Sorry for putting that annoying Disney earworm into your head, but it was too obvious a headline not to use for a link to a gallery of the top photographs in Nikon’s annual Small World Photomicrography Competition, described as “the leading forum for showcasing the beauty and complexity of life as seen through the light …
Researchers at the University of Delaware have developednanobombs that could be used to literally blow up cancer cells–and the biological pathways that carry instructions to generate additional cells and the small veins that nourish them. (Via MedGadget).
The Canadian Police Research Centre, a 26-year-old national agency that studies the latest crime-fighting technology, is planning to set up its new headquarters and research facility right here in Regina. From the CPRC website: The Canadian Police Research Centre (CPRC) is a partnership among the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, the Royal Canadian Mounted …
I kept meaning to blog some of the stuff we talked about at the Writing With Style workshop at the Banff Centre led by Robert J. Sawyer…and didn’t. But even though it’s been so long now I can’t really put them in context, here are the notes I took. Presumably, these were the things that …
A Beethoven manuscript found in the bottom of a filing cabinet at the Palmer Theological Seminary in Philadelphia will go on sale on December 1 at Sotheby’s in London. Estimated price: well over £1 million. The 80-page manuscript, never seen by scholars, is a transcription of the composer’s “Grosse Fuge” for piano duet. Back in …
Researchers have discovered a substance in a fungus found in northern European pine forests that as powerful an antibiotic as penicillin and vancomycin, and effective against antibiotic-resistant strains of Streptococcus pneumoniae and Streptococcus pyogenes. If the substance, called plectasin, is proven safe, it could be on the market by 2012, and there could be many …
Which explains why they were able to take off from a standing start and land without crunching their bones. Just like airplanes today, they extended flaps to increase lift at low speeds, say Cambridge scientists.
African Spider Craves Human Blood!
It’s once again time for the scientific world’s most prestigious awards to be handed out. I’m talking, of course, about the Ig Nobel Prizes. The Ig Nobels are presented each year by the science humor magazine Annals of Improbable Research to researchers who have done something that first makes people laugh, then makes them think. …
This sounds exciting: Mount Sinai School of Medicine researchers have developed a technique for inserting genes into specific non-coding regions of the genome in liver cells. Because these regions occur between genes, there’s no danger of the insertion damanging existing genes–and the inserted gene becomes a permanent part of the genome. Using this technique, the …
…created through the genetic engineering of male mosquitoes, could allow scientists to easily separate the sexes, allowing them to release large number of sterilized males in an effort to control malaria. Which is really cool, but what I like about the story is the fact it allowed me to use the headline “Glowing mosquito gonads.” …
The discovery of more “hobbit” bones in Indonesia strengthens the idea that a separate human-like species lived there as recently as 12,000 years ago. Evidence of butchered animals and the use of fire probably indicate the hobbits had rudimentary language, too.
