ScienceDaily: Strange Science News

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• Buffet dish sequences may prompt healthier choices
• Earliest record of copulating insects discovered
• Stress makes snails forgetful
• Rare new microbe found in two spacecraft clean rooms
• From one collapsing star, two black holes form and fuse
• Bringing sun's light and energy to interior rooms: Innovative solar technology may lead to interior lighting revolution
• Multitasking neurons filter and decide: How neural circuits identify information needed for decisions
• Monkeys use minds to move two virtual arms
• Newly discovered predatory dinosaur 'king of gore' reveals the origins of T. rex
• Cocktail novelties inspired by nature's designs
• For young baseball players, light bats don't hit too fast
• Creatures of influence
• Nanoscale 'tsunami' helps locusts tune in
• Japanese superfood prevents flu infection
• Male lizards prefer more-feminine lizards to 'bearded ladies'
• Playing pop and rock music boosts performance of solar cells
• Spider's super-thin ribbons key to silk tech

Buffet dish sequences may prompt healthier choices Posted: 06 Nov 2013 05:24 PM PST Most people are unaware that food order biases what ends up on their plates: the first food in line is taken the most and biases what else is taken. This influence is so strong that in one study researchers found that two-thirds of an individual's plate is filled with the first three items they encounter, thus food order can be leveraged to encourage selection and intake of healthier foods.

Earliest record of copulating insects discovered Posted: 06 Nov 2013 05:24 PM PST Scientists have found the oldest fossil depicting copulating insects in northeastern China.

Stress makes snails forgetful Posted: 06 Nov 2013 05:22 PM PST New research on pond snails has revealed that high levels of stress can block memory processes. Researchers trained snails and found that when they were exposed to multiple stressful events they were unable remember what they had learned.

Rare new microbe found in two spacecraft clean rooms Posted: 06 Nov 2013 01:26 PM PST A rare, recently discovered microbe that survives on very little to eat has been found in two places on Earth: spacecraft clean rooms in Florida and South America. Microbiologists often do thorough surveys of bacteria and other microbes in spacecraft clean rooms. Fewer microbes live there than in almost any other environment on Earth, but the surveys are important for knowing what might hitch a ride into space. If extraterrestrial life is ever found, it would be readily checked against the census of a few hundred types of microbes detected in spacecraft clean rooms.

From one collapsing star, two black holes form and fuse Posted: 06 Nov 2013 12:24 PM PST Over billions of years, small black holes can slowly grow into supermassive black holes by taking on mass from their surroundings, and also by merging with other black holes. But this slow process can't explain how supermassive black holes existing in the early universe would have formed less than one billion years after the Big Bang. New findings help to test a model that solves this problem.

Bringing sun's light and energy to interior rooms: Innovative solar technology may lead to interior lighting revolution Posted: 06 Nov 2013 12:24 PM PST Researchers have seen the light -- a bright, powerful light -- and it just might change the future of how building interiors are brightened. In fact, that light comes directly from the sun. And with the help of tiny, electrofluidic cells and a series of open-air "ducts," sunlight can naturally illuminate windowless work spaces deep inside office buildings and excess energy can be harnessed, stored and directed to other applications.

Multitasking neurons filter and decide: How neural circuits identify information needed for decisions Posted: 06 Nov 2013 11:13 AM PST Using brain recordings and a computer model, an interdisciplinary team confounds the conventional wisdom about how the brain sorts out relevant versus irrelevant sensory inputs in making choices.

Monkeys use minds to move two virtual arms Posted: 06 Nov 2013 11:12 AM PST Monkeys have learned to control the movement of both arms on an avatar using just their brain activity.

Newly discovered predatory dinosaur 'king of gore' reveals the origins of T. rex Posted: 06 Nov 2013 10:18 AM PST A dinosaur belonging to the same evolutionary branch as the famous Tyrannosaurus rex has just been discovered. Lythronax argestes possesses several unique features, a short narrow snout with a wide back of the skull with forward-oriented eyes. Lythronax translates as "king of gore."

Cocktail novelties inspired by nature's designs Posted: 06 Nov 2013 08:40 AM PST A mathematician and a celebrity chef have combined talents to create two culinary novelties inspired by nature.

For young baseball players, light bats don't hit too fast Posted: 06 Nov 2013 08:40 AM PST The use of non-wood bats in youth baseball has spurred decades of controversy about whether they propel the ball too fast, in part because of their higher bat-to-ball energy transfer -- the "trampoline effect." A study finds that in some cases non-wood bats do not hit the ball any faster. In the hands of young teen players, for example, lighter non-wood bats hit the ball at wood-like speeds.

Creatures of influence Posted: 06 Nov 2013 04:39 AM PST An international research team has developed mathematical tools that can estimate which species are most influential in a food web.

Nanoscale 'tsunami' helps locusts tune in Posted: 06 Nov 2013 04:39 AM PST The remarkable mechanism by which the tiny ears of locusts can hear and distinguish between different tones has been discovered by researchers. Understanding how the nanoscale features of the insect eardrum mechanically process sound could open up practical possibilities for the fabrication of embedded signal processing in extremely small microphones.

Japanese superfood prevents flu infection Posted: 06 Nov 2013 04:39 AM PST Scientists have discovered that bacteria found in a traditional Japanese pickle can prevent flu. Could this be the next superfood?

Male lizards prefer more-feminine lizards to 'bearded ladies' Posted: 06 Nov 2013 04:39 AM PST Mating-behavior studies of lizards in three southern US states have revealed which females male lizards find to be the sexiest. The research provides insight into the evolution of male-female differences.

Playing pop and rock music boosts performance of solar cells Posted: 06 Nov 2013 04:39 AM PST Playing pop and rock music improves the performance of solar cells, according to new research.

Spider's super-thin ribbons key to silk tech Posted: 05 Nov 2013 12:26 PM PST The silk of a spider feared for its venomous bite could be the key to creating new super-sticky films and wafer-thin electronics and sensors for medical implants that are highly compatible with the human body.

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