Scientific American

Platypus Genome Is Duckbill Oddball [60-Second Science]

Tue, 13 May 2008 10:45:08 EST

[The following is an exact transcript of this podcast.]

Robin Williams thought that the platypus was cobbled together by an inebriated deity: “Let’s take a beaver. Let’s put on a duck’s bill.” Now we know how weird the platypus is at the genetic level. Because researchers published the sequence of the platypus genome in the May 8th issue of the journal Nature. Brown University biologist Kenneth Miller commented on the platypus genome research that same night at the American Museum of Natural History:

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Thousands Dead, Missing In China Earthquake [News]

Tue, 13 May 2008 08:30:00 EST

SHANGHAI, China--The death toll from a 7.9-magnitude earthquake that rocked western China yesterday rose to nearly 12,000 and scores more were feared dead as rescuers continued to sift through the rubble of flattened schools and homes in search of thousands still missing, according to Xinhua news agency reports from the local government.

Wang Zhengyao, disaster relief division director at the Ministry of Civil Affairs, said that 11,921 people had died so far in the country's worst earthquake in three decades.

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The Brain Is Not Modular: What fMRI Really Tells Us [Scientific American Magazine]

Tue, 13 May 2008 08:20:00 EST

The atom is like a solar system, with electrons whirling around the nucleus like planets orbiting a star. No, actually, it isn’t. But as a first approximation to help us visualize something that is so invisible, that image works as a metaphor.

Science traffics in metaphors because our brains evolved to grasp intuitively a world far simpler than the counterintuitive world that science has only recently revealed. The functional activity of the brain, for example, is nearly as invisible to us as the atom, and so we employ metaphors. Over the centuries the brain has been compared to a hydraulic machine (18th century), a mechanical calculator (19th century) and an electronic computer (20th century). Today a popular metaphor is that the brain is like a Swiss Army knife, with specialized modules for vision, language, facial recognition, cheating detection, risk taking, spirituality and even God.

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Feces May Transmit Fatal Cheetah Disease [News]

Mon, 12 May 2008 18:20:00 EST

A fatal, Alzheimer's-like disease that attacks cheetahs' internal organs and has impeded breeding of the cats in captivity may be spread by their feces. Researchers from Japan and China report in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA that the disease, AA amyloidosis, was transmitted to mice exposed to fecal proteins from a cheetah that died of it.

The cheetah is classified as an endangered species. Only 12,000 to 15,000 are believed to remain in about 25 countries, down from 100,000 in 44 countries in 1900, according to the Cheetah Conservation Fund. Breeders would like to have a self-sustaining population of cheetahs in captivity, but in North America only 20 percent of captive cheetahs reproduce, and only 75 to 80 percent of cubs survive to reproductive age, says Adrienne Crosier, a reproductive biologist at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.

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You Say "Ga," I say "Ba," but Everyone Hears "Da" [60-Second Psych]

Mon, 12 May 2008 17:45:08 EST

[The following is an exact transcript of this podcast.]

So this week I'm taking it back to a study published in Nature in 1976 to tell you about a freaky auditory illusion called the McGurk effect. However, it also requires some visual input, so I'll have to send you to a video at http://snipurl.com/sciam-illusion (or simply click to play the video posted below this transcript.) [More]

Where Are They Now? [Features]

Mon, 12 May 2008 14:30:00 EST

From chemistry to code-breaking, genetics to geology, these scientifically precocious young men and women have gone on to win Nobel Prizes--and live fascinating lives

Since 1942 the science talent search first sponsored by Westinghouse, and later by the Intel Corporation, has launched approximately 2,500 young finalists and winners into the national limelight.

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The Watcher: Roald Hoffmann [Where Are They Now?]

Mon, 12 May 2008 14:29:00 EST

FINALIST YEAR: 1955

HIS FINALIST PROJECT: Measuring the movement of cosmic ray particles

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Beijing, a city looking for the blues [Sciam Observations Blog]

Mon, 12 May 2008 11:13:39 EST

BEIJING, China As I look out of my hotel room window on my first full day here, it is hard to tell where the clouds end and the haze of pollution begins. [More]

The Chaotic Genesis of Planets [Scientific American Magazine]

Mon, 12 May 2008 08:01:00 EST

Although they are, in cosmic terms, mere scraps--insignificant to the grand narrative of heavenly expansion--planets are the most diverse and intricate class of object in the universe. No other celestial bodies support such a complex interplay of astronomical, geologic, and chemical and biological processes. No other places in the cosmos could support life as we know it. The worlds of our solar system come in a tremendous variety, and even they hardly prepared us for the discoveries of the past decade, during which astronomers have found more than 200 planets.

The sheer diversity of these bodies’ masses, sizes, compositions and orbits challenges those of us trying to fathom their origins. When I was in graduate school in the 1970s, we tended to think of planet formation as a well-ordered, deterministic process--an assembly line that turns amorphous disks of gas and dust into copies of our solar system. Now we are realizing that the process is chaotic, with distinct outcomes for each system. The worlds that emerge are the survivors of a hurly-burly of competing mechanisms of creation and destruction. Many are blasted apart, fed into the fires of their system’s newborn star or ejected into interstellar space. Our own Earth may have long-lost siblings that wander through the lightless void.

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The Chaotic Genesis of Planets [Slideshow] [Features]

Mon, 12 May 2008 08:00:00 EST

Editor's Note: This slideshow is a supplement to the Feature "The Chaotic Genesis of Planets" from the May 2008 issue of Scientific American.

Barely a decade ago scientists who study how planets form had to base their theory on a single example--our solar system. Now they have dozens of mature systems and dozens more in birth throes. No two are alike.

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Genesis of Planets: Meteorites--Emissaries from the Past [Features]

Mon, 12 May 2008 07:59:00 EST

Editor's Note: This story is a supplement to the Feature "The Chaotic Genesis of Planets" from the May 2008 issue of Scientific American.

Meteorites are not just space rocks but space fossils--planetary scientists’ only tangible record of the origin of the solar system. Planetary scientists think that they come from asteroids, which are fragments of planetesimals that never went on to form planets and have remained in deep freeze ever since. The composition of meteorites reflects what must have happened on their parent bodies. Intriguingly, they bear the scars of Jupiter’s early gravitational effects.

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Olive Oil Yields Soar with NMR [60-Second Science]

Mon, 12 May 2008 00:00:08 EST

[The following is an exact transcript of this podcast.]

Olive oil producers generally guess the best time to harvest their olives by [More]

Volcano Blankets Chile in Dust [Image Gallery]

Mon, 12 May 2008 00:00:00 EST

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Scientists Know Better Than You--Even When They're Wrong [Features]

Fri, 09 May 2008 18:00:00 EST

If you take scientists at their word, human-induced climate change is well underway, evolution accounts for the diversity of life on Earth and vaccines do not cause autism. But the collective expertise of thousands of researchers barely registers with global warming skeptics, creationist movie producers and distrustful parents. Why is scientific authority under fire from so many corners? Sociologist Harry Collins thinks part of the answer lies in a misunderstanding of expertise itself. Like Jane Goodall living among the chimps, Collins, a professor at Cardiff University in Wales, has spent 30 years observing physicists who study gravitational wave detection--the search for faint ripples in the fabric of spacetime. He's learned the hard way about the work that goes into acquiring specialized scientific knowledge. In a recent book, Rethinking Expertise, he says that what bridges the gap--and what keeps science working--is something called "interactional expertise". Collins spoke recently with ScientificAmerican.com about his view of expertise; what follows is an edited transcript of that interview.

How did we get to the point where scientific authority is so easily challenged? [More]

News Bytes of the Week--Could Coastal Trees Have Saved Lives in Myanmar? [News]

Fri, 09 May 2008 15:00:00 EST

Felled mangrove trees may have doomed the coast of Myanmar [More]

Are Backyard Ethanol Brewers an Answer to High-Priced Gas? [News]

Fri, 09 May 2008 15:00:00 EST

A company banking on drivers' weariness of skyrocketing gasoline prices unveiled a home refinery device on Thursday offering another option: ethanol. E-Fuel Corporation says its EFuel100 MicroFueler can produce up to 35 gallons (132 liters) of ethanol a week that consumers can pump directly into their cars and trucks. There is no combustion inside the device, which runs on a standard household 110- to 220-volt AC power supply (consuming about 150 watts*) and uses a membrane system to distill the sugar, yeast and water solution required to make ethanol rather than combustion heating elements, as commercial ethanol producers do. [More]

Plans for Large Hadron Collider visible in screen shot of first Web site [Sciam Observations Blog]

Fri, 09 May 2008 14:20:16 EST

Remember the foreshadowing of the Death Star in Star Wars: Episode II? Check out this screen shot from the world's first Web site, http://info.cern.ch/, which went live 15 years ago on April 30, 1993.Note the multicolored diagram in the background. [More]

From Bountiful to Barren: Rainfall Decrease Left the Sahara Out to Dry [News]

Fri, 09 May 2008 14:10:00 EST

In a finding that may help scientists better predict the pace of climate change, research published in Science shows how the Sahara Desert, a region as big as the U.S. that stretches from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea across northern Africa, went from bountiful to bone-dry over a period of several thousand years.

Scientists peered into the Sahara's verdant past by analyzing sediment samples drilled out of the bottom of one of the desert's last living lakes. The samples revealed long-held secrets of how desert-friendly species replaced tropical plants and animals as monsoon rains retreated farther south into the continent.

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Mailbag: Is Fluoride Dangerous? Is a Solar Grand Plan a Good Idea? [Scientific American Magazine]

Fri, 09 May 2008 11:14:00 EST

Fluoride FindingsA report by the National Research Council (NRC) is cited as suggesting negative effects of fluoride in “Second Thoughts about Fluoride,” by Dan Fagin. But the NRC notes that its report was not initiated because of concerns about the low levels of fluoride used in community water fluoridation, nor did it examine that issue. Instead the report is part of a routine review by the Environmental Protection Agency to address whether the higher levels of naturally occurring fluoride currently allowed in drinking water pose a health risk. The EPA is evaluating the report.

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The Evolving Web of Future Wealth [Edit This]

Fri, 09 May 2008 10:25:00 EST

Editor's Note: Stuart Kauffman has a well-earned reputation as a scientific provocateur, albeit one with the weight of data and wisdom on his side. Kauffman, a complexity researcher and biologist of the University of Calgary and the Santa Fe Institute, has argued, for example, that self-organization--the propensity for systems to become more complex without outside guidance--was just as important as natural selection in shaping evolution. (Intelligent design advocates, take note.)

In his new book Reinventing the Sacred: A New View of Science, Reason, and Religion (Basic Books, New York; May 2008), Kauffman develops a larger argument: Understanding what's happening in complex systems could help modern science break free of what some consider its too-reductionistic underpinnings. One controversial idea that Kauffman develops in his book is that by failing to take this approach to economics, traditional economists are unable to explain something that seems obvious but isn't: How does innovation drive growth?

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Training Scientists to Run for Office [60-Second Science]

Fri, 09 May 2008 00:00:08 EST

[The following is an exact transcript of this podcast.]

Would America be a better place if more people with science training held elective office? One organization that thinks so is Scientists and Engineers for America, or SEA. On May 10th, they’re holding a daylong workshop in Washington, D.C., to teach researchers the nuts and bolts of running for office. More than 70 attendees have signed up. [More]

Legislation Introduced to Spur Treatments for Brain Ailments [News]

Thu, 08 May 2008 17:00:00 EST

Lawmakers yesterday introduced legislation designed to speed the development of new, safer therapies for brain and nervous system disorders and injuries, which affect an estimated 100 million Americans and costs an estimated $1.3 trillion annually to treat. [More]

Scientists Build Nano Hot Rods [News]

Thu, 08 May 2008 16:00:00 EST

Like a team of laboratory gearheads, Arizona State University (A.S.U.) researchers have found a way to soup up microscopic "nanomachines" that may someday be used to deliver lifesaving medications or test the quality of drinking water in remote regions of the world. In place of turbochargers and high-octane gas, the scientists tweaked their engine design and used an additive to speed the oxidation of hydrogen peroxide into fuel to create nanomachines 350 times more powerful than any previously built. [More]

To Catch a Plutonium Thief, Try Antineutrinos [News]

Thu, 08 May 2008 13:35:00 EST

A new more secure technology for guarding against theft from nuclear reactors has passed its first test.

Researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Sandia National Laboratories in Livermore, Calif., successfully monitored the power output of a relatively small nuclear power reactor by measuring the number of antineutrinos--ghostly particles generated by nuclear fission--that struck a refrigerator-size tank of liquid.

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What's Our Connection to the Platypus? [News]

Thu, 08 May 2008 13:00:00 EST

The platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus) is an odd-looking creature whose features combine the furry torso and wide, flat tail of a beaver with the rubbery bill and webbed feet of a duck. But its looks are not all that is strange about it. A new study indicates that the distinctive mammal's genetic code is an eclectic brew of bird, reptile and mammal. [More]

Whatever Happened to the Pioneer Spacecraft? [Scientific American Magazine]

Thu, 08 May 2008 11:08:00 EST

Mystery Cruise ControlThe velocities of Pioneer 10 and 11, now speeding out of the solar system, are mysteriously changing, as if an extra force from the sun were tugging at them. Explanations have ranged from gas leaks and observational error to modified theories of gravity [see “A Force to Reckon With”; SciAm, October 2005].

[More]

An Uninsured Doctor in the House [Features]

Thu, 08 May 2008 11:00:00 EST

One of the first things U.S. Rep. Steve Kagen (D–Wisc.) did when he took office last year was to nix his congressional health care coverage. The move stunned a human resources staffer, who, the lawmaker says, looked at him as though he were insane.

"I'll respectfully decline until you can make that same offer for all of my constituents," he says he told her, explaining his decision to turn down what many say is the Cadillac of U.S. health plans.

[More]

Cloth-Eating Fungus Could Make Fuel [60-Second Science]

Thu, 08 May 2008 10:30:08 EST

Podcast Transcript: It sounds like something out of a bad science fiction novel. During World War II, a fungus called Tricoderma reesei ate its way through US military uniforms and tents in the South Pacific. It chewed up the cloth and used special enzymes to convert the indigestible cellulose into simple sugars. Now that infamous fungus is getting some good publicity. It looks like it might hold a key to improving the production of biofuels. [More]

Myanmar Cyclone: Before and After [Image Gallery]

Thu, 08 May 2008 00:00:00 EST

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Quake Shakes Tokyo [News]

Wed, 07 May 2008 18:00:00 EST

Japan was rocked by a series of earthquakes today about 100 miles (160 kilometers) from Tokyo that injured two, cut off power to some 2,100 homes, and left the country on high alert for possible aftershocks. The largest quake hit at 1:45 a.m. local time in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of the Ibaraki Prefecture and measured 6.8 on the Richter scale, but Japan's meteorological agency told the Agence France-Presse (AFP) that it does not expect the tremors to result in a tsunami. [More]

Evolution Enclaves: Darwin the Botanist and Origins of Life Research [Science Talk]

Wed, 07 May 2008 14:30:08 EST

David Kohn, curator of the Darwin's Garden exhibit at the New York Botanical Garden, discusses Darwin's botanical studies. And Harvard Medical School's Jack Szostak talks about research into the origins of life. Plus we'll test your knowledge of some recent science in the news. Websites mentioned on this episode include www.nybg.org/darwin; www.hhmi.org; www.sciam.com/daily

The text transcript is currently not available. Transcripts are posted about a week after the podcast airs.

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Are Personal Genome Scans Medically Useless? [Scientific American Magazine]

Wed, 07 May 2008 08:16:00 EST

For $1,000 and up, several new companies will scan an individual’s entire genome for clues about ancestry, potential health limitations and the inheritance of traits such as lactose intolerance. Clients can compare their DNA with a celebrity’s or invite friends and family members to share genetic profiles. Despite the comprehensive reports and background data these Web-based services deliver, some observers believe the information is more recreational than relevant.

Direct-to-consumer genetic tests have existed for at least a decade, and in recent years the number of choices has exploded. Whereas most of these offerings probe for only a small number of gene variants, advances in genome chips now allow a quick, inexpensive search for a wide range of targets all at once. Navigenics in Redwood Shores, Calif., 23andMe in Mountain View, Calif., and deCODE Genetics in Reykjavik, Iceland, recently began scanning for markers associated with as many as two dozen conditions and traits. And for upward of $350,000, Knome in Cambridge, Mass., enables customers to join J. Craig Venter and James D. Watson in the elite cadre of humans who have had their entire genome sequenced, analyzed and interpreted.

[More]

Virus Outbreak Shakes China [Sciam Observations Blog]

Wed, 07 May 2008 07:33:58 EST

Updated from a May 5 blog entryChinese health-care officials are scrambling to contain the outbreak of a contagious and sometimes deadly intestinal virus--known as Enterovirus 71 (EV71)--that has already claimed the lives of at least 28 children and is likely to continue spreading. [More]

Mind Control by Cell Phone [Mind Matters]

Wed, 07 May 2008 07:00:00 EST

Hospitals and airplanes ban the use of cell phones, because their electromagnetic transmissions can interfere with sensitive electrical devices. Could the brain also fall into that category? Of course, all our thoughts, sensations and actions arise from bioelectricity generated by neurons and transmitted through complex neural circuits inside our skull. Electrical signals between neurons generate electric fields that radiate out of brain tissue as electrical waves that can be picked up by electrodes touching a person's scalp. Measurements of such brainwaves in EEGs provide powerful insight into brain function and a valuable diagnostic tool for doctors. Indeed, so fundamental are brainwaves to the internal workings of the mind, they have become the ultimate, legal definition drawing the line between life and death.

Brainwaves change with a healthy person's conscious and unconscious mental activity and state of arousal. But scientists can do more with brainwaves than just listen in on the brain at work-they can selectively control brain function by transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). This technique uses powerful pulses of electromagnetic radiation beamed into a person's brain to jam or excite particular brain circuits.

[More]

Were Dinos on Their Way Out Before the Meteor? [60-Second Science]

Wed, 07 May 2008 00:00:08 EST

Podcast Transcript: It’s accepted that a large meteor impact 65 million years ago was responsible for the mass extinction of the dinosaurs. Which opened up niches for birds and mammals. But last week at an evolution conference at The Rockefeller University in New York City, New Zealand biologist David Penny questioned whether the dinosaurs might not have already been on their way out. [More]

New Twist on Nanowires [Image Gallery]

Wed, 07 May 2008 00:00:00 EST

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The Monitor, ep. 13--Colossal Squid, Narwhals and Improvisational Robotics [The Monitor]

Tue, 06 May 2008 17:15:00 EST

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Toasted Bugs? Tropical Insects May Not Thrive in Warming World [News]

Tue, 06 May 2008 16:20:00 EST

Global warming may prove worse for insects--and other cold-blooded critters--living in the steamy tropics than for their counterparts living closer to the frigid polar regions, according to a new study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. Even though climate change is likely to affect areas near the poles, tropical insects are already living in conditions that verge on being too hot for them, which means they could be teetering on the edge of extinction.

Take the shield bug--also known as the stinkbug for the nasty smelling liquid it spews when attacked. There are varieties of the insect in both the U.K. and Kenya. But although the shield bugs in the former may prosper as a result of a warmer climate in their region, their counterparts in Kenya (and other parts of Africa) may find themselves unable to cope with the heat, according to the research--and, if they cannot adapt or move, they may perish. "The current climate is at its optimum temperature," says study co-author and biogeochemist Curtis Deutsch of the University of California, Los Angeles. "Any warming was going to push them towards reduced fitness."

[More]

Can You Catch Up on Lost Sleep? [Fact or Fiction]

Tue, 06 May 2008 13:10:00 EST

Let's do some sleep math. You lost two hours of sleep every night last week because of a big project due on Friday. On Saturday and Sunday, you slept in, getting four extra hours. Come Monday morning, you were feeling so bright-eyed, you only had one cup of coffee, instead of your usual two. But don't be duped by your apparent vim and vigor: You're still carrying around a heavy load of sleepiness, or what experts call "sleep debt"--in this case something like six hours, almost a full nights' sleep. [More]

Chile Volcano Eruption Sends Residents Fleeing, Causes One Death [News]

Tue, 06 May 2008 12:45:00 EST

Lava began to flow today from Chile's Chaitén volcano, chasing remaining residents out of a nearby town and putting the government of the affected Palena Province on high alert. The country had already been on edge following the volcano's initial eruption this past weekend, spewing hot ash, gas and smoke into the air for several days, forcing the evacuation of more than 4,200 residents and leading to the death of a 92-year-old woman who suffered a heart attack aboard a navy boat as she was being taken to Puerto Montt, about 125 miles (200 kilometers) north of the volcano. No lava flow, however, had been reported until Tuesday. [More]

How Boys Become Boys (and Sometimes Girls) [News]

Tue, 06 May 2008 12:00:00 EST

In research that could give doctors a way to reassign sex in cases of unclear gender, scientists report this week that they have figured out why some children with genes that should make them boys are instead born as girls. [More]

A Dump Truck for the 21st Century [News]

Tue, 06 May 2008 11:00:00 EST

Slideshow: View the "super tipper" [More]

Why the Next President Needs a Powerful Science Adviser [Scientific American Magazine]

Tue, 06 May 2008 08:19:00 EST

In the wake of the near panic over the launch of Sputnik in 1957, President Dwight D. Eisenhower appointed James Killian, the president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, to become the first special assistant to the president for science and technology. Ever since, the relationship between the nation’s chief executive and the White House’s resident authority on nuclear fission, the workings of DNA and the greenhouse effect, among an array of topics, has had its highs and lows.

To be sure, advice has flowed freely at times. Eisenhower consulted frequently with Killian and other scientists, and in the Kennedy years Jerome Wiesner, another M.I.T. president, helped to coordinate the government’s response to the publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, a book that spurred a national grassroots environmental movement by pointing out the dangers of pesticides.

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Cell Number Is Future Fat Fight Front [60-Second Science]

Tue, 06 May 2008 00:00:08 EST

Podcast Transcript: Losing weight is no walk in the park. (Although a walk in the park wouldn’t hurt). Seems no matter what diet you try, those stubborn love handles just won’t go away. Part of the problem is that the bulk of your bulk is stored inside fat cells. And the number of fat cells you have is set before you reach adulthood. So if you chunked up as a child, that battalion of fat cells is with you for life. It’s enough to make you want to bury your face in a tray of brownies, I know. But hold off. Because researchers from Stockholm think they’ve found a loophole. [More]

The Monitor: Episode 13 [SciAm Exclusives Video]

Tue, 06 May 2008 00:00:00 EST

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More than 22,000 Dead, 40,000 Missing from Myanmar Cyclone [News]

Mon, 05 May 2008 16:00:00 EST

More than 22,000 people were reported dead and 41,000 more were missing after a cyclone tore through the Southeast Asian country of Myanmar late Friday night and early Saturday morning. Over 10 hours, winds traveling up to 150 miles per hour struck Yangon, Myanmar's largest city, and dumped 20 inches of rain on the harbortown, formerly known as Rangoon. According to published reports, the country's foreign minister fears the final death toll may rise as high as 50,000. That would make the storm -- Tropical Cyclone Nargis -- one of Myanmar's most deadly natural disasters and the second largest in the region after the tsunami of 2004, which took nearly 200,000 lives. [More]