and motivates a hacker.

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Geophysical monitoring of the ground above active supervolcanoes shows that it rises and falls as magma moves beneath the surface of the Earth. Silica-rich magmas like those in the Yellowstone region and along the western margin of North and South America can erupt violently and explosively, throwing vast quantities of ash into the air, followed by slower flows of glassy, viscous magma.

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A Nagoya University researcher and his leading international research group discovered a Great Platform built with different kinds of stone at the archeological site of San Andrés, El Salvador, and challenged the prevailing theory regarding the sociocultural development of Southeastern Maya frontier.

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Inaccessibility and mysticism surrounding the mist-veiled mountains of the central Andes make this region promising to hide treasures. With an area of 2197 km2, most of the Llanganates National Park, Ecuador, is nearly unreachable and is traversed only by foot. However, fieldwork conducted by researchers from the Museo de Zoología at Catholic University of Ecuador resulted in the discovery of a more real and tangible gem: biodiversity.

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A study led by the Laboratory Evolutionary Biology and Ecology of the Université libre de Bruxelles published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, shows that the humivorous French Guianan termite Cavitermes tuberosus routinely practice asexual queen succession (parthenogenesis).

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A program encouraging overweight or obese adolescents to increase their physical activity through use of their everyday environment, rather than organized classes or sports programs, produced significant increases in participants' daily physical activity that were sustained for at least three to four months. A report on a pilot study conducted at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) health center in Revere, Mass., is being published online in the Journal of Adolescent Health.

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Male students in undergraduate introductory biology courses are outperforming females at test time, but it may be due to how exams are designed rather than academic ability. In addition, high socioeconomic status students are performing better than lower-status students on those same tests.

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Neuroscience researchers identify a gene critical for human brain development and unravel how it works.

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Get the latest research and features in healthcare, including hospital administration, patient care, and health economics in Newswise's Healthcare News Source.

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Researchers from Michigan State University are using Mira to perform large-scale 3-D simulations of the final moments of a supernova’s life cycle. While the 3-D simulation approach is still in its infancy, early results indicate that the models are providing a clearer picture than ever before of the mechanisms that drive supernova explosions.

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Hubble Space Telescope astronomers have discovered that the universe is expanding 5-9% percent faster than expected. They made the discovery by refining the universe's current expansion rate to unprecedented accuracy, reducing the uncertainty to only 2.4%. The team made the refinements by developing innovative techniques that improved the precision of distance measurements to faraway galaxies. These measurements are fundamental to making more precise calculations of how fast the universe expands with time, a value called the Hubble constant.

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A University of Montana graduate student's research on Alaskan brown bears and red salmon is the May cover story of the high-profile journal Ecology.

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Using a reverse paint-by-numbers approach, scientists have located another gene that controls the brilliant patterning of Heliconius butterfly wings. Led by former Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) fellow Nicole Nadeau, the researchers identified variations in the gene that correspond to wing color and pattern variation in three different Heliconius species.

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Part of Antarctica has been losing ice to the ocean for far longer than had been expected, satellite pictures reveal.

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Researchers have long known that sex hormones such as estrogen play a role in migraine. But there’s been little research on how that works. Do women with migraine have higher estrogen levels in general? Higher levels at the peak of the monthly cycle?

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Archaeologists studying the distribution of ancient rice believe they may be close to solving one of the enduring mysteries of the ancient world - how people of South East Asian origin ended up living on the African island of Madagascar, 6,000 km away.

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New research by the University of Stirling has found that men who are perceived low in masculinity can significantly increase this by applying deodorant, but that this is not the case for men who already have high levels of masculinity.

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Fate of region's large carbon reserves could affect greenhouse gas concentration.

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Employees (or shift workers), who punch in for graveyard or rotating shifts, are more prone to numerous health hazards, from heart attacks to obesity, and now, new research, published in Endocrinology, shows shift work may also have serious implications for the brain.