SSS 2011-08-02

Plants are sitting ducks for every hungry herbivore that wanders past. But for some greens, a little grazing is the best thing that can happen. They grow back faster and fuller and make more seeds than they would have if left alone. Now scientists kn

SSS 2011-08-04

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Sophie Bushwick. Got a minute? The carbon molecule known as a buckyball, a member of the fullerene family, can act as a cage for a variety of other chemicals. And now researchers have used one to tra

SSS 2011-08-05

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Steve Mirsky. Got a minute? Its tough to beat watching a spaceship lift off. But for us audio fans, theres another sequence during launch preparation thats awfully compelling. At 12:18 P.M. Eastern t

SSS 2011-08-10

Invasive species get a bad rapbut we humans are usually to blame for their spread. Take Japanese stiltgrass, an invasive that arrived from Asia nearly 100 years ago as a packing material for porcelain. When it creeps into forests, it forms dense carp

SSS 2011-08-12

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Sophie Bushwick. Got a Minute? What's the best way to find out if an unknown mixture contains a specific substance, like an environmental contaminant? You could use an expensive, bulky gas chromatogr

SSS 2011-08-15

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. Conventional poultry farms use antibiotics extensively, which contributes to the rise of antibiotic-resistant pathogens. But farms that turn to organic

SSS 2011-08-16

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Katherine Harmon. Got a minute? Some 50 million Americans 65 and older currently get help from Medicare. But the program doesn't cover all of the patient's medications. After a patient's annual dru

SSS 2011-08-17

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Steve Mirsky. Got a minute? When a healthy rat smells a cat, it flees. But rats infected with the Toxoplasma brain parasite actually follow cat odors, often presumably to their doom, red in tooth a

SSS 2011-08-18

This is Scientific Americans 60-SecondScience. Im Steve Mirsky. Got a minute? The traveling salesman problem is afavorite math conundrum: if a salesman has to visit a bunch of cities, how doyou get him to all of them once via the shortest possible ro

SSS 2011-08-19

Some graduate students in science, technology, engineering and mathor STEMonly do research, under the guidance of a mentor. Other STEM grad students also have teaching responsibilities, for example, instructing undergrads or local high schoolers. Now

SSS 2011-08-22

Most large animals have to chew food extensively and form it into a mushy ball that's easy to swallow. Cooking makes a huge differenceit softens the food and dramatically reduces eating time. Researchers calculated that if we lived like our non-cooki

SSS 2011-08-23

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Steve Mirsky. Got a minute? To be honest with you, I didnt feel a thing. But many other Scientific American staffers felt the shaking a few minutes before 2 P.M. Eastern time. After checking Twitter

SSS 2011-08-24

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Christopher Intagliata. Got a minute? Rivers today have high muddy banks, sandbars and bends. But they didnt always look that way because it wasnt until the evolution of tree-like plants, some 330 mi

SSS 2011-08-25

This is Scientific Americans 60-SecondScience. Im John Matson, got a minute? Say you need a diamond. You could go downto the jeweler, or you could put some carbon deep underground and let it sitfor a couple billion years. Or you could hop in a starsh

SSS 2011-08-26

This is Scientific Americans 60-SecondScience, Im Christopher Intagliata. Got a minute? Historians have speculated for years thatglobal environmental changes caused some ancient wars to erupt, or evensocieties to collapse. Such connections may still

SSS 2011-08-30

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. Smart phones can provide music, movie times, bus schedules. They can even make phone calls! And now, they might help cut down fuel use while driving. T

SSS 2011-08-29

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. Many scientists draw their concepts.For example, if we look at the work of somebody like Maxwell or Faradywe know they drew as part of their inventing

SSS 2011-08-31

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Christopher Intagliata. Got a minute? Handwashing is the best way to avoid spreading infection, according to the CDC. But doctors, nurses and hospital staff wash up less than half as often as they