Retroviruses are important pathogens capable of crossing species barriers to infect new hosts, but knowledge of their evolutionary history is limited. By mapping endogenous retroviruses (ERVs),…

Some older chemistry sets included a conductivity tester to demonstrate the conductivity of materials and liquids. If you wish to include Snap Circuits in your Science Play and Research Kit you can…

Archaeologists working in Nepal have uncovered evidence of a structure at the birthplace of the Buddha dating to the sixth century B.C., the first archaeological material linking the life of the…

Playing violent video games not only increases aggression, it also leads to less self-control and more cheating, according to  a paper in Social Psychological and Personality Science. The…

Caitlin Shetterly’s long feature, “The Bad Seed: The Health Risks of Genetically Modified Corn,” in Elle—a magazine with more than 1.1 million monthly readers—was particularly appalling. http://www…

Caitlin Shetterly’s long feature, “The Bad Seed: The Health Risks of Genetically Modified Corn,” in Elle—a magazine with more than 1.1 million monthly readers—was particularly appalling. http://www…

Global warming was set in motion around 1600 AD, it seems.  Because carbon dioxide emissions persist for a long time, even a sudden halt today means the carbon dioxide already in Earth's…

Awe-inspiring moments, like the sight of the Grand Canyon or the Aurora Borealis, might increase our tendency to believe in God and the supernatural, according to a new paper in Psychological Science…

Zombies are really popular - "...and zombies" attached to the end of well-established works of fiction have become a common trope and once they began to swarm over the literary canon, it was only a…

Classical gravity is not good enough.  As a first step, one must think about groups since that is the foundation of the Standard Model of physics. All my failed efforts to think about gravity…

An international collaboration has discovered a novel receptor, which allows the immune system of modern humans to recognize dangerous invaders, and subsequently elicits an immune response. The…

The government enjoyed tremendous success steering the goals of science in World War II and that continued during the NASA era. Since that time, government has exercised greater control of science…

This week, Americans officially start focusing on Christmas holiday celebrations and that means a lot of high-calorie food. Everyone is going to have recommendations for avoiding weight gain but…

If you have ever wondered about why you can tap a newly opened beer bottle and its suds will foam out and go all over the place, researchers from Carlos III University and Universite Pierre et Marie…

The top quark is the most massive elementary particle that we have so far discovered at particle accelerators. One usually describes this by saying that the top mass is about 185 times larger than…

Though more and more women are given antidepressant medication while they are pregnant and there have been more diagnosed cases of autism, there is no connection between the use of antidepressant…

Americans have had it good. Drug companies have consistently produced new products that have done terrific things, but they are hated by much of the public, to such an extent that marijuana advocates…

Diabetics who received prescribed heart medications by mail were less likely to visit the emergency room than patients who picked up prescriptions in person, according to a new Kaiser Permanente…

I may today perhaps make the boldest claim I ever made, at least many will think so, and I am not known for my humbleness (though I should be – how many established scientists do see themselves as…

 C/2012 S1, Comet ISON, began in the Oort cloud, almost a light year away and has traveled for over a million years. On Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 28, 2013, Comet ISON will sling shot around the…