ScienceDaily: Most Popular News

---

• Revolutionary naming system for all life on earth proposed: Based on the genetic sequence of organisms
• New, inexpensive production materials boost promise of hydrogen fuel
• If you think you have Alzheimer's, you just might be right, study suggests
• Shocking behavior of a runaway star: High-speed encounter creates arc
• Newly discovered marsupial the victim of fatal attraction: Due to stress hormone, males die before young are born
• Extreme weather caused by climate change decides distribution of insects, study shows
• Premature infants benefit from adult talk, study shows
• The way a room is lit can affect the way you make decisions
• High cost of fruits, vegetables linked to higher body fat in young children
• A new laser for a faster Internet
• Whole genome analysis speeds up: 240 full genomes in 50 hours
• Switch That Says It's Time to Sleep Identified
• Newly developed chemical restores light perception to blind mice
• Essential step toward printing living human tissues
• A forgotten model of the universe: Analysis of Einstein's 1931 paper featuring a dynamic model of the universe
• Technique allows for radiation-free detection of tumors, study finds
• How Were The Egyptian Pyramids Built?

Revolutionary naming system for all life on earth proposed: Based on the genetic sequence of organisms Posted: 21 Feb 2014 03:48 PM PST A new naming structure proposed by an American researcher moves beyond the Linnaeus system to one based on the genetic sequence of each individual organism. This creates a more robust, precise, and informative name for any organism, be it a bacterium, fungus, plant, or animal. Coded names could be permanent, as opposed to the shifting of names typical in the current biological classification system. Codes could also be assigned without the current lengthy process that is required by analyzing one organism's physical traits compared to another's. Lastly, the sequence could be assigned to viruses, bacteria, fungi, plants, and animals and would provide a standardized naming system for all life on Earth.

New, inexpensive production materials boost promise of hydrogen fuel Posted: 21 Feb 2014 03:45 PM PST Generating electricity is not the only way to turn sunlight into energy we can use on demand. The sun can also drive reactions to create chemical fuels, such as hydrogen, that can in turn power cars, trucks and trains. Scientists have now combined cheap, oxide-based materials to split water into hydrogen and oxygen gases using solar energy with a solar-to-hydrogen conversion efficiency of 1.7 percent, the highest reported for any oxide-based photoelectrode system.

If you think you have Alzheimer's, you just might be right, study suggests Posted: 21 Feb 2014 08:41 AM PST A correlation between self-reported incidence of memory loss and development of cognitive memory impairment later in life has been identified through a new study. The results are meaningful because it might help identify people who are at risk of developing Alzheimer's Disease sooner. "If the memory and thinking lapses people notice themselves could be early markers of risk for Alzheimer's disease, we might eventually be able to intervene earlier in the aging process to postpone and/or reduce the effects of cognitive memory impairment," the authors note.

Shocking behavior of a runaway star: High-speed encounter creates arc Posted: 21 Feb 2014 08:01 AM PST Roguish runaway stars can have a big impact on their surroundings as they plunge through the Milky Way galaxy. Their high-speed encounters shock the galaxy, creating arcs, as seen in a newly released image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.

Newly discovered marsupial the victim of fatal attraction: Due to stress hormone, males die before young are born Posted: 21 Feb 2014 07:39 AM PST A highly sexed mouse-like marsupial in Queensland's Springbrook National Park, Australia, has been discovered by a mammalogist. The rare, Black-tailed Antechinus is a rare, mouse-like marsupial with a deadly mating habit. "A single female's brood of young will typically be sired by several fathers. But during mating, stress hormone levels rise dramatically, eventually causing the males' bodies to shut down. The males all die before their young are born," found the researchers.

Extreme weather caused by climate change decides distribution of insects, study shows Posted: 20 Feb 2014 01:13 PM PST Extreme weather caused by climate change in the coming decades is likely to have profound implications for distributions of insects and other invertebrates. This is suggested by a new study of insects in tropical and temperate regions of Australia. "Our predictions are that some species would disappear entirely in the next few decades, even when they have a fairly wide distribution that currently covers hundreds of kilometers", the researchers conclude.

Premature infants benefit from adult talk, study shows Posted: 20 Feb 2014 01:13 PM PST Premature babies benefit from being exposed to adult talk as early as possible, new research concludes. The goal of the study was to test the association of the amount of talking that a baby was exposed to at what would have been 32 and 36 weeks gestation if a baby had been born full term. It was hypothesized that preterm infants exposed to higher word counts would have higher cognitive and language scores at seven and 18 months corrected age. The results showed the hypothesis to be true.

The way a room is lit can affect the way you make decisions Posted: 20 Feb 2014 10:20 AM PST The next time you want to turn down the emotional intensity before making an important decision, you may want to dim the lights first. A new study shows that human emotion, whether positive or negative, is felt more intensely under bright light. under bright lights emotions are felt more intensely. In the brighter room participants wanted spicier chicken wing sauce, thought the fictional character was more aggressive, found the women more attractive, felt better about positive words and worse about negative words, and drank more of the "favorable" juice and less of the "unfavorable" juice.

High cost of fruits, vegetables linked to higher body fat in young children Posted: 20 Feb 2014 07:29 AM PST High prices for fresh fruits and vegetables are associated with higher Body Mass Index in young children in low- and middle-income households, according new research. Research showed that when the prices of fruits and vegetables go up, families may buy less of them and substitute cheaper foods that may not be as healthy and have more calories. The study also identified a small association between higher-priced soft drinks and a lower likelihood of obesity among young children.

A new laser for a faster Internet Posted: 20 Feb 2014 06:50 AM PST A new laser holds the potential to increase by orders of magnitude the rate of data transmission in the optical-fiber network -- the backbone of the Internet. Light is capable of carrying vast amounts of information—approximately 10,000 times more bandwidth than microwaves, the earlier carrier of long-distance communications. But to utilize this potential, the laser light needs to be as spectrally pure -- as close to a single frequency -- as possible. The purer the tone, the more information it can carry, and for decades researchers have been trying to develop a laser that comes as close as possible to emitting just one frequency.

Whole genome analysis speeds up: 240 full genomes in 50 hours Posted: 19 Feb 2014 02:31 PM PST Although the time and cost of sequencing the human genome has plummeted, analyzing the 3 billion base pairs of genetic information can take months. Researchers working with Beagle -- one of the world's fastest supercomputers devoted to life sciences -- report they can analyze 240 full genomes in 50 hours.

Switch That Says It's Time to Sleep Identified Posted: 19 Feb 2014 09:47 AM PST The switch in the brain that sends us off to sleep has been identified in a study in fruit flies. The switch works by regulating the activity of a handful of sleep-promoting nerve cells, or neurons, in the brain. The neurons fire when we're tired and need sleep, and dampen down when we're fully rested. Although the research was carried out in fruit flies, or Drosophila, the scientists say the sleep mechanism is likely to be relevant to humans.

Newly developed chemical restores light perception to blind mice Posted: 19 Feb 2014 09:47 AM PST Progressive degeneration of photoreceptors -- the rods and cones of the eyes -- causes blinding diseases such as retinitis pigmentosa and age-related macular degeneration. While there are currently no available treatments to reverse this degeneration, a newly developed compound allows other cells in the eye to act like photoreceptors. The compound may be a potential drug candidate for treating patients suffering from degenerative retinal disorders.

Essential step toward printing living human tissues Posted: 19 Feb 2014 06:55 AM PST A new bioprinting method creates intricately patterned 3-D tissue constructs with multiple types of cells and tiny blood vessels. The work represents a major step toward a longstanding goal of tissue engineers: creating human tissue constructs realistic enough to test drug safety and effectiveness. The method also represents an early but important step toward building fully functional replacements for injured or diseased tissue that can be designed from CAT scan data using computer-aided design (CAD), printed in 3D at the push of a button, and used by surgeons to repair or replace damaged tissue.

A forgotten model of the universe: Analysis of Einstein's 1931 paper featuring a dynamic model of the universe Posted: 19 Feb 2014 04:52 AM PST Researchers have provided the first English translation and an analysis of one of Albert Einstein's little-known papers, "On the cosmological problem of the general theory of relativity." Published in 1931, it features a forgotten model of the universe, while refuting Einstein's own earlier static model of 1917. In this paper, Einstein introduces a cosmic model in which the universe undergoes an expansion followed by a contraction. This interpretation contrasts with the monotonically expanding universe of the widely known Einstein-de Sitter model of 1932.

Technique allows for radiation-free detection of tumors, study finds Posted: 18 Feb 2014 03:51 PM PST A way to scan young cancer patients' bodies for tumors without exposing them to radiation has been developed. The technique could reduce patients' risk of developing secondary cancers later in life. The new method is a modification of magnetic resonance imaging that employs a novel contrast agent to find tumors. The MRI-based method is as effective as cancer-detection scans that use ionizing radiation -- specifically, positron emission tomography-computed tomography -- the researchers found.

How Were The Egyptian Pyramids Built? Posted: 28 Mar 2008 07:43 AM PDT The Aztecs, Mayans and ancient Egyptians were three very different civilizations with one very large similarity: pyramids. However, of these three ancient cultures, the Egyptians set the standard for what most people recognize as classic pyramid design: massive monuments with a square base and four smooth-sided triangular sides, rising to a point. The Aztecs and Mayans built their pyramids with tiered steps and a flat top.

You are subscribed to email updates from Most Popular News -- ScienceDaily To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now.	Email delivery powered by Google
Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610