Healthy consumers can handle low levels of bacteria occasionally found in cosmetics but for severely ill patients these bacteria may trigger life-threatening infections, as patients in the intensive…

Although there is unquestionably much left to be discovered about life on Earth, charismatic animals like mammals are usually well documented, and it is rare to find a new species today—especially…

Monster.com is the perfect example of a company that spent its entire marketing budget on a Super Bowl ad and launched a success story. Is that the exception? No, it turns out that Super Bowl…

Boosted by physical and mental exercise, neural stem cells continue to sprout new neurons throughout life, but the exact function of these newcomers has been the topic of much debate. Removing a…

Earthquakes occurring at the edges of tectonic plates can trigger events at a distance and much later in time, according to a team of researchers reporting in Nature. These doublet earthquakes may…

February’s issue of Pediatrics offers a study saying there is reason to rethink blaming the spike in autism diagnoses on thimerosal, a mercury-containing preservative routinely used in several…

A study in Social Science Quarterly says that religious women are less likely to have abortions than secular women - not because they're more pro-life, but because they're less likely to get pregnant…

Based on the rapid evaporation of solvent from simple “inks,” University of Illinois researchers have demonstrated a process for fabrication of complex, three-dimensional nanoscale structures and…

Studies have shown that children do not accurately use landmarks to orient themselves until about the age of six but those studies were done in an artificial environment. A new study taking place in…

Researchers at the University of Copenhagen and Aarhus have shown they are able to use the radiocarbon dating method to study special proteins in the lens of the eye - they use a nuclear accelerator…

Ten years ago, astronomers made the stunning discovery that the universe is expanding at a faster pace today than it did in the past. “Explaining why the expansion of the Universe is currently…

Scientists at University College London say they have established a link between changes in the temperature of the sea’s surface and increases in North Atlantic hurricane activity. They say their…

Why do some people solve problems more creatively than others? Are people who think creatively somehow different from those who tend to think in a more methodical fashion? These questions are part…

Using mice as models, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology traced some of the differences between humans and chimpanzees to differences in our diet. Humans consume a…

Deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgery, which is used to treat Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders, is now being studied for its potential to treat a variety of conditions. For example,…

President Bush asked Congress to double federal support for basic research in the physical sciences in the State of the Union address. I guess he reads my column.

Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), scientists have discovered that cocaine-related images trigger the emotional centers of the brains of patients addicted to drugs, even when the…

For most people, the name “E. coli” is synonymous with food poisoning and product recalls, but a professor in Texas A&M University’s chemical engineering department envisions the bacteria as a…

After using a previous equation to pair parenting styles with a parenting method book, I thought it might be fun to use a similar format to pair political ideas with a candidate. The following…

Building upon several years of research into the gecko's uncanny ability to climb sheer walls, researchers at the University of California, Berkeley writing in the Journal of the Royal Society…