A Blog Around The Clock

How 'Mother Of Thousands' Makes Baby Plants:

New research shows how the houseplant "mother of thousands" (Kalanchoe diagremontiana) makes the tiny plantlets that drop from the edges of its leaves. Having lost the ability to make viable seeds, the plant has shifted some of the processes that make seeds to the leaves, said Neelima Sinha, professor of plant biology at UC Davis.

Red Wine Ingredient -- Resveratrol -- Fights Diabetes In Mice:

Even relatively low doses of resveratrol--a chemical found in the skins of red grapes and in red wine--can improve the sensitivity of mice to the hormone insulin, according to a new report. As insulin resistance is often characterized as the most critical factor contributing to the development of type 2 diabetes, the findings "provide a potential new therapeutic approach for preventing or treating" both conditions, the researchers said.

In Dogs, A Shortcut To Mapping Disease Genes:

Nearly two years ago, Broad Institute researchers and their colleagues announced they had successfully decoded the genome of the domestic dog, a species coaxed into hundreds of distinct types through selective breeding by humans over the past two centuries.

Dogs That Bite Children Have Often Not Bitten Kids Before:

Dogs that bite children have often not bitten kids before, but they tend to have underlying behavioural or medical problems, indicates research in the journal Injury Prevention.

Biologists Close In On Mystery Of Sea Turtles' 'Lost Years':

Biologists have found a major clue in a 50-year-old mystery about what happens to green sea turtles after they crawl out of their sandy nests and vanish into the surf, only to reappear several years later relatively close to shore.

Of Mice And Men: New Male Contraceptives Successful In Rodents And Humans:

Pills, sponges, IUDs, diaphragms -- women have many options for planning their fertility, none of them quite perfect. But what if men want to help out? They have only two options -- vasectomy, which is usually permanent, and condoms, which are crucial for dating but get old in long-term relationships. Will men ever have a way to reliably make sure that nobody is every calling them "Daddy" before they are ready?