The American century was the result of a can-do attitude born in the 19th century. As prosperity began to increase, collectives, such as unions, became the norm, and they were endorsed by many educated elites - but they were still promoting individualism in doing so.

That individualism rose as we shifted from blue-collar union jobs to the white-collar kind. Though American conservatives claim to care about small business and American liberals claim to care about unions, the white-collar service jobs that have replaced both have caused the individualism Americans are known for today - including distrust of centralized government, subjective definitions of words and invented baby names, and even family structure.

SALT LAKE CITY, Feb. 5, 2015 - The conservation value of growing coffee under trees instead of on open farms is well known, but hasn't been studied much in Africa. So a University of Utah-led research team studied birds in the Ethiopian home of Arabica coffee and found that "shade coffee" farms are good for birds, but some species do best in forest.

"Ethiopian shade coffee may be the most bird friendly coffee in the world, but a primary forest is irreplaceable for bird conservation, especially for birds of the forest understory," says doctoral student Evan Buechley, lead author of a new study that will be published online Feb. 11 in the journal Biological Conservation.

For decades, researchers in artificial intelligence, or AI, worked on specialized problems, developing theoretical concepts and workable algorithms for various aspects of the field. Computer vision, planning and reasoning experts all struggled independently in areas that many thought would be easy to solve, but which proved incredibly difficult.

However, in recent years, as the individual aspects of artificial intelligence matured, researchers began bringing the pieces together, leading to amazing displays of high-level intelligence: from IBM's Watson to the recent poker playing champion to the ability of AI to recognize cats on the internet.

Unlike slow and steady batteries, supercapacitors gulp up energy rapidly and deliver it in fast, powerful jolts. A growing array of consumer products is benefiting from these energy-storage devices, reports Chemical & Engineering News, with cars and trucks -- and their drivers -- poised to be major beneficiaries.

For some children, despite having no known physical or mental disability, learning to read, write, spell, do maths, dress, throw and catch a ball, or organize themselves presents significant challenges. When childhood milestones involving speech and movement are slow to develop in young children, should parents be concerned that their child might have a learning disability?

Learning disabilities may make life more of a challenge, but a diagnosis is not a life sentence. Shutterstock

Below we outline three learning disabilities and what to look out for.

By: Marsha Lewis, Inside Science

(Inside Science TV) – They may look flimsy, but the materials printed with 3-D printing technology are one-of-a-kind, light-weight and super-strong.

Materials engineers at LLNL have created a material with a special 3-D printer that mixes hard metal, tough ceramics and flexible plastics.

“It can hold more than 100,000-times its own weight. In fact, even more than that," said Chris Spadaccini, a materials engineer at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California.

“One of the benefits of this methodology is the ability to work with a wide range of materials," said Josh Kuntz, a materials engineer at LLNL.

In the last 40 years, health care has improved a great deal and we are living longer than ever. But the downside to longevity is more time for mutations to occur, and that means cancer.

A new forecast in the British Journal of Cancer has an alarming finding - that half of people in the United Kingdom will get cancer - but it makes sense. The good news is that in the last 40 years, cancer survival has doubled and half of cancer survivors now live more than 10 years.

A newfound link between chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) and early menopause was reported online today in Menopause. This link, as well as links with other gynecologic problems and with pelvic pain, may help explain why chronic fatigue syndrome is two to four times more common in women than in men and is most prevalent in women in their 40s. Staying alert to these problems may also help healthcare providers take better care of women who may be at risk for chronic fatigue syndrome, say the authors of this population-based, case-control study.

Inserting a specific strain of bacteria into the microenvironment of aggressive ovarian cancer transforms the behavior of tumor cells from suppression to immunostimulation, researchers at Norris Cotton Cancer Center and the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth have found. The findings, published in OncoImmunology, demonstrate a new approach in immunotherapy that can be applied in a variety of cancer types.

"By introducing an attenuated and safe form of the bacteria Listeria monocytogenes (Lm), in collaboration with Aduro Biotech Inc., we found that the attenuated bacteria is taken up by the immunosuppressive cells and transforms them from cells that protect the tumor into cells that attack the tumor," said Steve Fiering, PhD, lead author of the study.

Here's an argument for more nuclear power instead of more biofuels. As many places in the U.S. and Europe increasingly turn to biomass rather than fossil fuels for power and heat, scientists are focusing on what this trend might mean for air quality -- and human health. One study on wood-chip burners' particulate emissions, which can cause heart and lung problems, appears in the journal Energy & Fuels.

The scientists say the findings could help manufacturers reduce the negative impact of this fuel in the future. Or we could just stop burning things for energy and at least get into the 20th century.