Sometimes a person who gets drunk can perform functions their friends might regard as ordinary, like carrying on a conversation or driving a car - but the drunkard might have no memory of those things and those periods of amnesia, commonly known as "blackouts", can last from a few minutes to several hours.

Parents are always looking for new treatments to help their children with autism; it can be daunting to keep up with the multitude of new therapies constantly popping up on the internet, many with similar sounding names. There are several different “listening therapies” or auditory integrative training programs available online promising relief for autism symptoms. According to Sinha, Silove, Wheeler, and Williams (2006), “treatments to overcome variations in auditory sensitivity commonly encountered in people with autism have been developed and are collectively called auditory integration therapies. They include auditory integration training (AIT), the Tomatis method and Samonas sound therapy.”

Last week, the United Nations added 18 sites around the globe to its list of biosphere reserves, bringing the total number of sites so designated under its Man and the Biosphere Program to 581.

Most of us are probably more familiar with another U.N. collection: World Heritage Sites, which identify “universally” valued spots for conservation and awareness efforts. Indeed, some particularly special locales receive both designations.

But the purpose of biosphere reserves transcends basic conservation. The reserves are intended to showcase ways that humans can reconcile our needs and activities with those of native flora and fauna. They highlight unique and innovative strategies that are working — right now.

A Democratic president banned the use of federal money for human embryonic stem cell (hESC) research, a Republican president restricted federal hESC funding to existing lines and a Democratic president continues to limit federal money for hESC research.   Who is regarded as anti-science on this issue? Republicans.

I know, I know, Democrats are anti-science on plenty of other things - animal research, agriculture, vaccines and a whole list of others - but this is just about hESC research and there it is clearly just a Republican issue.   The mainstream media and science bloggers say so.   

The naked mole rat (or Heterocephalus glaber) (see figure 1) is a strange mammal. As their name already implies, they have little hair. Furthermore, their eyes are very small and their visual abilities are mediocre at best. This naked rat is one of only two eusocial mammals (the other one being the Damaraland mole rat, or Fukomys damarensis), with a lifestyle similar to social insects. Living in underground colonies, ruled by the only reproductive female (the ‘queen’), the work is performed by non-reproductive females. A few males hang around, mating with the queen. They live in a huge network of burrows, where they browse around in search of plant tubes, which they eat (see video).

Univ. of Illinois announced a silver pen for writing conductive cursive.  Researcher Jennifer Lewis notes “Pen-based printing allows one to construct electronic devices ‘on-the-fly,’".  I think, imagine just tracing a circuit schematic instead of having to wire and solder it.

Botany: A Blooming History

The last episode of the series by Timothy Walker majored on the exploits of noble scientists whose aim was

The image of a stoner always having the munchies is a stereotype because it's true - and it's true, say researchers, because it has a basis in biology.

Daniele Piomelli, Nicholas DiPatrizio and colleagues found that fats in foods like potato chips and french fries trigger a biological mechanism - and that is driven by natural marijuana-like chemicals in the body called endocannabinoids.

In their study, they discovered that when rats tasted something fatty, cells in their upper gut started producing endocannabinoids but sugars and proteins did not have this effect.

Many Worlds by Splitting a Wiener Sausage is extremely simple as far as models go. Before we can resolve the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paradox with it however, we need to understand what is still wrong with it.

It is “wrong” for a simple reason that I wrote about in several other posts, and anybody who understands the EPR problem to some degree should know the correct answer, regardless of whether they trust Bohm, or “believe Copenhagen”, or subscribe to locality, non-locality, many-worlds, objective state collapse into one world, whatever!

It never fails--I take some time off, and a giant squid shows up!

A few years ago, it was a half-eaten carcass found floating in Monterey Bay. Every teuthologist dreams of a giant squid sighting in her backyard, but Fate's wicked sense of humor had me taking a summer course in Friday Harbor when my dream came true. So while I was playing with worms, my labmates back home were eagerly dissecting the largest giant squid ever seen in Monterey Bay.

Not that I'm bitter or anything.