A toxic molecule implicated in cell damage and disease  may also be essential for bird migration, according to the University of Illinois. They propose the molecule superoxide as a key player in the mysterious process that allows birds to 'see' Earth's magnetic field.

Where we are born not only determines how we speak apparently how we taste food and drink, according to Andy Taylor, a researcher in flavor technology at The University of Nottingham and Greg Tucker, a food psychologist.

The taste preferences of the UK's major regions have been analyzed by the pair and Taylor of the Flavour Research Group said, "Taste is determined by our genetic make-up and influenced by our upbringing and experience with flavours. Just as with spoken dialects, where accent is placed on different syllables and vowel formations, people from different regions have developed enhanced sensitivities to certain taste sensation and seek foods that trigger these."

At the quantum level, the atoms that make up matter and the photons that make up light behave in seemingly bizarre ways.

Particles can exist in "superposition," in more than one state at the same time (don't look!), a situation that permitted Schrödinger's famed cat to be simultaneously alive and dead.  Matter can also be entangled', what Albert Einstein called "spooky action at a distance" in such a way that one thing influences another, regardless of how far apart the two are.

Human brains have tripled in size over the past 2 million years,  growing much faster than those of other mammals.

What might the reasons be for such dramatic brain expansion?

University of Missouri researchers studied three hypotheses for brain growth: ecological demand,  social competition and climate change.

Yes, climate change.   They're not stupid.   An entire presidential cabinet is stuffed with carbon dioxide true believers so it's good diplomacy to at least consider global warming may make us devolve - that would be terrific marketing for a carbon trading scheme.   Luckily, the much more likely social competition was determined in their analysis as the major cause of increased cranial capacity.

The largest animals ever to have walked the face of the earth just got a little smaller, according to a paper published today in the Zoological Society of London's Journal of Zoology.

Why aren't they as big as previously thought?   The researchers say that the original statistical model used to calculate dinosaur mass is flawed, which led to them suggesting dinosaurs have been oversized.  Widely cited estimates for the mass of Apatosaurus louisae, one of the largest of the dinosaurs, may be double that of its actual mass instead of the commonly cited 33-38 tons it may be as light as 18 tons. 

University of Georgia researchers have developed a successful way to grow molecular wire brushes that conduct electrical charges, a first step in developing biological fuel cells that could power pacemakers, cochlear implants and prosthetic limbs.

UGA chemist Jason Locklin and graduate students Nicholas Marshall and Kyle Sontag grew polymer brushes, made up of chains of thiophene and benzene, aromatic molecules sometimes used as solvents, attached to metal surfaces as ultra-thin films.