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Neighbors From Hell: Infanticide Rife In Guillemot Colony:

One of Britain's best-known species of seabird is increasingly attacking and killing unattended chicks from neighbouring nests due to food shortages.

GPS Navigation Devices Can Be Spoofed, Counter Measures Not Effective In Certain Cases:

Just like flat-screen televisions, cell phones and computers, global positioning system (GPS) technology is becoming something people can't imagine living without. So if such a ubiquitous system were to come under attack, would we be ready?

Abrupt Climate Change Focus Of U.S. National Laboratories:

Abrupt climate change is a potential menace that hasn't received much attention. That's about to change. Through its Climate Change Prediction Program, the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Biological and Environmental Research (OBER) recently launched IMPACTS - Investigation of the Magnitudes and Probabilities of Abrupt Climate Transitions - a program led by William Collins of Berkeley Lab's Earth Sciences Division (ESD) that brings together six national laboratories to attack the problem of abrupt climate change, or ACC.

Iberian Peninsula's Earliest Agricultural Systems Were Unsustainable:

A team of Catalan and Andalusian researchers has proved that the first agricultural systems on the Iberian Peninsula became ever more unsustainable with the passage of time. The study involved the analysis of fossilised grains of wheat and barley from Los Castillejos (Granada), an area of archaeological remains where cereals were cultivated between 4000 and 2500 BCE.

Honeybee Venom Toxin Used To Develop New Tool For Studying Hypertension:

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have modified a honeybee venom toxin so that it can be used as a tool to study the inner workings of ion channels that control heart rate and the recycling of salt in kidneys. In general, ion channels selectively allow the passage of small ions such as sodium, potassium, or calcium into and out of the cell.

Dark Chocolate: Half A Bar Per Week May Keep Heart Attack Risk At Bay:

Maybe gourmands are not jumping for joy. Probably they would have preferred bigger amounts to support their passion. Though the news is still good for them: 6.7 grams of chocolate per day represent the ideal amount for a protective effect against inflammation and subsequent cardiovascular disease.

Type Of Plankton -- A Food Source For Many Fish -- Has Ability To Survive Climate Change:

Queen's researchers have found that the main source of food for many fish - including cod - in the North Atlantic appears to adapt in order to survive climate change.

Caffeine Experts Call For Warning Labels For Energy Drinks:

Johns Hopkins scientists who have spent decades researching the effects of caffeine report that a slew of caffeinated energy drinks now on the market should carry prominent labels that note caffeine doses and warn of potential health risks for consumers.

Primordial Fish Had Rudimentary Fingers:

Tetrapods, the first four-legged land animals, are regarded as the first organisms that had fingers and toes. Now researchers at Uppsala University can show that this is wrong. Using medical x-rays, they found rudiments of fingers in the fins in fossil Panderichthys, the "transitional animal," which indicates that rudimentary fingers developed considerably earlier than was previously thought.

Is That Song Sexy Or Just So-so?:

Why is your mate's rendition of Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get it On" cute and sexy sometimes and so annoying at other times? A songbird study conducted by Emory University sheds new light on this question, showing that a change in hormone levels may alter the way we perceive social cues by altering a system of brain nuclei, common to all vertebrates, called the "social behavior network."

'Redesigned Hammer' That Forged Evolution Of Pregnancy In Mammals Found:

Yale researchers have shown that the origin and evolution of the placenta and uterus in mammals is associated with evolutionary changes in a single regulatory protein, according to a report in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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By themadlolscien… (not verified) on 24 Sep 2008 #permalink