Researchers have discovered coral beds off the coast of Hawaii that are more than 4,200 years old, making them among the oldest living creatures on Earth.

The team was directed by Brendan Roark of Texas A&M's College of Geosciences and included colleagues from the University of California-Santa Cruz and Australian National University in Canberra.

Two different species of coral beds were documented using carbon dating methods, Roark says, with both being much older than previously believed. One species – Leiopathes – is now confirmed to be about 4,265 years old, while the other species, Gerardia, is believed to be about 2,742 years old.

The safety of early applications of synthetic biology may be adequately addressed by the existing regulatory framework for biotechnology, especially in contained laboratories and manufacturing facilities. But further advances in this emerging field are likely to create significant challenges for U.S. government oversight, according to a new report authored by Michael Rodemeyer of the University of Virginia. Synthetic biology promises major advances in areas such as biofuels, specialty chemicals, and agriculture and drug products. 

Weeds, trees or tomatoes; no matter the plant genome of interest, Yves Van de Peer and associate Bioinformaticians at the VIB-Ugent research institute repeatedly observe that the last genome duplication to have occurred in all extant plants happened at the same time—65 million years ago.  This is a rather peculiar date considering it coincides with earth's last mass extinction event.  With this factoid in mind, an inference can be made; duplicated chromosome mutants (polyploids) have a strong advantage during times of environmental hardship.

If you are one of the many millions that suffer from unexplained abdominal cramps, bloating, constipation and diarrhea, you are not alone. According to the NIH, 1 in 5 Americans suffer from similar symptoms.

The cause? Physicians have placed all of the unexplained and irregular symptoms into the catch-all disorder irritable bowel syndrome.

Mechanically, walking is a complicated feat.  We take for granted that a carefree cascade of one-footed falls adds up to steady rapid locomotion.

Replicating a dynamically stable foot-over-foot walk has become a holy grail for roboticists—remember the hype about ASIMO? Researchers at Penn State are taking a shortcut to nanoscale bipedal drones thanks to to motor proteins, the walking caravan molecules within our cells.

A shock hit NASA's Mission Madness tournament when the fight between the SPB balloon mission and the MER rovers "Spirit" and "Opportunity" escalated to unexpected levels. And now you can find out just how this happened. 'Mission Madness' is a NASA Edge-run voting contest where the public gets to vote for their favorite mission, in a series of 1-on-1 brackets leading to the final winner.

DEFINITIONS

Parcelatories, or Partitions, is a mathematical function of Combinatory Analysis which indicates how many possible forms an Whole Number can be obtained from the sum of others smaller Whole Numbers.

An example usually mentioned is the Parcelatories of the number 10.

The number 10 can be obtained from 42 different additions. The list below contains all possible counts:

Two new greenhouse gases are accumulating in the atmosphere, according to an international research team led by scientists from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in the US and CSIRO scientist, Dr Paul Fraser, from the Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research.

Nitrogen trifluoride (NF₃) and sulfuryl fluoride (SO₂F₂) are powerful greenhouse gases that have recently been discovered to be growing quickly in the global background atmosphere.

These gases are used in industrial processes, partly as alternatives to other harmful greenhouse and ozone depleting gases.

Johns Hopkins researchers have discovered a new energy-making biochemical twist in determining the lifespan of yeast cells, one so valuable to longevity that it is likely to also functions in humans. 

Their findings, published in the March 20 issue of Cell, reveal that making glucose is highly influenced by a large enzyme complex already known to fix damaged DNA, and which apparently affects yeast life span through a common chemical process—acetylation. 

In a series of experiments, the Hopkins team showed that when continuously acetylated, the so-called NuA4 enzyme complex causes yeast cells to live longer than they would under normal conditions. 

There was once a theory in manufacturing and business; 'planned obsolescence.'  If you didn't make products with limitations, no one would ever buy new ones.

Then along came a bunch of Asian companies who made better products and American manufacturing took a dive.    Made In America became a political point of pride rather than a mark of quality.

But quality is making a comeback because warranty costs are the next big cost items, write researchers in the International Journal of Six Sigma and Competitive Advantage - so manufacturers need to design for reliability.