Science Update
Sharing Science | Satisfying Curiosity | Debunking BS
AAAS 2012 ANNUAL MEETING SPECIAL - This week, we're coming to you from Vancouver, British Columbia, where scientists are gathering to tackle issues or global importance, such as how to boost crop productivity to feed a growing population, and making cookstoves safer for the world's poor. Also: video games to combat cataracts, and ultra-thin electronics printed with silver ink.
Cleaner cookstoves could save millions of lives and slow global warming.
A protein found in our tongues determines our ability to taste fat.
Eating grapes protects against macular degeneration in mice.
EVOLUTION - Did a giant beaver that once roamed North America communicate by whistling? A newly discovered mammalian fossil that sported fangs. And, did the advent of cooking drive human evolution? Also: new research suggests that Neanderthals' shorter legs were actually an advantage for navigating mountainous terrain.
Overfeeding fruit flies sets off a chain reaction that makes their intestine grow.
Lab studies show how alcohol inhibits the immune system's response to an infection.
Giant jellyfish have what it takes to become king of the seas in the future.
The brain has special hotspots that are sensitive to each type of taste.
HORMONES & BEHAVIOR - Testosterone and fatherhood, the genetics of oxytocin and depression, gender and spatial reasoning revisited, where taste is found in the brain, and more.
PLANETS & PATHOGENS - Gardening for Mars, the darkest planet, a parasite that turns rats against themselves, telling the viruses from the bacteria, and the link between caffeine and skin cancer prevention.
Caffeine may protect against skin cancer by inhibiting an enzyme that cancer cells need.
NASA nutritionists face a delicious challenge when planning what astronauts will eat on a mission to Mars.
Removing antibiotics from poultry farms could have immediate public health implications.
Lager beers have been around for about 500 years, thanks to the meeting of yeasts from the Old and New World.
A hormone called ghrelin is a key part of how stress triggers mice to seek out fatty food.
A failing grade for fat substitutes, a master regulator gene for fat, a brainwave that helps control memory, and turning skin cells into brain cells.
A compound found in apple peels could prevent muscle wasting.
The soaring price of gold drives deforestation in the Amazon, colonoscopies laced with gold could help detect cancer, and honey protects against antibiotic resistance. Also: a starless starfish, and a jellyfish that navigates without a brain.
In the event of a nuclear accident, a new filter made of natural materials could treat water contaminated with radioactive iodine.
A listener asks if pasteurizing orange juice destroys its vitamin C.
A delicious, but neglected fruit could get its day in the sun again with a bit of genetic engineering.
An early screening test for autism, a car controlled by thoughts, the safety of fruit seeds, blaming the hero, and testing an ancient Egyptian prosthetic.
