An extraordinary advance in human origins research reveals evidence of the emergence of the upright human body plan over 15 million years earlier than most experts have believed. More dramatically, the study confirms preliminary evidence that many early hominoid apes were most likely upright bipedal walkers sharing the basic body form of modern humans.

The voyage of NASA’s Pluto-bound New Horizons spacecraft through the Jupiter system earlier this year provided a bird’s-eye view of a dynamic planet that has changed since the last close-up looks by NASA spacecraft.

New Horizons passed Jupiter on Feb. 28, riding the planet’s gravity to boost its speed and shave three years off its trip to Pluto.

An estimated 6.6 million people in Europe suffer from schizophrenia:(1) a serious mental illness characterized by disturbances in the thoughts, perceptions, emotions and behavior of a person.

A large majority of families who care for someone with schizophrenia are confident that many people with the disease can lead independent, fulfilling lives with the ability to have a part-time job when having optimal control over their symptoms.

These results announced today on World Mental Health Day, are findings from a European survey of over 320 families and carers of people with schizophrenia conducted between July and September 2007 by EUFAMI (European Federation of Associations of Families of People with Mental Illness).

Recent observations from NASA and Japanese X-ray observatories have helped clarify one of the long-standing mysteries in astronomy -- the origin of cosmic rays.

Outer space is a vast shooting gallery of cosmic rays. Discovered in 1912, cosmic rays are not actually rays at all; they are subatomic particles and ions (such as protons and electrons) that zip through space in all directions at near-light speed, with energies tens of thousands of times greater than particles produced in Earth’s largest particle accelerators.

A research team combining high-energy physicists from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and neuroscientists from the Salk Institute in La Jolla, Calif., has discovered a type of retinal cell that may help monkeys, apes, and humans see motion.

The cell type has very similar properties to so-called Y retinal ganglion cells, which were first described in cats in 1966. Upon the Y-cell's discovery, scientists began a decades-long search for its counterpart in primates.

Researchers conducting a clinical trial state that the drug topiramate may be effective in curbing alcohol dependence.

“Topiramate has emerged as a promising treatment for people with alcohol dependence,” says the lead author, Professor Bankole Johnson, D.Sc., M.D., Ph.D., M.Phil., FRCPsych., who is chairman of the University of Virginia Department of Psychiatry and Neurobehavioral Sciences. “Our finding in this national study was that topiramate is a safe and highly efficacious medicine that can be paired with a 15-minute brief intervention by health practitioners who are not addiction specialists.