ScienceDaily: Top Science News

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• Repeat act: Parallel selection tweaks many of the same genes to make big and heavy mice
• Why women wiggling in high heels could help improve prosthetic limbs and robots
• Plastic trash altering ocean habitats
• NASA's Spitzer sees the light of alien 'super-Earth'
• Is a new form of life really so alien?
• Quantum dots brighten the future of lighting
• Chemistry: Scientists unlock mystery of how 'handedness' arises in proteins, other functional molecules
• Ancient ballgame reveals more about early Mesoamerican society
• African designer and scientist fashion anti-malaria garment that wards off bugs
• Bats, whales, and bio-sonar: New findings about whales’ foraging behavior reveal surprising evolutionary convergence
• Rare glimpse of world's rarest gorilla
• Not always safety in numbers when it comes to extinction risk
• New material class developed: Pentamode metamaterial
• Refugees from the Ice Age: How was Europe repopulated?
• Psychopathy linked to specific structural abnormalities in the brain
• Sperm crawl and collide on way to egg, say scientists
• Mystery of the domestication of the horse solved: Competing theories reconciled
• Turning 'bad' fat into good: A new candidate pathway for treating visceral obesity

Repeat act: Parallel selection tweaks many of the same genes to make big and heavy mice Posted: 08 May 2012 07:01 PM PDT Organisms are adapted to their environment through their individual characteristics, like body size and body weight. Such complex traits are usually controlled by many genes. As a result, individuals show tremendous variations and can also show subtle gradations. Researchers have now investigated how evolution alters such traits through selection. To do this, they examined the genomes of mouse lines that were selected independently of each other for extreme body size.

Why women wiggling in high heels could help improve prosthetic limbs and robots Posted: 08 May 2012 07:01 PM PDT People walking normally, women tottering in high heels and ostriches strutting all exert the same forces on the ground despite very differently-shaped feet, according to new research. The finding suggests that prosthetic lower limbs and robots' legs could be made more efficient by making them less human-like and more like the prosthetics used by 'Blade Runner' Oscar Pistorius.

Plastic trash altering ocean habitats Posted: 08 May 2012 07:01 PM PDT A 100-fold upsurge in human-produced plastic garbage in the ocean is altering habitats in the marine environment, according to a new study.

NASA's Spitzer sees the light of alien 'super-Earth' Posted: 08 May 2012 02:44 PM PDT NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has detected light emanating from a "super-Earth" planet beyond our solar system for the first time. While the planet is not habitable, the detection is a historic step toward the eventual search for signs of life on other planets.

Is a new form of life really so alien? Posted: 08 May 2012 02:35 PM PDT The idea of discovering a new form of life has not only excited astronomers and astrobiologists for decades, but also the wider public. The notion that we are the only example of a successful life form in the galaxy has, for many, seemed like an unlikely statistic. A new essay examines what really constitutes "life" and the probability of discovering new life forms.

Quantum dots brighten the future of lighting Posted: 08 May 2012 02:33 PM PDT Researchers have boosted the efficiency of a novel source of white light called quantum dots more than tenfold, making them of potential interest for commercial applications.

Chemistry: Scientists unlock mystery of how 'handedness' arises in proteins, other functional molecules Posted: 08 May 2012 01:33 PM PDT Chemists have solved a molecular mystery. The overwhelming majority of proteins and other functional molecules in our bodies display a striking molecular characteristic: They can exist in two distinct forms that are mirror images of each other, like your right hand and left hand. Surprisingly, each of our bodies prefers only one of these molecular forms.

Ancient ballgame reveals more about early Mesoamerican society Posted: 08 May 2012 12:21 PM PDT New research explores the importance of the ballgame to ancient Mesoamerican societies. Dr. Blomster's findings show how the discovery of a ballplayer figurine in the Mixteca Alta region of Oaxaca demonstrates the early participation of the region in the iconography and ideology of the game, a point that had not been previously documented by other researchers.

African designer and scientist fashion anti-malaria garment that wards off bugs Posted: 08 May 2012 12:20 PM PDT A scientist and designer from Africa have together created a fashionable hooded bodysuit embedded at the molecular level with insecticides for warding off mosquitoes infected with malaria. The outfit debuted on the runway at the Cornell Fashion Collective spring fashion show, April 28.

Bats, whales, and bio-sonar: New findings about whales’ foraging behavior reveal surprising evolutionary convergence Posted: 08 May 2012 12:19 PM PDT Though they evolved separately over millions of years in different worlds of darkness, bats and toothed whales use surprisingly similar acoustic behavior to locate, track, and capture prey using echolocation, the biological equivalent of sonar. Now researchers have shown that the acoustic behavior of these two types of animals while hunting is eerily similar.

Rare glimpse of world's rarest gorilla Posted: 08 May 2012 09:45 AM PDT Conservationists working in Cameroon's Kagwene Gorilla Sanctuary have collected the first camera trap video footage of the Cross River gorilla. With fewer than 250 individuals remaining, Cross River gorillas are the world's rarest gorilla and a notoriously elusive species rarely observed directly by field researchers.

Not always safety in numbers when it comes to extinction risk Posted: 08 May 2012 08:28 AM PDT A basic tenet underpinning scientists' understanding of extinction is that more abundant species persist longer than their less abundant counterparts. A new study reveals a much more complex relationship. A team of scientists analyzed more than 46,000 fossils from 52 sites and found that greater numbers did indeed help clam-like brachiopods survive the Ordovician extinction. Surprisingly, abundance did not help brachiopod species persist for extended periods outside of the extinction event.

New material class developed: Pentamode metamaterial Posted: 08 May 2012 07:38 AM PDT Engineers have succeeded in realizing a new material class through the manufacturing of a stable crystalline metafluid, a pentamode metamaterial. Using new nanostructuring methods, these materials can now be realized for the first time with any conceivable mechanical properties.

Refugees from the Ice Age: How was Europe repopulated? Posted: 08 May 2012 06:43 AM PDT Scientists have used DNA analysis to gain important new insights into how human beings repopulated Europe as the Ice Age relaxed its grip.

Psychopathy linked to specific structural abnormalities in the brain Posted: 07 May 2012 01:46 PM PDT New research provides the strongest evidence to date that psychopathy is linked to specific structural abnormalities in the brain. The study is the first to confirm that psychopathy is a distinct neurodevelopmental subgroup of anti-social personality disorder.

Sperm crawl and collide on way to egg, say scientists Posted: 07 May 2012 12:41 PM PDT Scientists have shed new light on how sperm navigate the female reproductive tract, "crawling" along the channel walls and swimming around corners -- with frequent collisions.

Mystery of the domestication of the horse solved: Competing theories reconciled Posted: 07 May 2012 12:41 PM PDT New research indicates that domestic horses originated in the steppes of modern-day Ukraine, southwest Russia and west Kazakhstan, mixing with local wild stocks as they spread throughout Europe and Asia.

Turning 'bad' fat into good: A new candidate pathway for treating visceral obesity Posted: 06 May 2012 01:01 PM PDT Brown seems to be the color of choice when it comes to the types of fat cells in our bodies. Brown fat expends energy, while its counterpart, white fat stores it. Now a team of researchers has essentially made white fat take on characteristics of brown fat. Their findings put medical science a step closer in the race to develop novel anti-obesity therapies.

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