|  World's top scientists pledge to share all findings to fight Zika By Kate Kelland LONDON (Reuters) - Thirty of the world's leading scientific research institutions, journals and funders have pledged to share for free all data and expertise on Zika to speed up the fight against an outbreak of the viral disease spreading across the Americas. Specialists welcomed the initiative, saying it showed how the global health community had learned crucial lessons from West Africa's Ebola epidemic, which killed more than 11,300 people and saw scientists scrambling to conduct research to help in the development of potential treatments and vaccines. Zika, a viral disease carried by mosquitoes, is causing international alarm as an outbreak in Brazil has now spread through much of the Americas. Read More » Researchers find new Zika clues to birth defect in fetus study  | By Julie Steenhuysen CHICAGO (Reuters) - Researchers on Wednesday reported new evidence strengthening the association between Zika virus and a spike in birth defects, citing the presence of the virus in the brain of an aborted fetus of a European woman who became pregnant while living in Brazil. An autopsy of the fetus showed microcephaly or small head size, as well as severe brain injury and high levels of the Zika virus in fetal brain tissues, exceeding levels of the virus typically found in blood samples, researchers in Slovenia from the University Medical Center in Ljubljana reported in the New England Journal of Medicine. The findings help "strengthen the biologic association" between Zika virus infection and microcephaly, researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, wrote in an editorial that accompanied the paper.
| Read More » Ripple effect: scientists await word on gravitational waves  | By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A century ago, Albert Einstein hypothesized the existence of gravitational waves, small ripples in space and time that dash across the universe at the speed of light. On Thursday, at a news conference called by the U.S. National Science Foundation, researchers may announce at long last direct observations of the elusive waves. Such a discovery would represent a scientific landmark, opening the door to an entirely new way to observe the cosmos and unlock secrets about the early universe and mysterious objects like black holes and neutron stars.
| Read More » NASA delays space station cargo run due to mold on packing bags By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - NASA's next cargo run to the International Space Station will be delayed for at least two weeks after black mold was found in two fabric bags used for packing clothing, food and other supplies, the U.S. space agency said on Wednesday. The source of the mold, a common fungal growth in humid climates like Florida's, is under investigation by NASA and Lockheed Martin, which prepares NASA cargo for launch aboard two commercial carriers, Orbital ATK and privately owned SpaceX. An Orbital Cygnus cargo ship was more than halfway packed for the launch, scheduled for March 10, when the mold was found during routine inspections and microbial sampling, NASA spokesman Daniel Huot said. Read More » Ripple effect: scientists await word on gravitational waves  | By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A century ago, Albert Einstein hypothesized the existence of gravitational waves, small ripples in space and time that dash across the universe at the speed of light. On Thursday, at a news conference called by the U.S. National Science Foundation, researchers may announce at long last direct observations of the elusive waves. Such a discovery would represent a scientific landmark, opening the door to an entirely new way to observe the cosmos and unlock secrets about the early universe and mysterious objects like black holes and neutron stars.
| Read More » Ripple effect: scientists await word on gravitational waves  | By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A century ago, Albert Einstein hypothesized the existence of gravitational waves, small ripples in space and time that dash across the universe at the speed of light. On Thursday, at a news conference called by the U.S. National Science Foundation, researchers may announce at long last direct observations of the elusive waves. Such a discovery would represent a scientific landmark, opening the door to an entirely new way to observe the cosmos and unlock secrets about the early universe and mysterious objects like black holes and neutron stars.
| Read More » Gravitational Waves: A Black Hole Is Trying to Slap You — Can You Feel It?  | Paul Sutter is a visiting scholar at The Ohio State University's Center for Cosmology and AstroParticle Physics (CCAPP). Sutter is also host of the podcasts Ask a Spaceman and RealSpace, and the YouTube series Space In Your Face. Sutter contributed this article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.
| Read More » Have Gravitational Waves Been Detected? Scientists Provide Update Today (Watch Live)  | Scientists are widely expected to announce the first-ever direct detection of elusive gravitational waves this morning, and you can watch the big moment live. Then, at 1 p.m. EST (1800 GMT), the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Ontario, Canada, will host its own webcast about the announcement and its implications. Space.com will carry that event live as well, thanks to the Perimeter Institute.
| Read More » First Migrants to Imperial Rome ID'd by Their Teeth  | Three adult men and a young adolescent of unknown gender buried in cemeteries outside Rome were likely migrants to the city, their teeth reveal. The four immigrants all lived during the first to third centuries A.D. They are the first individuals ever to be identified as migrants to the city during the Roman Imperial era, which began around the turn of the millennium and ended in the fourth century. This was a time when Rome was a thriving, complex metropolis, said study researcher Kristina Killgrove, a biological anthropologist at the University of West Florida.
| Read More » Bacterial Slime Acts As Teensy Eyeball  | Slimy microbes called cyanobacteria use their teensy bodies as lenses to collect light and "see," before growing little legs to inch toward those rays, new research suggests. "The idea that bacteria can see their world in basically the same way that we do is pretty exciting," study lead author Conrad Mullineaux, a microbiologist at the Queen Mary University of London, said in a statement. Cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, are some of the most ancient life-forms on the planet.
| Read More » Fossils Shed New Light on Human-Gorilla Split  | Fossils of what may be primitive relatives of gorillas suggest that the human and gorilla lineages split up to 10 million years ago, millions of years later than what has been recently suggested, researchers say. Although the fossil record of human evolution is still patchy, it is better understood than that of great apes such as chimpanzees and gorillas. Since few great ape fossils have been found in Africa so far, "some scientists have forcefully suggested that the ancestors of African apes and humans must have emerged in Eurasia," said study senior author Gen Suwa, a paleoanthropologist at the University of Tokyo.
| Read More » Why Are Millennials Narcissistic? Blame Income Inequality Millennials have heard it before: People born between the early 1980s and the early 2000s are the most narcissistic, individualistic and self-absorbed generation in recorded history. Researchers reporting in 2013 in the journal Psychological Science found that socioeconomic changes preceded changes in individualism, particularly the change from a blue-collar manufacturing economy to one full of white-collar office workers. Meanwhile, cross-cultural research suggests that countries with greater income inequality tend to have citizens with higher self-regard. Read More » Ripple effect - scientists await word on gravitational waves  | By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A century ago, Albert Einstein hypothesised the existence of gravitational waves, small ripples in space and time that dash across the universe at the speed of light. On Thursday, at a news conference called by the U.S. National Science Foundation, researchers may announce at long last direct observations of the elusive waves. Such a discovery would represent a scientific landmark, opening the door to an entirely new way to observe the cosmos and unlock secrets about the early universe and mysterious objects like black holes and neutron stars.
| Read More » Extraterrestrial Life Could Be Vulnerable to Greenhouse Effect  | A powerful greenhouse effect can destroy a planet's chances of hosting life, a new study suggests. Until proven otherwise, scientists on Earth assume water is necessary for life to arise on other planets. Inside such a habitable zone, Earth-like planets are neither too hot nor too cold for liquid water to exist on the surface.
| Read More » Breakthrough: Scientists detect Einstein-predicted ripples WASHINGTON (AP) — In an announcement that electrified the world of astronomy, scientists said Thursday that they have finally detected gravitational waves, the ripples in the fabric of space-time that Einstein predicted a century ago. Read More » To Stop Brain Shrinkage, Start Moving Couch potatoes beware: Physical fitness during middle age may be a driver of brain health later in life, according to the results of a new study. The brain shrinkage was small but significant enough to raise the participants' risk of memory loss and dementia, the researchers said. The research tapped into data from the Framingham Heart Study, an ongoing program that has followed the lives of thousands of ordinary people over the course of nearly 70 years and three generations. Read More » Jaguar Aims to Make Autonomous Cars Drive More Like Humans  | Self-driving cars may represent an important achievement in the fields of artificial intelligence and robotics, but one car manufacturer is hoping to develop new technologies that could help these autonomous machines drive less like robots and more like, well, humans. British automotive company Jaguar Land Rover is taking part in a new research project, dubbed MOVE-UK, to foster the development of safer and more effective autonomous cars. "Customers are much more likely to accept highly automated and fully autonomous vehicles if the car reacts in the same way as the driver," Wolfgang Epple, director of research and technology for Jaguar Land Rover, said in a statement.
| Read More » Einstein's gravitational waves detected in scientific milestone  | By Will Dunham and Scott Malone WASHINGTON/CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (Reuters) - Scientists said on Thursday they have for the first time detected gravitational waves, ripples in space and time hypothesized by physicist Albert Einstein a century ago, in a landmark discovery that opens a new window for studying the cosmos. The researchers said they detected gravitational waves coming from two black holes - extraordinarily dense objects whose existence also was foreseen by Einstein - that orbited one another, spiraled inward and smashed together. The scientific milestone, announced at a news conference in Washington, was achieved using a pair of giant laser detectors in the United States, located in Louisiana and Washington state, capping a long quest to confirm the existence of these waves.
| Read More » Head Case: Henry VIII Beheaded Wives Due to Head Injuries? England's King Henry VIII is best known for his erratic and sometimes violent behavior — he married six times and had two of his wives beheaded, for example — and now, researchers say the Tudor king's brutal ways may have stemmed from brain injuries he got during several sporting accidents. Henry VIII suffered a series of head injuries, potentially resulting in traumatic brain injury that may explain his boorish behavior, a new study said. In the study, the researchers analyzed historical documents for reports of the king's health and behavior, up to his death, at age 55. Read More » | |
