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Saturday, August 3, 2013

ScienceDaily: Top Science News

ScienceDaily: Top Science News


Baby owls sleep like baby humans: Owlets spend more time in REM sleep than adult owls

Posted: 02 Aug 2013 06:48 AM PDT

Baby birds have sleep patterns similar to baby mammals, and their sleep changes in the same way when growing up. This is what a biologists found out working with barn owls in the wild. The team also discovered that this change in sleep was strongly correlated with the expression of a gene involved in producing dark, melanic feather spots, a trait known to covary with behavioral and physiological traits in adult owls. These findings raise the intriguing possibility that sleep-related developmental processes in the brain contribute to the link between melanism and other traits observed in adult barn owls and other animals.

Astronomers discovery a graveyard for comets

Posted: 02 Aug 2013 05:02 AM PDT

Astronomers have discovered a graveyard of comets. The researchers describe how some of these objects, inactive for millions of years, have returned to life leading them to name the group the 'Lazarus comets'.

Genetics: More than merely a mutated gene

Posted: 01 Aug 2013 08:31 PM PDT

If two women have the same genetic mutation that puts them at higher-than-average risk for a disease such as breast cancer, why does only one develop the disease? Genetic scientists have begun to understand how the rest of the genome interacts with such mutations to cause the differences we see among individuals.

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