SSS 2011-10-10

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm John Matson. Got a minute? Earth's surface is dominated by oceans. But where did all that water come from? Asteroids and comets smashing into the early Earth have long been thought to be a promisin

SSS 2011-12-14

When it comes to sheer celestial bling, stars might not corner the market on twinkle, because beneath their rocky exteriors, some terrestrial planets may be half diamond. So said scientists at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union. The r

SSS 2011-12-08

Golf fans always suspected it: before his infamous improprieties, the mere presence of Tiger Woods could panic other pros. Now, economist Jennifer Brown has figured out how strong that Tiger factor was. She analyzed a decade's worth of PGA events, co

SSS 2011-12-06

Three seconds to shoot. Its Reggie! And its Indiana by eight! Reggie Miller, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant. Theyve all gone on seemingly memorable shooting streaks. But past research has shown that the so-called hot hand is a myth, rooted in our tenden

SSS 2011-12-05

Why do cheaters cheat? Perhaps because they can think up original ways to avoid work: a new study finds that creativity is tied to a willingness to cheat. The work is in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The teacher hands back copies

SSS 2011-11-18

On November 8th, Russia launched a probe toward the tiny Martian moon Phobos. The launch was picture-perfect, and the spacecraft, called PhobosGrunt, soared into the night sky over Kazakhstan. The good news stops there. For instead of boosting itself

SSS 2011-07-04

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Steve Mirsky at the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting in Lindau Germany.This will just take a little more time than our usual minute. Why do I talk so much on money, when I'm a professor public health?

SSS 2011-06-08

You shouldn't judge a book by its cover, and you shouldn't judge a species by place of its origin, so say ecologists in the commentary in the Journal Nature. They argued that conservation should access organisms based on their impact on the local env

SSS 2011-06-01

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. Meatloaf, mac-and-cheese or a big bowl of mashed potatoes. We all have our comfort foods. Except for people with anorexia. Food makes them extremely unco

SSS 2011-05-16

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. If you want to guess how many jelly beans are in a jar, you should ask your friends. Then average their answers. Because a group guess is often more accu

SSS 2011-05-06

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. Albert Einstein wins again. A new study has confirmed another prediction of his theory of general relativity. The corroboration appears online in the jou

SSS 2011-09-06

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. Labor Days over, and Americans fortunate enough to have jobs are getting back to work. But all work and no play might make us, well, less productive. Tha

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 2011-08-02

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 2011-02-07

Patients undergoing coronary bypass surgery need implants of new, healthy blood vessels. So do those who receive repeated hemodialysis due to kidney failure. The best option is to use the patient's own veins or arteries, but thousands of patients don

SSS 2011-03-02

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. They say that love is blind. And that's probably for the best. Because a new study shows that people who greatly idealize their spouses have the happiest

SSS 2011-02-11

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. Ahhh, the great outdoors. Great for your health, too. Because studies suggest that the more we visit local parks, the more fit we are. Researchers at Pen

SSS 2011-04-12

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Steve Mirsky. Got a minute? One of the things that amazed me was when we brought business people back to say, What dont we teach you in school, these were physicists who became business people. We di

SSS 2011-01-05

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. January often gets people thinking about what they've accomplished over the past 12 months. This year, it got the editors of the medical journal the Lanc

SSS 2011-01-06

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science, Im Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. We produce tears in response to insults to the eyesthe sting of onion fumes, a tiny insect that flew into your cornea. But we also produce emotional tear