Twenty-four years, a political party and a gulf of ideology separates the first two women to share the nation’s major party tickets. But has the way the media talks about Sarah Palin and Geraldine Ferraro changed?

Not so much, according to ongoing research by members of “the Palin Watch” at The University of Alabama.  

Newspapers around North America have used similar media frames to describe these very different women, who made vice-presidential runs at different times and for different parties.

Both of these women’s candidacies were framed by the media around, 1) their questionable experience, 2) their selection as a political stunt, and 3) their selection as a gamble.

The birth of new neurons (neurogenesis) does not end completely during development but continues throughout all life in two areas of the adult nervous system, i.e. subventricular zone and hippocampus. Recent research has shown that hippocampal neurogenesis is crucial for memory formation. These studies, however, have not yet clarified how the newborn neurons are integrated in the existing circuits and thus contribute to new memories formation and to the maintenance of old ones.

Water is the most common and important material in nature but exactly what is water on earth and what properties does it have?

It's a more challenging problem than people think.  

Based on past elections and economic factors, two professors at the University of Oregon predict that Senator Barack Obama will win the presidential election by a 52 to 48 margin.

In the paper "A Disaggregate Approach to Economic Models of Voting in U.S. Presidential Elections: Forecasts of the 2008 Election," published in the Economics Bulletin, economic professors Stephen Haynes and Joe Stone's research shows that lowest-income states prefer McCain by 55.4 percent to 44.6 percent. Middle income states are almost evenly split between the two candidates and highest-income states prefer Obama by 53.3 percent to 46.65 percent.

Haynes and Stone note in their research that the 52 to 48 margin in favor of Obama falls within the four-point range of statistical error.

Newt Gingrich, John Kerry, and someone named Billy Beane (I have no clue who he is) argue that medicine is not yet sufficiently data driven.:

In the past decade, baseball has experienced a data-driven information revolution. Numbers-crunchers now routinely use statistics to put better teams on the field for less money. Our overpriced, underperforming health care system needs a similar revolution...

Remarkably, a doctor today can get more data on the starting third baseman on his fantasy baseball team than on the effectiveness of life-and-death medical procedures. Studies have shown that most health care is not based on clinical studies of what works best and what does not — be it a test, treatment, drug or technology. Instead, most care is based on informed opinion, personal observation or tradition.