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Wednesday, March 19, 2014

ScienceDaily: Most Popular News

ScienceDaily: Most Popular News


Major 'third-hand smoke' compound causes DNA damage and potentially cancer

Posted: 16 Mar 2014 05:31 PM PDT

Leftover cigarette smoke that clings to walls and furniture is a smelly nuisance, but now research suggests that it could pose a far more serious threat, especially to young children who put toys and other smoke-affected items into their mouths. Scientists reported that one of the tobacco-specific nitrosamines newly formed in "third-hand smoke" damages DNA and could potentially cause cancer.

Bionic plants: Nanotechnology could turn shrubbery into supercharged energy producers

Posted: 16 Mar 2014 12:33 PM PDT

Plants have many valuable functions: They provide food and fuel, release the oxygen that we breathe, and add beauty to our surroundings. Now, researchers wants to make plants even more useful by augmenting them with nanomaterials that could enhance their energy production and give them completely new functions, such as monitoring environmental pollutants.

Mercury's contraction much greater than thought, new imaging shows

Posted: 16 Mar 2014 12:32 PM PDT

New global imaging and topographic data from MESSENGER show that the innermost planet has contracted far more than previous estimates. The results are based on a global study of more than 5,900 geological landforms, such as curving cliff-like scarps and wrinkle ridges, that have resulted from the planet's contraction as Mercury cooled. The findings are key to understanding the planet's thermal, tectonic, and volcanic history, and the structure of its unusually large metallic core.

Intelligent people are more likely to trust others

Posted: 16 Mar 2014 10:38 AM PDT

Intelligent people are more likely to trust others, while those who score lower on measures of intelligence are less likely to do so, says a new study. Researchers based their finding on an analysis of the General Social Survey, a nationally representative public opinion survey carried out in the United States every one to two years. The authors say one explanation could be that more intelligent individuals are better at judging character and so they tend to form relationships with people who are less likely to betray them.

A battery that 'breathes' could power next-gen electric vehicles

Posted: 16 Mar 2014 07:27 AM PDT

Sales of electric vehicles (EVs) nearly doubled in 2013, but most won't take you farther than 100 miles on one charge. To boost their range toward a tantalizing 300 miles or more, researchers are reporting progress on a "breathing" battery that has the potential to one day replace the lithium-ion technology of today's EVs.

Contagious yawning a mystery: May not be linked to empathy after all

Posted: 14 Mar 2014 06:18 PM PDT

While previous studies have suggested a connection between contagious yawning and empathy, new research finds that contagious yawning may decrease with age and is not strongly related to variables like empathy, tiredness and energy levels. Contagious yawning is a well-documented phenomenon that occurs only in humans and chimpanzees in response to hearing, seeing or thinking about yawning.

Atomically thick metal membranes

Posted: 14 Mar 2014 08:14 AM PDT

For the first time researchers have shown that freestanding metal membranes consisting of a single layer of atoms can be stable under ambient conditions. The success and promise of atomically thin carbon, in which carbon atoms are arranged in a honeycomb lattice, also known as graphene has triggered enormous enthusiasm for other two dimensional materials, for example, hexagonal boron nitride and molybdenum sulphide. These materials share a common structural aspect, namely, they are layered materials that one can think of as individual atomic planes that can be pulled away from their bulk 3D structure.

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