Researchers at Yale University have developed a new way of seeing inside solid objects, including animal bones and tissues, potentially opening a vast array of dense materials to a new type of detailed internal inspection. (more…)
Conventional wisdom holds that during the Mesozoic Era, mammals were small creatures that held on at life’s edges. But at least one mammal group, rodent-like creatures called multituberculates, actually flourished during the last 20 million years of the dinosaurs’ reign and survived their extinction 66 million years ago.
New research led by a University of Washington paleontologist suggests that the multituberculates did so well in part because they developed numerous tubercles (bumps, or cusps) on their back teeth that allowed them to feed largely on angiosperms, flowering plants that were just becoming commonplace. (more…)
Long thought to produce only one generation of tree-killing offspring annually, some populations of mountain pine beetles now produce two generations per year, dramatically increasing the potential for the bugs to kill lodgepole and ponderosa pine trees, University of Colorado Boulder researchers have found.
Because of the extra annual generation of beetles, there could be up to 60 times as many beetles attacking trees in any given year, their study found. And in response to warmer temperatures at high elevations, pine beetles also are better able to survive and attack trees that haven’t previously developed defenses. (more…)
Wolfgang Fink of the University of Arizona department of electrical and computer engineering has developed an autonomous robotic lake lander that could be used to explore this planet and others. (more…)
Taking a sample from just one part of a tumour may not give a full picture of its‘genetic landscape’, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
The findings could help explain why attempts at using single biopsies to identify biomarkers to which personalised cancer treatments can be targeted have not been more successful. (more…)
Sharing scientific knowledge is a fundamental part of university life. Regardless of whether you’re an undergraduate or a tenured professor, everyone has the responsibility of spreading their knowledge as widely as possible.
Why would you want to, though? “For a variety of reasons,” answers William Raillant-Clark, Press attaché at Université de Montréal’s Office of Communications and Public Relations. “The media is an excellent vehicle for communicating your ideas or your discoveries to the general public, and it can also draw the attention of your research peers to your work. This is one of the reasons why funding partners and potential research directors take into consideration science outreach work.” (more…)
A new atlas and catalog of the entire infrared sky with more than a half-billion stars, galaxies and other objects captured by NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) mission was unveiled by NASA Wednesday. (more…)
In the wilds of New York City — or as wild as you can get so close to skyscrapers — scientists have found a new leopard frog species that for years biologists mistook for a more widespread variety of leopard frog.
While biologists regularly discover new species in remote rain forests, finding this one in the ponds and marshes of Staten Island, mainland New York and New Jersey — sometimes within view of the Statue of Liberty — is a big surprise, said the scientists from UCLA, Rutgers University, UC Davis, and The University of Alabama who worked together to make the unexpected discovery. (more…)
