ScienceDaily: Top Science News

---

• Rats! Humans and rodents process their mistakes
• Global ocean currents explain why Northern Hemisphere is the soggier one
• Mixing nanoparticles to make multifunctional materials
• Evolution is not a one-way road towards complexity
• Lots of oxygen does not necessarily lead to the evolution of advanced life
• Tiny sea creatures are heading for extinction, and could take local fisheries with them
• Learning dialects shapes brain areas that process spoken language
• Narrow-spectrum UV light may dramatically reduce surgical infections

Rats! Humans and rodents process their mistakes Posted: 20 Oct 2013 01:07 PM PDT What happens when the brain recognizes an error? A new study shows that the brains of humans and rats adapt in a similar way to errors by using low-frequency brainwaves in the medial frontal cortex to synchronize neurons in the motor cortex. The finding could be important in studies of mental illnesses such as obsessive compulsive disorder, ADHD, and Parkinson's disease.

Global ocean currents explain why Northern Hemisphere is the soggier one Posted: 20 Oct 2013 01:06 PM PDT The Northern Hemisphere gets more tropical rain because of ocean currents that originate in the icy waters near Greenland.

Mixing nanoparticles to make multifunctional materials Posted: 20 Oct 2013 01:05 PM PDT Scientists have developed a general approach for combining different types of nanoparticles to produce large-scale composite materials. The technique opens many opportunities for mixing and matching particles with different magnetic, optical, or chemical properties to form new, multifunctional materials or materials with enhanced performance for a wide range of potential applications.

Evolution is not a one-way road towards complexity Posted: 18 Oct 2013 10:22 AM PDT The larvae of the Wirenia argentea hold a much more complex muscular architecture than their adults -- they remodel during their metamorphosis. So evolution is not a one-way road towards complexity.

Lots of oxygen does not necessarily lead to the evolution of advanced life Posted: 18 Oct 2013 10:22 AM PDT Any textbook will tell you that oxygen is essential for advanced life to evolve. But why did life not explode when oxygen levels rose dramatically 2.1 billion years ago? This became a big question after scientists showed the oxygen content 2.1 billion years ago was probably the same as when life exploded 500 million years ago.

Tiny sea creatures are heading for extinction, and could take local fisheries with them Posted: 18 Oct 2013 10:21 AM PDT A species of cold water plankton in the North Atlantic, that is a vital food source for fish such as cod and hake, is in decline as the oceans warm. This will put pressure on the fisheries that rely on abundant supplies of these fish.

Learning dialects shapes brain areas that process spoken language Posted: 18 Oct 2013 10:20 AM PDT Using advanced imaging to visualize brain areas used for understanding language in native Japanese speakers, a new study finds that the pitch-accent in words pronounced in standard Japanese activates different brain hemispheres depending on whether the listener speaks standard Japanese or one of the regional dialects.

Narrow-spectrum UV light may dramatically reduce surgical infections Posted: 16 Oct 2013 06:24 PM PDT Despite major efforts to keep operating rooms sterile, surgical wound infections remain a serious and stubborn problem, killing up to 8,200 patients a year in the U.S. Researchers suggests that narrow-spectrum UV light could dramatically reduce such infections without damaging human tissue.

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