ScienceDaily: Top Science News

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• Mind reading from brain recordings? 'Neural fingerprints' of memory associations decoded
• Musical robot companion enhances listener experience
• Scientists find new primitive mineral in meteorite
• Moderate coffee consumption offers protection against heart failure, study suggests
• Gravitational lensing: Astronomers spot rare arc from hefty galaxy cluster
• Better surfaces could help dissipate heat
• Seeing inside tissue for no-cut surgeries: Researchers develop technique to focus light inside biological tissue
• Rewriting quantum chips with a beam of light: Laser technique brings ultrafast computing closer to reality
• Scientists spark new interest in the century-old Edison battery
• Curry spice, omega-3 fatty acid preserve walking ability following spinal-cord injury
• Biologists reveal potential 'fatal flaw' in iconic sexual selection study
• Cheaper cell phones with better signal quality: World's most powerful nanoscale microwave oscillators developed
• New toilet turns human waste into electricity and fertilizer

Mind reading from brain recordings? 'Neural fingerprints' of memory associations decoded Posted: 26 Jun 2012 02:27 PM PDT Researchers have begun to show that it is possible to use brain recordings to reconstruct aspects of an image or movie clip someone is viewing, a sound someone is hearing or even the text someone is reading. A new study brings this work one step closer to actual mind reading by using brain recordings to infer the way people organize associations between words in their memories.

Musical robot companion enhances listener experience Posted: 26 Jun 2012 01:38 PM PDT Wedding DJs everywhere should be worried about job security now that a new robot is on the scene. Shimi, an interactive musical companion recommends songs, dances to the beat and keeps the music pumping based on listener feedback.

Scientists find new primitive mineral in meteorite Posted: 26 Jun 2012 10:19 AM PDT In 1969, an exploding fireball tore through the sky over Mexico, scattering thousands of pieces of meteorite across the state of Chihuahua. More than 40 years later, the Allende meteorite is still serving the scientific community as a rich source of information about the early stages of our solar system's evolution. Recently, scientists discovered a new mineral embedded in the space rock -- one they believe to be among the oldest minerals formed in the solar system.

Moderate coffee consumption offers protection against heart failure, study suggests Posted: 26 Jun 2012 10:18 AM PDT While current American Heart Association heart failure prevention guidelines warn against habitual coffee consumption, some studies propose a protective benefit, and still others find no association at all. Amidst this conflicting information, new research attempts to shift the conversation from a definitive yes or no, to a question of how much.

Gravitational lensing: Astronomers spot rare arc from hefty galaxy cluster Posted: 26 Jun 2012 10:12 AM PDT Seeing is believing, except when you don't believe what you see. Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have found a puzzling arc of light behind an extremely massive cluster of galaxies residing 10 billion light-years away. The galactic grouping, discovered by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, was observed as it existed when the universe was roughly a quarter of its current age of 13.7 billion years. The giant arc is the stretched shape of a more distant galaxy whose light is distorted by the monster cluster's powerful gravity, an effect called gravitational lensing. The trouble is, the arc shouldn't exist.

Better surfaces could help dissipate heat Posted: 26 Jun 2012 08:52 AM PDT Researchers at MIT have found that relatively simple, microscale roughening of a surface can dramatically enhance its transfer of heat. Such an approach could be far less complex and more durable than approaches that enhance heat transfer through smaller patterning in the nanometer (billionths of a meter) range. The new research also provides a theoretical framework for analyzing the behavior of such systems, pointing the way to even greater improvements.

Seeing inside tissue for no-cut surgeries: Researchers develop technique to focus light inside biological tissue Posted: 26 Jun 2012 08:43 AM PDT Imagine if doctors could perform surgery without ever having to cut through your skin. Or if they could diagnose cancer by seeing tumors inside the body with a procedure that is as simple as an ultrasound. Thanks to a new technique, all of that may be possible in the not-so-distant future.

Rewriting quantum chips with a beam of light: Laser technique brings ultrafast computing closer to reality Posted: 26 Jun 2012 08:43 AM PDT The promise of ultrafast quantum computing has moved a step closer to reality with a technique to create rewritable computer chips using a beam of light. Researchers used light to control the spin of an atom's nucleus in order to encode information.

Scientists spark new interest in the century-old Edison battery Posted: 26 Jun 2012 08:43 AM PDT Scientists have dramatically improved the performance of Thomas Edison's nickel-iron battery. The enhanced device could be used in electric vehicles, much as Edison originally envisioned.

Curry spice, omega-3 fatty acid preserve walking ability following spinal-cord injury Posted: 26 Jun 2012 08:39 AM PDT Researchers discovered that a diet enriched with a popular omega-3 fatty acid and an ingredient in curry spice preserved walking ability in rats with spinal-cord injury. The findings suggest that these dietary supplements help repair nerve cells and maintain neurological function after degenerative damage to the neck.

Biologists reveal potential 'fatal flaw' in iconic sexual selection study Posted: 26 Jun 2012 06:27 AM PDT A classic study from more than 60 years ago that reportedly showed that males are more promiscuous and females more choosy in selecting mates may be wrong, say life scientists who are the first to repeat the historic experiment using the same methods.

Cheaper cell phones with better signal quality: World's most powerful nanoscale microwave oscillators developed Posted: 26 Jun 2012 06:27 AM PDT Researchers have developed the world's most powerful nanoscale microwave oscillators. The new electron spin-based oscillators use a spin-transfer torque magnetoresistive random access memory or STT-RAM, which has great potential over other types of memory currently in use for both speed and power efficiency. The new oscillators could lead to mobile communication devices that are less expensive to manufacture and deliver a much better signal quality.

New toilet turns human waste into electricity and fertilizer Posted: 26 Jun 2012 04:29 AM PDT Scientists have invented a new toilet system that will turn human waste into electricity and fertilizers and also reduce the amount of water needed for flushing by up to 90 per cent compared to current toilet systems in Singapore.

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