Rocky basalt pillars that litter Iceland's Skaelingar valley likely formed in a surprising reaction where lava met water - but without any explosion occurring.

The authors of a new paper say that non-explosive lava–water interactions happened during the emplacement of the Laki lava flow in Iceland during 1783–1784. Skaelingar valley contains a tributary stream to the Skafta River.

"Usually, when lava and water meet in aerial environments, the water instantly flashes to steam," said lead author Tracy Gregg, a University of Buffalo associate professor of geology. "That's a volume increase of eight times — boom.

Atrial fibrillation, the most frequently diagnosed type of irregular heart rhythm, is more prevalent in whites than people from other race or ethnic groups, according to researchers at UC San Francisco. 
Atrial fibrillation is the most common cardiac arrhythmia. People over 40 years of age have a 26 percent lifetime risk of developing this abnormality, according to the Framingham Heart Study.

Researchers have come one step closer to understanding unstable atomic nuclei.

The protons and neutrons inside the atomic nucleus exhibit shell structures in a manner similar to electrons in an atom. For naturally stable nuclei, these nuclear shells fill completely when the number of protons or the number of neutrons is equal to the 'magic' numbers 2, 8, 20, 28, 50, 82 or 126. But not always. For exotic nuclei, 28 is not a magic number of neutrons. Traditional magic numbers, which were once thought to be common for all nuclei, can change in unstable, radioactive nuclei that have a large imbalance of protons and neutrons.

A group at the University of Exeter used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology on the brains of 13 volunteers, all faculty members and graduate students in English at the school, to see how they respond to poetry and prose - and then declared that "scientists prove" poetry is like music to the mind.

The upcoming results in the Journal of Consciousness Studies found a "reading network" of brain areas was activated in response to any written material and also that more emotionally charged writing aroused several of the regions in the brain which respond to music. 

A new paper uses mathematical models
to examine the effect of direct and indirect social influences, otherwise known as peer pressure, on how decisions are reached on important issues. The data taken from 15 networks, including groups as disparate as U.S. school superintendents and Brazilian farmers, outline peer pressure's crucial role in society.  

In soccer, football in the rest of the world, a team is most vulnerable right after they score. That is why goals often come in pairs. 

But there is also a more dangerous statistic relating to scoring. Players are at a greater risk of injury five minutes or after a goal has been scored and the frequency of player injuries also increases when their team has the lead, according to a paper that analyzed injuries over the last three World Cup tournaments.