69320243
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sciencehabit writes:
An “excuse me” might be nice. Researchers have found that Earth belches a potent greenhouse gas known as tetrafluoromethane (CF4) during earthquakes and other tectonic events. The emissions likely aren’t making a significant contribution to global warming, but the findings could change the way scientists model future climate scenarios. They also complicate the use of CF4 as a way to measure how the continents and climate have changed over millennia.
69319155
submission
sciencehabit writes:
If the holy grail of medieval alchemists was turning lead into gold, how much more magical would it be to draw gold from, well, poop? It turns out that a ton of sludge, the goo left behind when treating sewage, could contain several hundred dollars’ worth of metals—potentially enough to generate millions of dollars worth of gold, silver, and other minerals each year for a city of a million people.
69284849
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sciencehabit writes:
Certain scientific fields require a special type of brilliance, according to conventional wisdom. And a new study suggests that this belief, as misguided as it may be, helps explain the underrepresentation of women in those fields. The authors found that fields in which inborn ability is prized over hard work produced relatively fewer female Ph.D.s. This trend, based on 2011 data from the National Science Foundation’s Survey of Earned Doctorates, also helps explain why gender ratios don’t follow the simplified STEM/non-STEM divide in some fields, including philosophy and biology, they conclude.
69207075
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sciencehabit writes:
Zebra stripes are a mystery. Scientists have speculated that they do everything from enabling the equids to evade predators by creating an optical illusion when a herd gallops away to regulating body heat to helping the animals avoid biting flies. But a new team of researchers argues that none of these hypotheses has addressed the marked regional variation in the pattern of striping seen on plains zebras, which range from southern Ethiopia to eastern South Africa. The scientists quantified the characteristics of stripes on zebras at 16 sites across the animals’ range and examined 29 environmental factors, including temperature, predation, and biting flies, searching for an association. The strongest correlation was between temperature and striping, they report. In areas with the lowest seasonal temperatures, zebras have fewer and fainter stripes. The scientists don’t know why this correlation exists, but suggest that it may be tied to heat regulation or to disease-carrying parasites harbored by tsetse flies.
69203185
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sciencehabit writes:
If there’s one thing that distinguishes humans from other animals, it’s our ability to use language. But when and why did this trait evolve? A new study concludes that the art of conversation may have arisen early in human evolution, because it made it easier for our ancestors to teach each other how to make stone tools—a skill that was crucial for the spectacular success of our lineage. The study involved getting a number of college students to try to make their own primitive stone tools, some using language, others not. The team discovered that only those that used language were able to make effective tools.
69176569
submission
sciencehabit writes:
Are you a shy person with a snarky sense of humor who secretly craves hugs? You might be able to conceal that from your friends, but not from your computer. A new study of Facebook data shows that machines are now better at sussing out our true personalities than even our closest acquaintances.
69041869
submission
sciencehabit writes:
The future of winter clothes has arrived, and it’s even better than wrapping yourself in an electric blanket. Researchers have created a new cloth that warms up with just a bit of electricity and traps body heat more efficiently than standard cotton fabric. The scientists dipped ordinary cotton cloth in a solution of silver nanowire particles, which form a conductive network embedded in the cloth. By varying the concentration of the solution, the researchers were able to control the particles’ spacing in the network, ultimately finding the sweet spot where the fabric trapped close to 80% of the heat our bodies radiate while still allowing water molecules to pass through. That retains the breathability of the material, making it possible to create comfortable winter clothes out of the new fabric. For extra-cold days, electricity can provide an additional boost: The cloth warms up to nearly 40C when powered with a mere 0.9 volts of electricity.
69041825
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sciencehabit writes:
Card sharks, beware. A new program cannot be beaten at a variety of poker called heads-up limit Texas Hold ’em—at least in a human lifetime—a team of computer scientists reports. Researchers had previously developed unbeatable algorithms for other games such as checkers, but the new work marks the first time scientists have found such an algorithm for—or "solved"—a complex game in which some information about the state of the game (i.e., the cards in his opponent’s hand) remains hidden from the player. The program has yielded insights that could help players improve their game, and the general approach may have real-world usefulness in security and health care applications.
69004407
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sciencehabit writes:
Last year NASA scientists trained orbiting and ground-based observatories on one of the most bizarre and violent systems in our galaxy: Eta Carinae, a binary system made up of two enormous unstable stars that orbit each other every 5.5 years. NASA researchers have now used these observations to refine computer simulations of the system and to produce 3D printed models, which have helped them discover fingerlike protrusions from a bow shock that is heating gas in the system to millions of degrees.
68993155
submission
sciencehabit writes:
For much of the last decade, a team of researchers in Boston has eagerly exhumed and reburied dirt. It’s part of a strategy to access an untapped source of new antibiotics—the estimated 99% of microbes in the environment that refuse to grow in laboratories. Now, their technique has yielded a promising lead: a previously unknown bacterium that makes a compound with infection-killing abilities. What’s more, the team claims in a report out today, the compound is unlikely to fall prey to the problem of antibiotic resistance. That suggestion has its skeptics, but if the drug makes it through clinical trials, it would be a much needed weapon against several increasingly hard-to-treat infections.
68952589
submission
sciencehabit writes:
How come our feathered friends don’t get out of the way when a giant piece of metal rushes at them? It’s difficult to conduct field experiments without causing actual casualties, so wildlife researchers resorted to virtual reality. They played videos of trucks approaching at speeds ranging from 60 to 360 kilometers per hour toward brown-headed cowbirds in an enclosed chamber and studied the birds’ behavior. The scientists found that the cowbirds paid attention to the distance between them and the truck rather than the truck’s speed, always flying away when the truck appeared about 30 meters away, they report online today in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B. The strategy may have saved them from natural predators such as hawks, the researchers suggest, but it proves fatal for dealing with highway cars and other vehicles traveling above 120 kilometers per hour. More studies are needed to determine whether other birds and animals behave in a similar way, but the researchers suggest that installing special lights on planes could alert birds to begin their escape from a longer distance away.
68952369
submission
sciencehabit writes:
Scientists analyzing data from NASA’s Kepler satellite have boosted the tally of known or suspected planets beyond our solar system to more than 4000, they reported today at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society. Most are inhospitable—too big, too hot, or too cold for any conceivable life form. But another team seeking to verify Kepler candidates announced here today that they had identified eight new potentially habitable planets, including some close to Earth in size and situation. “We’ve significantly increased the list of verified small planets in the habitable zone,” says Douglas Caldwell of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, California.
68900761
submission
sciencehabit writes:
Only a small number of worlds look anything like Earth: roughly the same size and at the right distance from their star for liquid water to be present. But are these Earth-like exoplanets really made from the same sort of stuff—a rocky surface, an iron core, and just a dash of water? A new study suggests that exoplanets, at least up to 1.6 times the mass of Earth, follow pretty much the same recipe as our home. Indeed, scientists have come up with the core ingredients to make such a world. So if we’re looking for life out there, we can probably ignore anything bigger than that.
68894009
submission
sciencehabit writes:
First there was the Sawzall, a reciprocating saw that is the go-to tool for tearing down walls and cutting up unwanted material. Now there’s the “Jawzall,” a tool invented by a Cornell University undergraduate and her colleagues to assess just how deadly different shark bites can be. Researchers have long known the puncture power of various shark teeth, but many sharks also shake their heads as they chow down on their prey, ripping its flesh. To learn more about such gnashing, the student mounted four to 10 teeth from a variety of sharks onto separate sawing blades. Then she and her colleagues videotaped how well the teeth sliced through a dead salmon after six back-and-forth cuts. After 12 back-and-forth cuts, teeth got through just 7% of the tissue cut on the first six cuts. Even though sharks grow new teeth every month, such rapid wear may limit how often they can eat.
68839013
submission
sciencehabit writes:
When predators get close, the bright, orange-lipped “disco clam” flashes them to scare them off. But it's not just the light that's important. Researchers have found that the clam has sulfur in its fleshy lips and tentacles and suspect that, like another clam species that drop tentacles laden with sulfuric acid to deter predators, the disco clam's sulfur also gets converted into a distasteful substance. The flashing may warn predators away, similar to the bright orange of a monarch butterfly warning birds of its toxic taste.
