Biologists from the American Museum of Natural History and the City University of New York have found that grizzly bears are roaming into what was traditionally thought of as polar bear habitat, the Canadian province of Manitoba, where they are officially listed as extirpated. The preliminary findings were published in Canadian Field Naturalist and show that sightings of Ursus arctos horribilis in Canada's Wapusk National Park are recent and appear to be increasing in frequency.
A team of paleontologists has discovered a new dinosaur species which belongs to the same group of gigantic, long-necked, long-tailed, four-legged, plant-eating sauropods as Brachiosaurus. The new species has been dubbed 'Abydosaurus', and its discovery will be detailed in an upcoming issue of Naturwissenshaften.
The fossils were excavated from the Cedar Mountain Formation in Dinosaur National Monument near Vernal, Utah. The team recovered four heads – two still fully intact – from a quarry in Dinosaur National Monument in eastern Utah. Complete skulls have been recovered for only eight of more than 120 known varieties of sauropod.
In order to determine if there is cancer in the lymph nodes, pathologists must currently perform several detailed, time-consuming tests. But University of Missouri researchers have developed a laser-induced ultrasound, called the photoacoustic method, that may help doctors locate the general area of the lymph node where melanoma cells are residing with much more efficiency than is currently possible. The new approach is detailed in the Journal of Biomedical Engineering.
Depression raises stress hormone levels in adolescent boys and girls but may lead to obesity only in girls, according to research in a recent issue of the Journal of Adolescent Health. Authors of the study suggest that early treatment of depression could help reduce stress and control obesity.
The hormone Cortisol regulates various metabolic functions in the body and is released as a reaction to stress. Researchers have long known that depression and cortisol are related to obesity, but they had not figured out the exact biological mechanism.
A new study of the IGF1 gene in BMC biology has found that small domestic dogs probably originated in the Middle East more than 12,000 years ago. Researchers traced the evolutionary history of IGF1, finding that the version of the gene that is a major determinant of small size probably originated as a result of the domestication of the Middle Eastern gray wolf.
A new study from UK researchers suggests that deficits in prospective memory (remembering to remember, or remembering to perform an intended action) are more common for recreational drug users. The new research appears in the Journal of Psychopharmacology.
42 ecstasy/polydrug users (14 males, 28 females) and 31 non-users (5 males, 26 females) were recruited for the study – all were students. The students were quizzed about their drug habits (including tobacco, cannabis and alcohol), and given questionnaires to assess their everyday memory, cognitive failures and prospective and retrospective memory.
What makes Hollywood blockbusters? Scientists writing in Psychological Science may have the answer. Using the sophisticated tools of modern perception research to deconstruct 70 years of film, shot by shot, the Cornell researchers say that successful movies follow a particular mathematical pattern.
The team of psychologists measured the duration of every shot in every scene of 150 of the most popular films released from 1935 to 2005. The films represented five major genres—action, adventure, animation, comedy and drama. Using a complex mathematical formula, they translated these sequences of shot lengths into "waves" for each film.
A new study published this week in PLoS Biology suggests that seasonal changes in absolute humidity are the apparent underlying cause of wintertime influenza outbreaks. The study also found that the onset of outbreaks might be encouraged by anomalously dry weather conditions, at least in temperate regions.
