My picks from ScienceDaily

How The Brain Handles Surprise, Good And Bad:

Whether it's a mugger or a friend who jumps out of the bushes, you're still surprised. But your response--to flee or to hug--must be very different. Now, researchers have begun to distinguish the circuitry in the brain's emotion center that processes surprise from the circuitry that processes the aversive or reward "valence" of a stimulus. C. Daniel Salzman and colleagues published their findings in the journal Neuron.

Official Kilogram Losing Mass: Scientists Propose Redefining It As A Precise Number Of Carbon Atoms:

How much is a kilogram? It turns out that nobody can say for sure, at least not in a way that won't change ever so slightly over time. The official kilogram -- a cylinder cast 118 years ago from platinum and iridium and known as the International Prototype Kilogram or "Le Gran K" -- has been losing mass, about 50 micrograms at last check. The change is occurring despite careful storage at a facility near Paris.

The Science Of Collective Decision-making:

Why do some juries take weeks to reach a verdict, while others take just hours? How do judges pick the perfect beauty queen from a sea of very similar candidates? We have all wondered exactly why we did not win a certain award. Now, new psychological research explains how groups come to a collective decision.

Understanding The Neuron's Green Architecture:

Being green is a lifestyle. Turns out, each of your neurons is deeply committed to that green lifestyle - and you didn't even know it. In just a thousandth of a second, a neuron can dump up to 5,000 molecules of its chemical messenger - a neurotransmitter - into the synapse, where it will trigger an impulse in a neighboring nerve cell. The neuron is a recycler par excellence when it comes to these neurotransmitters. Neurons must not only ready neurotransmitter receptors to receive the signals coming fast and furious, but they must also recycle receptors that have been used. And you thought you had recycling problems?

Biologists Expose Hidden Costs Of Firefly Flashes: Risky Balance Between Sex And Death:

A new study by biologists at Tufts University has discovered a dark side lurking behind the magical light shows put on by fireflies each summer. Using both laboratory and field experiments to explore the potential costs of firefly courtship displays, the biologists have uncovered some surprising answers.

Bioluminescence Genes Found Through Metagenomic Study Of Deep Mediterranean:

Metagenomics is a revolutionary approach to study microbes. Rather than isolating pure cultures, the power of high-throughput sequencing is applied directly to environmental samples to obtain information about the genomes of the prokaryotic cells present in a specific habitat studied. The ocean is an ideal subject of this approach because of its enormous microbiota, whose biomass equals that of all other living organisms on earth is mostly microbial, and also because most of these microbes are extremely fastidious to cultivate.

New Strategy To Create Genetically-modified Animals Developed:

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine have demonstrated the potential of a new strategy for genetic modification of large animals. The method employs a harmless gene therapy virus that transfers a genetic modification to male reproductive cells, which is then passed naturally on to offspring.

The Petri Dish Is Taken To New Dimensions:

A team of Brown University biomedical engineers has invented a 3-D Petri dish that can grow cells in three dimensions, a method that promises to quickly and cheaply produce more realistic cells for drug development and tissue transplantation.

Scientific Nursing Top Gives Breastfeeding Babies A Brain Workout:

Breastfeeding babies could become smarter thanks to a scientifically designed 'clever baby' nursing top recently revealed by the University of Portsmouth.

New Understanding Of Basic Units Of Memory:

A molecular "recycling plant" permits nerve cells in the brain to carry out two seemingly contradictory functions -- changeable enough to record new experiences, yet permanent enough to maintain these memories over time.