An international research consortium has found that longer telomeres increase the risk of melanoma. Telomeres are a part of the genome that function like the plastic caps of your shoelaces, which…

Lord Toast. Credit: Catarina Mota, CC BY-NC-SA By Akshat Rathi, The Conversation and Flora Lisica, The Conversation The 24th Ig Nobel prizes were announced on September 18th. The prizes annually…

Researchers have equipped a robot with a novel tactile sensor that lets it grasp a USB cable draped freely over a hook and insert it into a USB port. Its processing algorithm is faster, so it…

Could novels help us fight climate change? Credit: Asian Development Bank/flickr By Stephanie LeMenager, University of Oregon A frail risk analyst rediscovers his inner frontiersman in a devastating…

For future astronauts, the process of suiting up may go something like this: Instead of climbing into a conventional, bulky, gas-pressurized suit, an astronaut may don a lightweight, stretchy garment…

A new review of literature suggests that while domestic violence rates are higher for homosexual couples, they aren't as high as previous studies have found, and the authors of the paper say the…

Mobile phones are in the hands of 80 percent of Americans so manufacturers are scrambling to find new ways to keep people buying the next model. Being able to use gestures in the space around the…

It's no secret how Africa can feed itself - grow more food. That sort of naïve statement is fine for environmentalists who were born as part of the  Agricultural 1%, but it falls apart in the…

A longstanding question in science has the role of mitochondria in debilitating and fatal motor neuron diseases. Mitochondria are organelles – compartments contained inside cells – that serve…

We've all been driving and come upon signs warning us that construction is happening and we have to slow down for the safety of workers and that penalties are going to be doubled. We see billboards…

As has been predicted for some time, there is a physics train wreck coming at the semiconductor industry - a size and speed where atoms have reached their limits. Quantum computing has remained a…

By Joel N. Shurkin, Inside Science -- Researchers in Pittsburgh, using a brain-computer interface, have shown why learning something similar to what you already know--a repertoire of previous…

Circular RNA were discovered a few years ago, but their role in our bodies is poorly understood.  Our genetic information is stored in DNA, tiny strands of nucleic acid that contain instructions…

Referrals for genetic testing more than doubled across the UK after actress Angelina Jolie announced in May that she proactively underwent a double mastectomy due to testing positive for a BRCA1 gene…

The wage gap between government employees and the private sector is already large and growing. Now there will be a gap in benefits due to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (AKA Obamacare…

A new study uses tree rings to document arroyo evolution along the lower Rio Puerco and Chaco Wash in northern New Mexico. Arroyos are deep, oversized channels that have vertical or steeply cut walls…

Five years ago, it was good luck finding a hotel anywhere near the rural areas where natural gas extraction - fracking - was taking place. The boom in natural gas meant a boom in employment and a…

Miranda is a small, icy moon of Uranus and one of the most visually striking and enigmatic bodies in the solar system. Despite its relatively small size, Miranda appears to have experienced an…

Researchers at Harvard School of Medicine and the University at Buffalo have discovered a sleep-promoting circuit located deep in the primitive brainstem, only the second "sleep node" identified in…

A new paper believes it can measure the precision with which people make decisions - by pupil size before they are presented with any information. Spontaneous, moment-to-moment fluctuations in…