News Articles

The earliest evidence of a comet entering Earth's atmosphere and exploding has been found. It rained down a shock wave of fire which obliterated every life form in its path, has been found. 

The regions of the U.S. that have doctors and hospitals consolidated into large networks are more likely to have accountable care organizations - medical practice structures that seek to improve medical care and reduce costs - according to a new RAND Corporation paper written to bolster support for the federal Affordable Care Act. 
Consolidation and accelerating growth of large accountable care organizations are a key cost control strategy for Obamacare.

Clouds on Mars look a lot like those on Earth: images of the Martian sky taken by NASA's Opportunity rover depict gauzy, high-altitude wisps, similar to our cirrus clouds. These clouds likely consist of either carbon dioxide or water-based ice crystals but since we can't sample a Martian cloud yet, it's difficult to know the precise conditions that give rise to them. So researchers have done the next-best thing; they've recreated Mars-like conditions within a three-story-tall cloud chamber in Germany, adjusting the chamber's temperature and relative humidity to match conditions on Mars — essentially forming Martian clouds on Earth.  

With 99% of the Earth's water unused, it might not seem like there could be a water scarcity issue, but water tends to be boom and bust. Many of the poorest regions don't have access to potable water and new estimates by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) if temperatures warm due to climate change.

Bees are more genetically related to ants than they are to social wasps such as yellow jackets and paper wasps, according to a new paper.
 Ants, bees and stinging wasps all belong to the aculeate (stinging) Hymenoptera clade, the insect group in which social behavior is most extensively developed, said senior author and ant specialist Phil Ward, professor of entomology at UC Davis. 
The use of genome sequencing and bioinformatics answers a piece of a long-standing, unanswered evolutionary puzzle. Previously it was thought that ants and bees were distantly related, with ants being closer to certain parasitoid wasps.

Triathletes participate in a grueling endurance sport - in the Olympic version, it means swimming about 1 mile, bicycling 40 miles and then running 6.2 miles. Those in the Ironman version get even more extreme, a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike race and then running a full marathon, 26.2 miles.
Clearly, in both training and competition, they regularly push their bodies beyond the limits most of us can endure. There is no doubt that triathletes are tougher than most people, the mystery is why.

High taxes or low taxes, anti-global warming or anti-GMO. You can often figure out how an American votes by asking their stance on a few issues.
The government is currently in the middle of a shutdown because neither side remembers what bipartisan means. Yet one things remains the same in both camps; belief superiority, the idea that their views on certain issues are not only correct but also that all other views are inferior.
A recent psychology paper examined whether one end of the American political spectrum believes more strongly than the other in the superiority of its principles and positions. It found both sides have elements of "belief superiority," depending on the issue. 

Premenstrual syndrome (PMS) is the name given to women who are in a bad mood when they are about to get their periods.  Most women are unaffected by the hormonal changes of the menstrual cycle, but approximately 20% of women say they experience premenstrual syndrome and 5% say they have a severe disorder characterized by functionally impairing or distressing mood and physical symptoms in the luteal phase of the menstrual cycle (second half of cycle) - which scholars call premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), a more severe form of PMS.  

Since 1996, corn containing a gene that allows it to create a protein that is toxic to certain insects yet is safe for human consumption has been grown in the United States.
Most of this genetically modified "Bt corn" has been used for animal feed or processed into corn meal, starch, or other products. Varieties of sweet corn (corn on the cob) have existed since the late 1990s, though relatively few acres have been planted related to the impact of marketing campaigns against it by activist groups. 
A new study doesn't rehash the well-documented safety issue and instead deals with the environmental aspects. It suggests that Bt sweet corn is better for the environment because it requires fewer pesticide applications than conventional corn.

James Rothman, Randy Schekman and Thomas Südhof have been awarded the 2013 Nobel Prize in Medicine for their work on how the cell organizes its transport system.Disturbances in the control system for the transport and delivery of cellular molecules contribute to conditions such as neurological diseases, diabetes, and immunological disorders. The three US researchers received the award for their discoveries of machinery regulating vesicle traffic, a major transport system in our cells.

In a world of over-diagnosis, virtually anything can be considered a mental disorder if you are willing to pay someone to give you therapy for it. Afraid of attractive women? You have Venustraphobia. Afraid of GMO foods? The name is in the works.  Body piercings. plastic surgery, eating couch cushions, every odd compulsion has someone saying clinically it's real.
Even in the fuzzy world of behavior, being an actual clinical diagnosis requires an evidence basis and most pop diagnosis addictions don't have that; it's just individual weirdness manifesting a compulsion. 

Healthcare workers' use of disposable gowns and gloves upon entering all patient rooms on an intensive care unit, versus only in rooms on standard isolation protocol, helped reduce patient acquisition of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) by approximately 40 percent, according to new research.
The study did not show statistically significant results for preventing patient acquisition of another common bacteria, vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus (VRE) and the use of gowns and gloves increased handwashing frequency among healthcare workers and did not result in any increase in adverse events for patients.