A SciDev.Net survey reveals the challenges of applying research insights to policy and practice, and underscores that evidence is not enough.
A new finding by Harvard stem cell biologists turns one of the basics of neurobiology on its head – demonstrating that it is possible to turn one type of already differentiated neuron into another within the brain. The discovery by Paola Arlotta and Caroline Rouaux “tells you that maybe the brain is not as immutable…
If there were a celebrity among brain chemicals, it would be dopamine. Supposedly released whenever we experience something pleasurable, it’s forever linked to salacious stories of sex, drugs and wild partying in the popular press. The Kim Kardashian of neurotransmitters, it gives instant appeal to listless reporting and gives editors an excuse to drop some…
When an oncoming hurricane curves offshore — as most do — we usually breathe a sigh of relief. But soon, those offshore storms might give us something more to worry about. Offshore hurricanes could demolish half the turbines in proposed wind farms just off the USA’s coastlines, according to a recent study in the Proceedings…
When a carnivore becomes extinct, other predatory species could soon follow, according to new research. Scientists have previously put forward this theory, but a University of Exeter team has now carried out the first experiment to prove it. Published in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters, the study shows how the demise of one carnivore…
Astronomers have found a galaxy that represents a new type, and falls within the range of active galaxies known as Seyfert galaxies. It glows green because of X-rays spewing from a gigantic black hole at its center that weighs several million to billion times more than the sun. Dubbed a “green bean” galaxy, it appears…
Researchers studying different African communities of wild chimpanzees have pooled their data and found that the apes sometimes kill each other nearly everywhere they’ve been studied. Chimp homicides occurred most frequently in groups with the most adult males, anthropologist Michael Wilson reported at the American Association of Physical Anthropologists’ annual meeting. Chimps spend most of…