Science News

Tommy the chimpanzee was denied a writ of habeas corpus and will not be recognized as a legal person by a New York state appeals court.

Decades of destruction in the Amazon rainforest might be the reason that Brazil's taps are running dry, Brazilian scientists say. Deforestation is crippling the jungle's ability to pump moisture into the air, which could...

Magnetite (or Fe3O4) is an elaborate kind of rust -- a regular lattice of oxygen and iron atoms. But this material plays an increasingly important role as a catalyst, in electronic devices and in medical applications.

Those formerly silent walls can "talk" now: Researchers have demonstrated a simple optical technique by which audio information can be extracted from high-speed video recordings. The method uses an image-matching process...

Two medical imaging techniques, called positron emission tomography and computed tomography, could be used in combination as a biomarker to predict the effectiveness of antibiotic drug regimens being tested to treat tube...

Fear of police, language barriers, lack of knowledge of cardiac arrest symptoms and financial concerns prevent Latinos -- particularly those of lower socioeconomic status -- from seeking emergency medical help and perfor...

It's a Saturday morning in June at the Royal Society in London. Computer scientists, public figures and reporters have gathered to witness or take part in a decades-old challenge.

Children in emergency departments can safely be treated for pain from limb injuries using intranasal ketamine, a drug more typically used for sedation, according to the results of the first randomized, controlled trial c...

Insects can transmit viral diseases to humans. Therefore, understanding how insects cope with viral infection, and what immune mechanisms are triggered, can be important to stop diseases transmission. In a new study, res...

Media reports routinely link chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the neurodegenerative brain disease, with behavioral symptoms in former football players. But just how CTE and behavioral changes are related is poorly...

While it may seem like pufferfish hold their breath as they inflate, they can actually breathe as they puff up. But this trick may actually tire pufferfish out and put them at risk of being eaten once they've deflated, a...

You need iron - but fortified foods are now being blamed for diabetes, heart disease and cancer. Let New Scientist guide you through the menu minefield (full text available to subscribers)

Smoking cigarettes is linked to the disappearance of the Y chromosome in the blood -- a side effect that might explain why men who smoke are at greater risk for cancer than women who smoke.

A genetic variant which causes smokers to smoke more heavily has been shown to be associated with increased body mass index -- but only in those who have never smoked.

Though undeniably effective, the current rehydration therapy for cholera could increase the toxicity of the cholera bacterium, researchers have discovered. Backed with new data, the scientists propose a change in the tre...

Intracranial hypertension -- increased blood pressure inside the head -- can predict a child's risk of death from malaria. A study now reports that accumulation of white blood cells impairs the blood flow out of the brai...

A new study provides 'the strongest evidence to date' that endocrine disrupting chemicals such as polychlorinated biphenyls found in flame retardant cloth, paint, adhesives and electrical transformers, can interfere with...

Some National Football League players have been seeking out unproven stem cell therapies to help accelerate recoveries from injuries, according to a new paper. Each year, more than 700 stem cell clinics around the world ...

Take two poisonous mushrooms, and call me in the morning. While no doctor would ever write this prescription, toxic fungi may hold the secrets to tackling deadly diseases. A team of scientists has discovered an enzyme th...

Leptin, a hormone that regulates the amount of fat stored in the body, also drives the increase in blood pressure that occurs with weight gain, according to researchers.

In a breakthrough study, a research team discovered that specific bacterial components in the human gut microbiota can trigger a natural defense mechanism that is highly protective against malaria transmission. It is est...

A new study provides an explanation as to why blood cancers are more common in men than in women, revealing that estrogens regulate the survival of stem cells that give rise to blood cancers. Moreover, findings in mice w...