SSS 2010-01-01

We like to think that medical equipment implanted in our bodies undergoes rigorous testing before its put inside a person. Thats not always the case, at least for cardiovascular devices. Thats according to an article in the Journal of the American Me

SSS 2010-01-04

No surprise: machines and humans have differing opinions about art. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute and the University of Girona had computers and non-art expert humans place each of 275 paintings into one of 11 artistic periods, for exampl

SSS 2010-01-05

Sometimes it pays to look like a pile of poop. At least if youre a tasty caterpillar trying to avoid getting eaten by hungry birds. Because a study in the journal Science shows that even young chicks tend to overlook caterpillars disguised as dung. A

SSS 2010-01-06

Stereotypes are usually the last thing to change in the face of contradictory evidence. A case in point is the long held belief that boys are better at mathematics than girls. Well a meta-analysis to be published in the journal Psychological Bulletin

SSS 2010-01-07

It's hard to mistake that sound. Now imagine hearing it during a night that can last for months and where temperatures drop as low as 37 degrees Celsius. Enough to give nightmares to musk ox and Arctic hares, the favorite prey of the long-legged whit

SSS 2010-01-11

When people suffer from a migraine, they often retire to a cave-like dark room. But exactly why does bright light hurt the migraine sufferer? A possible answer was published this week in the online issue of journal Nature Neuroscience. A big clue was

SSS 2010-01-12

If youve ever had a garden or grown flowers in a window box, youve probably heard that you shouldnt water your plants at high noon because their leaves might scorch. Now a study in a journal called New Phytologist confirms that water droplets can foc

SSS 2010-01-13

The author David Allen is considered to be one of world's top consultants when it comes to personal productivity. He's perhaps best known for his self-help time management book-Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity that has for yea

SSS 2010-01-14

What do a whale and a frog have in common? According to a study published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, pound for pound, they sound the same. Sounds fishy? I mean, if you've ever heard the eerie song of the humpback whale [whale song], you

SSS 2010-01-15

For astronomers who study the large-scale structure of the universe, dwarf galaxies have proven quite vexing. Because the leading model of cosmology has been unable to account for their relative lack of substance. Now scientists writing in the journa

SSS 2010-01-18

Your feet may love running shoes. But what about the rest of your body? New research finds that running shoes actually increase the pressure on ankles, knees and hipsmore than high heels can during walking. Thats according to a study in the Journal o

SSS 2010-01-19

Most of us blink without thinking. But people whove sustained strokes or combat injuries can lose their ability to blink. Which is important for lubricating and cleaning the eye. Surgery is an optiona small piece of muscle transplanted from the leg c

SSS 2010-01-20

Ever wonder what your French fries were fried in? Like bumbling burglars who leave fingerprints at a crime scene, cooking oils leave their own clues. And by measuring the carbon isotopes in French fries, University of Hawaii researchers found that on

SSS 2010-01-21

At one time or another, youve probably said, Its a small world. Well, it used to be much, much smaller. Because according to scientists from the University of Utah, about a million years ago our ancestors numbered fewer than 20,000. The estimate appe

SSS 2010-01-22

When you picture ancient Egyptian beauties such as Queen Nefertiti or Cleopatra, theyre probably wearing dramatic black eyeliner. Ancient Egyptians believed that eye makeup had properties bestowed by the gods that protected the wearers from illness.

SSS 2010-01-25

They say that men dont like to ask for directions. Well, that reluctance to seek expert advice may extend to the shopping cart. Because a study in the Journal of Consumer Marketing finds that guys also will likely avoid asking salespeople for suggest

SSS 2010-01-26

What was around the bend in rivers hundreds of millions of years ago? Its a trick questionbecause there werent any bends. Ancient rivers were typically just wide, sheetlike flows of water. New reports in the journals Geology and Earth-Science Reviews

SSS 2010-01-27

We all know that talking on a cell phone can impair our ability to drive (although too many of us do it anyway). Now a study in the journal Psychonomic Bulletin and Review shows that the reverse is also true: driving makes it hard to keep track of wh

SSS 2010-01-28

Studies from around the world have reported that men are more jealous of sexual infidelity than emotional infidelity. And women are the oppositetheyre more jealous of emotional cheating than sexual cheating. And experts often lean on an evolutionary

SSS 2010-01-29

Organisms evolved sexual reproduction so they could stay one step ahead of parasites. Or so the theory goes. But what about beasties that make babies without sex? How do they escape infection? A study in the journal Science suggests that for bdelloid