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Friday, August 22, 2014

ScienceDaily: Most Popular News

ScienceDaily: Most Popular News


Life can persist in cold, dark world: Life under Antarctic ice explored

Posted: 20 Aug 2014 11:00 AM PDT

The first breakthrough article to come out of a massive U.S. expedition to one of Earth's final frontiers shows that there's life and an active ecosystem one-half mile below the surface of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, specifically in a lake that hasn't seen sunlight or felt a breath of wind for millions of years. The life is in the form of microorganisms that live beneath the enormous Antarctic ice sheet and convert ammonium and methane into the energy required for growth.

Solar energy that doesn't block the view

Posted: 19 Aug 2014 05:02 PM PDT

Researchers have developed a new type of solar concentrator that when placed over a window creates solar energy while allowing people to actually see through the window. It is called a transparent luminescent solar concentrator and can be used on buildings, cell phones and any other device that has a flat, clear surface.

Why global warming is taking a break

Posted: 19 Aug 2014 08:30 AM PDT

The average temperature on Earth has barely risen over the past 16 years. Researchers in Switzerland have now found out why. And they believe that global warming is likely to continue again soon.

Minor variations in ice sheet size can trigger abrupt climate change

Posted: 18 Aug 2014 07:48 PM PDT

Small fluctuations in the sizes of ice sheets during the last ice age were enough to trigger abrupt climate change, scientists have found. The team compared simulated model data with that retrieved from ice cores and marine sediments in a bid to find out why temperature jumps of up to ten degrees took place in far northern latitudes within just a few decades during the last ice age.

Depression often untreated in Parkinson's disease

Posted: 15 Aug 2014 04:26 PM PDT

Depression is known to be a common symptom of Parkinson's disease, but remains untreated for many patients, according to a new study. In fact, depression is the most prevalent non-motor symptom of Parkinson's, a chronic neurodegenerative disorder typically associated with movement dysfunction. Among those with high levels of depressive symptoms, only one-third had been prescribed antidepressants before the study began, and even fewer saw social workers or mental health professionals for counseling.

Bats bolster brain hypothesis, maybe technology, too

Posted: 15 Aug 2014 07:23 AM PDT

Bats demonstrate remarkable skill in tracking targets such as bugs through the trees in the dark of night. Decades of research on how bats use echolocation to keep a focus on their targets not only lends support to a long debated neuroscience hypothesis about vision but also could lead to smarter sonar and radar technologies.

Inside the cell, an ocean of buffeting waves, contrary to conventional understanding

Posted: 14 Aug 2014 09:38 AM PDT

Conventional wisdom holds that the cytoplasm of mammalian cells is a viscous fluid, with organelles and proteins suspended within it, jiggling against one another and drifting at random. However, a new biophysical study challenges this model and reveals that those drifting objects are subject to a very different type of environment. The cytoplasm is actually an elastic gel, it turns out, so it puts up some resistance to simple diffusion, researchers report.

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