2007 Was Tied As Earth's Second Warmest Year Climatologists at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York City have found that 2007 tied with 1998 for Earth's second warmest year in a century. Goddard Institute researchers used temperature data from weather stations on land, satellite measurements of sea ice temperature since [...]

What does a natural stream look like? Ecologists working to restore streams in the eastern United States have been using a misguided ideal, according to new research. The picturesque notion, supported by many ecologists, that a stream untouched by human hands meanders in a single S-shaped channel with high vertical banks seems to be wrong. [...]

Chronic-pain treatment without side effects A drug has been found that treats chronic pain in mice, without the usual painkiller side effects of sedation, addiction or developing tolerance. Whether the compound has the same effect in people remains to be seen, but researchers are approaching the drug's target with "cautious optimism". The compound comes from [...]

Mmmm … Bacteria When you eat a cup of yogurt, billions of bacteria make their way to your gut. Some researchers believe that these "probiotics" can be good for you, alleviating everything from bowel disease to allergies. Now, a team of researchers has shown that, at least in mice, supplementing food with a helping of [...]

Monkey Think, Robot Do In a major step toward helping victims of paralysis walk again, researchers at Duke University Medical Center today announced that they had proved monkeys can use their brainpower to control the walking patterns of robots. The Duke researchers, working with the Computational Brain Project of the Japan Science and Technology Agency, [...]

Snoozing Worms Help Explain Evolution Of Sleep The roundworm C. elegans, a staple of laboratory research, may be key in unlocking one of the central biological mysteries: why we sleep. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine report in the January 11 advanced online edition of Nature that the round worm has a [...]

Aggression As Rewarding As Sex, Food And Drugs, New Research Shows New research from Vanderbilt University shows for the first time that the brain processes aggression as a reward - much like sex, food and drugs - offering insights into our propensity to fight and our fascination with violent sports like boxing and football. “Aggression [...]

There can be only 1! *Clang. Clan. Clang, clang clang. Spark.* "Wait! Wheres your head?" My head, wheres yours?" "How are we supposed to kill each other if we don't have any heads?" Life Expectancy Of Yeast Extended To 800 In Yeast Years, No Apparent Side Effects Biologists have created baker's yeast capable of living [...]

Redefining Genes Within these helices, so we are told, lie all the instructions for making an organism, passed from one generation to the next by copying the DNA blueprint. But over the past year or so, it has begun to look increasingly as though biologists may need to reconsider the role of their favorite molecule. [...]

Big Dinosaurs Had "Teen Sex" The reproductive strategy of dinosaurs was unlike that of their reptilian ancestors or their bird descendants, the study concludes. "They are growing really fast and yet maturing early," said Sarah Werning, a graduate student in paleontology and integrative biology at the University of California, Berkeley. "Among living animals, the only [...]