ScienceDaily: Top Science News

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• Extinctions of large animals sever the Earth's 'nutrient arteries'
• Light slowed to a crawl in liquid crystal matrix
• Shortening tails gave early birds a leg up
• Brain scans may help diagnose dyslexia
• Ancient mammal relatives cast light on recovery after mass extinction
• Ecosystems change long before species are lost
• High-angle helix helps bacteria swim
• Wireless devices go battery-free with new communication technique
• Dating oldest known petroglyphs in North America
• Decellularized mouse heart beats again after regenerating with human heart precursor cells
• Sugar toxic to mice in 'safe' doses, test finds
• Baby corals pass the acid test
• Virus-derived particles target blood cancer
• A hypnotic suggestion can generate true and automatic hallucinations
• Precisely measuring velocity of supernova shockwave

Extinctions of large animals sever the Earth's 'nutrient arteries' Posted: 13 Aug 2013 07:27 PM PDT A new study has demonstrated that large animals have acted as carriers of key nutrients to plants and animals over thousands of years and on continental scales.

Light slowed to a crawl in liquid crystal matrix Posted: 13 Aug 2013 05:14 PM PDT Light traveling in a vacuum is the Universe's ultimate speed demon, racing along at approximately 300,000 kilometers/second. Now scientists have found an effective new way to put a speed bump in light's path. Researchers have embedded dye molecules in a liquid crystal matrix to throttle the group velocity of light back to less than one billionth of its top speed.

Shortening tails gave early birds a leg up Posted: 13 Aug 2013 05:14 PM PDT A radical shortening of their bony tails over 100 million years ago enabled the earliest birds to develop versatile legs that gave them an evolutionary edge, a new study shows.

Brain scans may help diagnose dyslexia Posted: 13 Aug 2013 05:14 PM PDT A new study shows that differences in a key language structure can be seen even before children start learning to read.

Ancient mammal relatives cast light on recovery after mass extinction Posted: 13 Aug 2013 05:13 PM PDT Much work so far suggests that the survivors of mass extinctions often are presented with new ecological opportunities because the loss of many species in their communities allows them to evolve new lifestyles and new anatomical features as they fill the roles vacated by the victims. However, it turns out that not all survivors respond in the same way, and some may not be able to exploit fully the new opportunities arising after a mass extinction.

Ecosystems change long before species are lost Posted: 13 Aug 2013 10:45 AM PDT Researchers take a detailed look at how species affect an ecosystem as they progress through their lifecycles.

High-angle helix helps bacteria swim Posted: 13 Aug 2013 10:45 AM PDT It's counterintuitive but true: Some microorganisms that use flagella for locomotion are able to swim faster in gel-like fluids such as mucus. Research engineers have now figured out why. It's the angle of the coil that matters.

Wireless devices go battery-free with new communication technique Posted: 13 Aug 2013 10:03 AM PDT Engineers have created a new wireless communication system that allows devices to interact with each other without relying on batteries or wires for power. The technology could enable a network of devices and sensors to communicate with no power source or human attention needed.

Dating oldest known petroglyphs in North America Posted: 13 Aug 2013 09:16 AM PDT A new high-tech analysis shows the oldest known petroglyphs in North America, which are cut into several boulders in western Nevada, date to at least 10,500 years ago and perhaps even as far back as 14,800 years ago.

Decellularized mouse heart beats again after regenerating with human heart precursor cells Posted: 13 Aug 2013 08:23 AM PDT For the first time, a mouse heart beat again after its own cells were stripped and replaced with human heart precursor cells. The findings show the promise that regenerating a functional organ by placing human induced pluripotent stem cells -- which could be personalized for the recipient -- in a three-dimensional scaffold could have for transplantation and understanding heart development.

Sugar toxic to mice in 'safe' doses, test finds Posted: 13 Aug 2013 08:17 AM PDT When mice ate a diet of 25 percent extra sugar -- the mouse equivalent of a healthy human diet plus three cans of soda daily -- females died at twice the normal rate and males were a quarter less likely to hold territory and reproduce, according to a toxicity test developed at the University of Utah.

Baby corals pass the acid test Posted: 13 Aug 2013 07:19 AM PDT Corals can survive the early stages of their development even under the tough conditions that rising carbon emissions will impose on them says a new study. Globally, ocean acidification remains a major concern and scientists say it could have severe consequences for the health of adult corals, however, the evidence for negative effects on the early life stages of corals is less clear cut.

Virus-derived particles target blood cancer Posted: 13 Aug 2013 07:19 AM PDT Researchers have developed unique virus-derived particles that can kill human blood cancer cells in the laboratory and eradicate the disease in mice with few side effects.

A hypnotic suggestion can generate true and automatic hallucinations Posted: 13 Aug 2013 07:10 AM PDT Scientists have found evidence that hypnotic suggestion can modify processing of a targeted stimulus before it reaches consciousness. The experiments show that it is possible to hypnotically modulate even highly automatic features of perception, such as color experience.

Precisely measuring velocity of supernova shockwave Posted: 13 Aug 2013 07:10 AM PDT Astronomers have precisely measured the expansion velocity of a shockwave of the supernova remnant W44. The remnant is located in the constellation of Aquila, approximately 10,000 light-years away from our solar system. The team observed the high-temperature and high-density molecular gas in the millimeter/submillimeter wave ranges.

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