I may have been unattentive to recent papers on Supersymmetry, but I got the impression that during the last few months the majority of SUSY phenomenologists have been keen on speculating on the few apparently non-standard features of the recently discovered Higgs boson, as published last June (such as the alleged copious decay of photon pairs, or the dearth of decays to tau lepton pairs or b-quark pairs - note: all are mostly back to what the standard model predicts, after the analysis of more data following the discovery announcements), but rather improductive on the front of taking the new signal as a pivot point for new global fits.

Despite losing in the state with arguably the most anti-science crackpots in its citizenry - California - GMO activists in arguably the second most anti-science state - Washington - are determined to show the country why they should be number one.

This past May, I was fortunate enough to take part in a conference in Venice, Italy, which was a retrospective on the legacy of famous paleontologist and author Stephen Jay Gould 10 years after his death. The choice of Venice as the conference venue was a nod to one of Gould’s most famous and influential papers, “The Spandrels of San Marco and the Panglossian Paradigm: A Critique of the Adaptationist Programme“, which he co-authored with Richard Lewontin in 1979.

The IFIT protein enables the human immune system to detect viruses and prevent infection by acting as foot soldiers guarding the body against infection. They recognize foreign viral ribonucleic acid (RNA) produced by the virus and act as defender molecules by potentially latching onto the genome of the virus and preventing it from making copies of itself, blocking infection. 

Researchers have created a device which potentially can see one molecule though a simple optical system and can analyze its components within minutes. It uses plasmonics, the study of vibrations of electrons in different materials, and could allow for rapid and more accurate drug testing for professional athletes because it could detect the presence of even trace amounts of a substance.

It could also be used at airports or other high-security locations to prevent would-be terrorists from concealing explosives or traffickers from smuggling drugs. 

What was the backbone of early tetrapods, the earliest four-legged animals, like?

High-energy X-rays and a new data extraction protocol have allowed researchers to reconstruct the backbones of the 360 million year old fossils in exceptional detail. The results shed new light on how the first vertebrates moved from water onto land. 

Tetrapods are four-limbed vertebrates,today represented by amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. Around 400 million years ago, early tetrapods were the first vertebrates to make short excursions into shallower waters where they used their four limbs for moving around. How this happened and how they then transferred to land is the science debate.

Any time the subject of taxes comes up with respect to economics we are invariably treated to examples such as the following, to illustrate how government revenue has an effect on the economy.  Of course, this is all smoke and mirrors nonsense, but nevertheless it seems plausible enough so that many people don't consider the absurdity of these examples.

In the first instance, we are treated to the supposition of what society would be like without taxation.

Regulars to this blog know I am partial to game theory. The very idea that mathematical reasoning can teach us a thing or two about the strategies we deploy in social interactions, is most intriguing. Game theory recognizes that humans do possess rational and selfish characteristics, and builds models describing human decisions based on no more than these two characteristics. This minimalistic approach teaches us a lot about the character of economic behavior and the emergence of strategies build on cooperation, retaliation, etc.

 A new treatment, BETMIGA (mirabegron) has received approval from the European Commission (EC) for the treatment of overactive bladder (OAB) symptoms in adults.

The only thing that might have saved a sequel like "Ace Ventura, Pet Detective, Jr."(1) was putting it in space. If you put ":In Space" at the end of anything, it gains instant credibility it might otherwise not have. (see The Muppets)(2)

But some people, like Abraham Lincoln, don't need more credibility, they are already heroic.  So making Lincoln a Vampire Hunter is just showing off. And Albert Einstein doesn't need to go into space - but maybe his iconic formula, E=mc^2, does.