Two Studies On Bee Evolution Reveal Surprises:
The discovery of a 100-million-year old bee embedded in amber -- perhaps the oldest bee ever found -- "pushes the bee fossil record back about 35 million years," according to Bryan Danforth, Cornell associate professor of entomology.
Tiny Bones Rewrite Textbooks: First New Zealand Land Mammal Fossil:
Small but remarkable fossils found in New Zealand will prompt a major rewrite of prehistory textbooks, showing for the first time that the so-called "land of birds" was once home to mammals as well.
The tiny fossilised bones - part of a jaw and hip - belonged to a unique, mouse-sized land animal unlike any other mammal known and were unearthed from the rich St Bathans fossil bed, in the Otago region of South Island.
But the real shock to scientists was that it was there at all: until now, decades of searching had shown no hint that the furry, warm-blooded animals that thrived and prospered so widely in other lands had ever trodden on New Zealand soil.
The fact that even one land mammal had lived there, at least 16 million years ago, has put paid to the theory that New Zealand's rich bird fauna had evolved there because they had no competition from land mammals.
Worms Produce Surprise Insight Into Human Fever:
Give or take a few dozen trillions, a human adult has about 70 trillion cells. An adult Caenorhabditis elegans roundworm has exactly 959 cells.
Yet we have an awful lot in common, says Alejandro Aballay of Duke University, who has been exploring two "highly conserved" cell-signaling pathways for innate immunity shared by worms and humans. For one, we have a lot of common enemies, particularly soil-borne pathogens. C. elegans, of course, lives in the soil. Human populations merely ingest soil by the ton in our food, on our hands, and suspended in our drinking water.
Oysters Can Take Heat And Heavy Metals, But Not Both:
Pollution is bad for the sea life and so is global warming, but aquatic organisms can be resilient. However, even organisms tough enough to survive one major onslaught may find that a double whammy is more than their molecular biology can take.
Feet, Rather Than Fists, The Most Dangerous Bodily Weapon To Use In Assaults:
The researchers base their findings on an assessment of nearly 25,000 people treated in emergency care in and around Cardiff, Wales between 1999 and 2005. All had sustained injuries during acts of violence.
Online Journal Combines Teaching Math And Studying How Students Learn:
When instructors at Bronx-area community colleges applied for a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to study how students think about fundamental concepts of calculus, they hoped to gain a better understanding of how college students learn mathematics. During the 4-year project, the teacher-researchers integrated ongoing research theories with classroom teaching. As a result, their project has evolved into a tool for helping students reason their way through complex calculus.
Novel Brain Areas Associated With The Recognition Of Gender, Ethnicity And The Identity Of Faces:
Researchers in Southern California have isolated brain regions that respond selectively to the cues of gender, ethnicity and identity in faces. Using a novel adaptation technique, they found evidence for neurons that are selectively tuned for gender, ethnicity and identity cues in an area not previously thought to be associated with face processing. Led by researchers at the University of Southern California (USC), the work is a collaboration between USC, the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, and the University of California at San Diego (UCSD). The findings appear Dec. 11 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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