Given the direct benefit to the individual of immunity against disease, vaccination, is not completely altruistic. However, immunization does provide a significant benefit to society. For those who cannot get vaccinated, we rely on herd immunity – if society is made up mostly of those who have expended the energy and cost to get vaccinated,…
Averting the worst consequences of human-induced climate change is a “great moral issue” on a par with slavery, according to the leading NASA climate scientist Jim Hansen. Hansen, will be awarded the prestigious Edinburgh Medal for his contribution to science, and in his acceptance speech will call for a worldwide tax on all carbon emissions….
The discovery of a major gear in the biological clock that tells the body when to sleep and metabolize food may lead to new drugs to treat sleep problems and metabolic disorders, including diabetes. Scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies showed that two cellular switches found on the nucleus of mouse cells, known…
Fifty-five million years ago, the world abruptly warmed by a scorching 5 degrees Celsius, the oceans turned acidic, and life ran a gantlet of extinction. Sound familiar? That was the closest nature ever came to foreshadowing the fossil-fuel-fed warming that is just getting underway now. But for 15 years, climate scientists have puzzled over how…
A hoax or a miracle? The Shroud of Turin has inspired this question for centuries. Now, an art historian says this piece of cloth, said to bear the imprint of the crucified body of Jesus Christ, may be something in between. According to Thomas de Wesselow, formerly of Cambridge University, the controversial shroud is no…
Particles in polluted air seed clouds and influence the temperatures of oceans, which could stir up severe weather phenomena.
Many Christians give up certain foods for Lent, however ecologists have discovered these changes in human diet have a dramatic impact on the diet of wild animals. In Ethiopia, members of the Orthodox Tewahedo Church stop eating meat and dairy products during a 55-day fast before Easter. As a result, spotted hyenas too change their…
The circumstances that ended the last ice age, somewhere between 19,000 and 10,000 years ago, have been unclear. In particular, scientists aren’t sure how carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, played into the giant melt. New research indicates it did in fact help drive this prehistoric episode of global warming, even though it did not kick…
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is operating again after its winter break. At the beginning of April, opposing stable beams of protons were smashed into each other at four observation positions. The total collision energy in these bunches of sub-atomic particles was eight trillion electron volts – a world record. Scientists expect the big boost…
Legislation making its way through U.S. Congress would allow anyone to invest in the latest cool idea, with the prospect of making a profit one day. The Crowdfund Act, which passed the Senate in March, would let anyone invest up to 5% of their annual income, or $2,000, in a project or firm that is…