Life
- Brain
Scientists Say: Synapse
When brain cells need to pass messages, they do it without touching, across a space called a synapse.
- Environment
Cleaning up water that bees like to drink
Plant roots suck up pesticides used on soils, then release them into water that can seep from their leaves. This is a sweetened water that bees love to sip. A teen figured out how to remove most of the pesticide with bits of charcoal.
- Animals
Frog’s gift of grab comes from saliva and squishy tissue
What puts the grip in a frog’s high-speed strike? Quick-change saliva and a super-soft tongue, scientists find.
- Animals
Cool Jobs: A world aglow
Three scientists probe how the natural world makes light, in hopes of using this information to design new and better products.
- Brain
High-school brain researcher takes home $250,000 prize
Three teens won big in this year’s Regeneron Science Talent Search. They studied brain injury, mathematical models and networks of connections within big data sets.
- Animals
Malaria parasites lure mosquitoes to infected hosts
Malaria parasites leave behind an alluring molecule in their hosts’ blood. It draws mosquitoes to sip it, helping spread the disease these carry.
- Microbes
Teen invents a dip to keep germs away
A teen competing in the 2017 Regeneron Science Talent Search invented an eco-friendly chemical mix. It should keep bacteria from growing on treated paper, fabrics — including wound coverings — and more.
- Life
Scientists Say: ATP
This chemical is a bit like a rechargeable battery. Cells build and break apart its chemical bonds to store and release energy.
- Brain
Teens make riskier decisions than children or adults
Teens may make risky decisions in part because they don’t care about uncertainty.
- Health & Medicine
Hibernation: Secrets of the big sleep
Mammals from bears to squirrels hibernate the winter away. Learning how they do it might one day help people mimic aspects of it to heal from brain injuries or voyage to Mars.
- Animals
Explainer: How brief can hibernation be?
Many animals frequently slow body functions and drop their temperatures — sometimes for just a day. Is that hibernation, or just torpor? Are the two even related? Scientists disagree.
- Agriculture
Wild hamsters raised on corn eat their young alive
European hamsters raised in the lab turn into crazy cannibals when fed a diet rich in corn, new data show. The problem may trace to a shortage of a key vitamin.
