Using the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, researchers have examined two fossilized birds, Gansus yumenensis and Confuciusornis sanctus. Confuciusornis sanctus , which lived 120 million years ago, was one of many evolutionary links between dinosaurs and birds, sporting the first known bird-like beak. Gansus yumenensis, considered the oldest modern bird, lived more than 100 million years ago and looked a bit like a modern grebe.

How easy is it to falsify memory?  Perhaps as easy as a little bit of social pressure, according to research at the Weizmann Institute.

In a forthcoming Science study, they show a unique pattern of brain activity when false memories are formed – one that hints at a surprising connection between our social selves and memory.

The experiment took place in four stages. In the first, volunteers watched a documentary film in small groups. Three days later, they returned to the lab individually to take a memory test, answering questions about the film. They were also asked how confident they were in their answers. 

You know a problem is real when academics say they don't need 5 more years of funding to know what is going to happen.  

But that's the situation in the Great Lakes and the threated posed by Asian carp, according to Bill Taylor, University Distinguished professor in global fisheries sustainability at Michigan State University .    "The costs of hydrological separation are high, but it's a one-time expense and remediation in the Great Lakes from these invasive species will eventually make separation look cheap."

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s federal regulatory process is stifling commercial investment in the development of genetically engineered animals for food, warns a task force led by a U.C. Davis animal scientist, and that could have serious implications for agriculture and food security in the United States.

Clouding the science issues are anti-science opposition groups that seek to delay or obstruct approval by co-opting regulations and concerns about labeling requirements.  The FDA does not require that food labels include information about production methods, such as genetic engineering or organic processes, unless those processes result in a material difference in the product. 

A quasar named ULAS J1120+0641, powered by a black hole with a mass two billion times that of the Sun, is by far the brightest object yet discovered in the early Universe - yet. 

Given the news recently about yet another E. coli outbreak, you may be concerned E. coli is not just a plague in 'organically' processed and prepared vegetables but perhaps in regular steak  - and you would be correct.