An old problem (Discover, New Scientist)
Medical scientists have done full-body scans of a large number of mummies, from many cultures, many social classes, and many times. A lot of the mummies had signs of heart disease. So this may not be the modern problem we always thought. It's just that something else (usually an infectious disease) usually got us before the heart disease.
Vostok bug (BBC, New Scientist)
A recent Russian expedition to Lake Vostok, buried under Antarctic ice, may have found living bacteria in the buried lake...
...or not (Science Insider)
... but then again, it may just be contamination of the sample.
Grapes to the rescue again (Science Daily)
You may recall the science story about red wine being good for your health. That got refined to a specific chemical in red grapes - resveratrol. Now, they have pinned down the metabolic pathway that resveratrol works through.
Three bodies - no problem (ScienceNOW)
Humiliatingly enough, physics can give exact solutions for gravitational problems only for cases with just two bodies, and a few special cases of three bodies. "A few" used to be just three. Now, suddenly, two physicists have found 13 additional cases.
Teeth from where? (ScienceNOW, Discover Magazine)
Biologists have been able to grow new human teeth, cultured from human gum tissue, incubated in ... mouse kidneys.
Triumph over glare (Science Daily)
The biggest problem with spotting planets in other star systems is the images of the planets being drowned out in the glare in the star. Now, a new imaging system, using sophisticated software, not only spots the planets, it lets us analyze the spectra of the light coming off them. That opens the door for chemical analysis. The first reports come from four red planets in a system 128 light-years away.
My enemy's enemy (Science Daily)
Infants just nine months old can recognize which people are like them and which are different (in terms of who likes the same foods they do, at least). Furthermore, they like seeing people be nice to people like them - and they like seeing people be mean to people who are different. Hm.
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