Category Archives: news briefs

After a year of work, researchers announced last week that they have assembled a detailed draft of the dog genome, the genetic coding that makes a dog a dog. The genome has been placed on-line in various public databases, making … Continue reading →

Frequent tanners may be addicted to the mood-elevating effects of ultraviolet, or UV, light, say researchers from North Carolina’s Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center. In the July issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology, Steven Feldman … Continue reading →

Mayo Clinic researchers have discovered a gene that plays a role in regulating aging and fertility in mice, which may lead to a better understanding of age-related disorders in humans. In the July issue of Nature Genetics, Jan van Deursen … Continue reading →

The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere may have played a significant role in the evolution of leaves, report British scientists. Plants need CO2 to live. They absorb the gas through pores called stomata, which also work to cool the … Continue reading →

Researchers studying hormones associated with food intake and metabolism have discovered a hitherto unknown biological feature of obesity. Julio Licinio of the University of California at Los Angeles and colleagues have found that obese people lack a normal nighttime spike … Continue reading →

NASA’s Stardust spacecraft has revealed comet Wild 2 to be unlike any other comet known. Researchers describe the strange astronomical object in a series of papers in the June 18 issue of Science. The spacecraft came within less than 150 … Continue reading →

The longest Antarctic ice core yet drilled is revealing Earth’s climate of the past, as well as predicting its future, suggesting that the next ice age is at least 15,000 years away. The ice core, almost 2 miles long, was … Continue reading →

Thanks to genetic analysis and the rat-eating habits of ancient Polynesians, researchers are determining the routes prehistoric humans used to colonize the Western Pacific. The Pacific rat (Rattus exulans) is believed to have been a food source for the Lapita, … Continue reading →

Scientists have long known that calorie-restricted diets can extend the lives of creatures ranging from yeast to fruit flies to mice. (A few, very hungry people are trying to see if it works for humans, too.) But exactly why near-starvation … Continue reading →

It’s long been thought that stress might be a factor in the development of breast cancer, but a study in the June 1 issue of the American Journal of Epidemiology suggests otherwise. Candyce Kroenke of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and … Continue reading →