MS-LS2-2
Construct an explanation that predicts patterns of interactions among organisms across multiple ecosystems.
- Agriculture
Bananas under attack: Understanding their foes
Fungal blights threaten the world’s most popular fruit. But genetic studies hint at new ways to combat some of these diseases.
- Plants
Scientists Say: Bromeliad
Bromeliads are plants with long spiky leaves. They are common houseplants, and we even see one in the grocery store — the pineapple.
- Health & Medicine
Measles in the Americas: Going, going — gone!
The Americas have at last shed a major childhood scourge: measles. The viral infection used to kill hundreds of children each year. Now the hemisphere only sees cases spread by travelers.
- Health & Medicine
Zebra finches can ‘drink’ water from their own fat
When water is scarce, thirsty zebra finches can produce their own water. They do it by breaking down their body fat.
- Animals
Cool Jobs: Linking animal health to human health
Scientists who watch out for diseases in wild animals also can play a role in keeping people from getting sick.
- Microbes
Staph infections? The nose knows how to fight them
Bacteria living in some people’s noses make a compound that could help fight a nasty type of infection that laughs at other antibiotics.
- Ecosystems
Will chicken cologne guard you from malaria?
Mosquitoes that carry malaria are repelled by the smell of chickens. In malaria country, that could make these birds a human’s best friend.
- Animals
Plants, animals adapt to city living
Cities have turned into experiments in evolution for both plants and animals, from the taste of clover to the stickiness of lizards’ toes.
- Animals
Scientists Say: Crepuscular
Day creatures are diurnal. Night creatures are nocturnal. Animals active at twilight get a special name.
- Health & Medicine
U.S. mosquitoes now spreading Zika virus
Scientists had worried that if people sick with Zika came to America, local mosquitoes might bite them and spread the disease. That’s now happened.
- Health & Medicine
Scientists Say: Poisonous
A poison-arrow frog is poisonous, but a rattlesnake is not. What’s the difference? It’s how the poison is delivered.
- Health & Medicine
Zika vaccines look promising
As a Zika epidemic surges through Brazil and northward, scientists are looking for drugs to keep more people from becoming infected. Several vaccines show promise in early tests — but none has yet been tried in people.
