Cancer-driving genomic aberrations in localized lung cancer appear are so consistently present across tumors that a single biopsy of one region of the tumor is likely to identify most of them, according to a new paper.

The study addresses the challenge of what scientists call genomic heterogeneity, the presence of many different variations that drive tumor formation, growth and progression, and likely complicate the choice and potential efficacy of therapy.

A landmark study of renal cell cancer in 2012 found that most cancer-promoting variations were not present across all regions of those tumors, so biopsy of a single region would not provide a good representation of cancer genes important in the genesis of any given tumor.

Antarctic sea ice reached a new record high extent this year, covering more of the southern oceans than it has since scientists began a long-term satellite record to map sea ice extent in the late 1970s.

The Antarctic sea ice extent exceeded 7.72 million square miles (20 million square kilometers) for the first time since 1979, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The ice extent stayed above this benchmark extent for several days. The average maximum extent between 1981 and 2010 was 7.23 million square miles (18.72 million square kilometers). 

It is pretty hard to trust or admire our government on a good day.

However, this is more of a theoretical concern than a practical one, since they haven't had a whole lot of them lately. 

Tropical Storm Simon, once a hurricane, is expected to bring heavy rain to portions of the central Plains and Midwest on today and tomorrow. Since it is not hitting New York City during presidential election season, it won't be called a SuperStorm and get much national media attention.

Credit: Millionaire Chess tournament

When I was a kid, no one outside Texas played Texas Hold 'Em. We played Stud, we played Draw, we played Liar's, but not Hold 'Em.

Like Esther Williams movies and organic food, some things just make their way into pop culture and there is no rational reason why. Texas Hold 'Em is now the most popular card game in the country, every month or so our neighborhood gets together at one of our homes and puts in 20 bucks each and we go at it.

Naomi Klein: To fight climate change, we have to end capitalism. Mariusz Kubik, CC BY

By Matthew Nisbet, Northeastern University

Earth is “f---ed” and our insatiable growth economy is to blame. So argues Naomi Klein in her intentionally provocative best-seller This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate.

Tropical Cyclone Hudhud formed on Oct. 8th and began moving from east to west across the Bay of Bengal in the Northern Indian Ocean. 

NASA's Aqua satellite flew over Hudhud today and took a picture of the storm that showed it was still somewhat elongated, but more organized than the previous day. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument aboard NASA's Aqua satellite provided the hint of a developing eye.

Warnings for winds, rain and surf are already in effect for the northern Andhra Pradesh coast and south Odisha coastline of eastern India as Hudhud approaches.

No matter what type of chemotherapy you attack a tumor with, many cancer cells resort to the same survival tactic: They start eating themselves. This autophagy process happens when two proteins pair up and switch it on this process, according to a new paper.

"This gives us a therapeutic avenue to target autophagy in tumors," says Brigham Young University chemistry professor Josh Andersen. "The idea would be to make tumors more chemo-sensitive. You could target these proteins and the mechanism of this switch to block autophagy, which would allow for lower doses of chemotherapy while hopefully improving patient outcomes."

Who doesn't want more brain power? Credit: James Steidl

By Elizabeth Maratos, University of Leicester

The practice of physically stimulating the brain in order to alleviate symptoms of illness and injury has been around since the early 20th century. For example, electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is still used to alleviate symptoms of depression.

The evolution of new traits with novel functions has long been studied by evolutionary biology and a new study of the color markings of cichlid fish has shed some new light on it.

Swiss scientists writing in Nature Communications show what triggered these evolutionary innovations, namely: a mobile genetic element in the regulatory region of a color gene.