A 'lump' of dark matter may be ripping apart Taurus' face
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 4 minutes
| 701 words
| Mittie Cheatwood
The Hyades — a young, V-shaped cluster of stars swooshing through the head of the constellation Taurus — is slowly being ripped apart by an enormous, invisible mass, a new study suggests. This unrest in the bull's head could point to an ancient cache of dark matter left over from the Milky Way's creation, the study authors said.
In the new paper, published March 24 in the journalAstronomy and Astrophysics, researchers used data from the European Space Agency's (ESA) Gaia star-mapping satellite to investigate the history of the Hyades.
[Read More]A Chiropractor Adjusted Her Neck. Then This Woman's Vision Problems Began
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 3 minutes
| 509 words
| Arica Deslauriers
A visit to the chiropractor took a sharp — and unexpected — twist when a 59-year-old woman developed vision problems after her treatment, according to a new report of the woman's case.
The woman had gone to the chiropractor for a neck manipulation intended to treat her headaches. After the visit, however, the woman developed three floating vision spots in her right eye. She described them as tadpole-shaped and continuously visible, according to report.
[Read More]Canary islanders threatened by toxic gases from lava pouring into the sea
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 4 minutes
| 662 words
| Arica Deslauriers
(opens in new tab)More than a week after its volcano erupted in a spectacular display of molten lava, islanders on La Palma are threatened by a new hazard — the toxic gases and particles created as the volcanic flow spills into the sea.
Officials have told residents on the Spanish island — one of the Canary Islands about 60 miles (100 kilometers) off the coast of West Africa — to seal their doors and windows with tape and wet towels to keep out the potentially dangerous clouds, which can occur when molten lava pours into the ocean.
[Read More]Does Your Brain Let You Hear Your Own Footsteps?
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 4 minutes
| 729 words
| Mittie Cheatwood
Our brain might come equipped with a noise-canceling feature: one that helps us ignore the sound of our own footsteps or the crunching of our bites.
In a new study, which was conducted in mice, the mouse brain canceled out the sound of its own footsteps. This ability helped the mice to better hear other sounds in their surroundings, researchers reported today (Sept. 12) in the journal Nature(opens in new tab).
[Read More]Donating a Kidney Doesn't Shorten Donor's Life
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 3 minutes
| 514 words
| Fernande Dalal
People who donate one of their kidneys are likely to live just as long as someone with two healthy kidneys, assuming they survive the initial somewhat riskier period.
A new study, which involved more than 80,000 live kidney donors in the United States and looked at survival rates over a 15-year period, is the first to use data from a national level, rather than from single-transplant centers with similar populations.
[Read More]Getting to the Bottom of Why Guppies Jump
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 3 minutes
| 521 words
| Fernande Dalal
When a guppy jumped out of a laboratory tank and nearly landed in her cup of tea, Daphne Soares couldn’t resist putting her current research on hold to investigate this strange leaping behavior.
"The guppy jumped from its holding tank next to my computer," Soares, an assistant professor in the department of biology at the University of Maryland in College Park, told LiveScience. "Why do they do this? It was one of those things that we were just too curious about, so we had to look into it.
[Read More]Gulp! Soda Linked to Memory Woes, Strokes and Dementia
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 3 minutes
| 609 words
| Mittie Cheatwood
People who often drink soda, with sugar or without it, may be more likely to develop memory problems and have smaller brain volumes, according to two recent studies.
In one study, researchers found that people who drank diet soda every day were three times more likely to have a stroke or develop dementia over 10 years than those who did not consume any diet soda.
In the second study, the same researchers concluded that people who consumed at least one diet soda a day had smaller brain volumes than those who did not drink any diet soda.
[Read More]Hot Bugs Get More Sex
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 2 minutes
| 269 words
| Mittie Cheatwood
Being hot can lead to more sex. Especially if you're a male ambush bug.
These predatory insects are known for camouflaging themselves against flowers, lying in wait to ambush prey. The ambush bug (Phymata americana) is mostly yellow with dark brown or black patches, with the males possessing darker heads as well as thoraxes — the mid-regions of insects — than females.
Scientists now find male ambush bugs may use their dark patches to absorb light and heat up, thus improving their mating chances.
[Read More]In Images: Solar Eclipses Depicted in Fine Art
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 5 minutes
| 910 words
| Patria Henriques
Annunciation to the ShepherdsFor hundreds of years, artists have incorporated the spectacular sight of an eclipse into their paintings.
This 14th-century fresco by Taddeo Gaddi, found in the Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence, depicts an angel announcing the birth of the baby Jesus to shepherds during an eclipse.
A letter attributed to Gaddi, written between 1338 and 1348, suggests he suffered severe eye damage from looking directly at the sun during an eclipse, according to a study published in 2002 in the journal Meteorics and Planetary Science.
[Read More]Iron and Zinc May Prevent PMS
Posted on November 13, 2022
| 5 minutes
| 894 words
| Fernande Dalal
Women who feel bloated, irritable or depressed before getting their periods — classic signs of premenstrual syndrome, or PMS — may want to pay attention to the amount of iron in their diets, according to a new study.
Researchers at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst found that women with an iron intake of more than 20 milligrams a day had about a 35 percent lower risk of being diagnosed with PMS than women who had the lowest iron intake, about 10 mg a day.
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