Fecal pollution can explain a lot of the increase in resistant bacteria where humans live, but not all of it. In some cases resistance genes were common without the presence of “crAssphage”, a bacteriophage common in human feces  - environments polluted with high levels of antibiotics from manufacturing, according to a new paper.

As European science-related institutions, such as the European Research Council, have shown their growing preference for Open Access, e.g., via the Plan S, the primary rationale for this is the positive effect on the discovery of new knowledge that various models of Open Access can be expected to have.

House plants can help clean a home's air, but unless you live in a greenhouse a mechanical high-efficiency particulate (HEPA) air filter is the way to go, because it forces pet dander, pollen (even cigarette smoke if you still do that) or pollen through a mesh that traps those. 

Gol-e-Zard Cave lies in the shadow of Mount Damavand, which at more than 5,000 metres dominates the landscape of northern Iran. In this cave, stalagmites and stalactites are growing slowly over millennia and preserve in them clues about past climate events. Changes in stalagmite chemistry from this cave have now linked the collapse of the Akkadian Empire to climate changes more than 4,000 years ago.

An ancient genetic mechanism needed for plant fertility is helping to solve a science mystery 700 million years in the making.

The researchers discovered how a gene called DUO1 known to control sperm production inside pollen grains of flowering plants, is also used by primitive land plants to produce free-swimming sperm. They found that the gene originated in the stoneworts, an ancient group of aquatic algae that diverged from land plants over 700 million years ago.

The paper suggests that it was a simple change in the DUO1 gene sequence that allowed the algal ancestors of land plants to produce small swimming sperm to increase the chances of fertilization in an aquatic environment.

When I first began writing about the anti-vaccine issue, California was the home of the movement (1). The state had more philosophical exemptions than the rest of the country combined, and they were primarily wealthy white elites living on the coast.

You know, like Hollywood.

Medicine is not going to be enough. That was the first lesson that the world learned when Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) raged across cultures in the 1980s. Though its cause was learned to be Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) its transmission was social. In some undeveloped countries, unprotected sex, infidelity, and sometimes even rape were points of pride. In wealthier nations, risky behavior in sub-cultures was touted as freedom.

Which corporation lets executives commute to work on emissions-belching airplanes, damages native landmarks while putting up advertising, speculates on international bank trade while saddling consumers with their losses, and writes policies for its customers that it then defies in its own practices?

The United States, and other countries with modern science and technology regulations, have enjoyed terrific boosts in yields, so great that food has become a cheap commodity, which has allowed for alternative processes (organic, shade tree, natural, etc.) to flourish by charging a premium.

For any of you who haven't seen it, here is a stereo image of Ultima Thule, alternating between two images which help if you don’t have 3D Anaglyph glasses. The interesting thing about it is that there is no sign that the two lobes are more than slightly squashed by touching each other. They seem to have formed like this, in a gentle process, as separate objects that gradually grew by gravitational attraction of smaller pieces. Then eventually, the system lost energy probably due to influence of some third moon, and as they came together gently touched each other.