Run Off-Road: 8 Picturesque Trail Runs
Posted on May 29, 2023
| 5 minutes
| 949 words
| Fernande Dalal
IntroSummer is here and the outdoors beckons. If you're a runner, you're probably checking out the summer race schedule. Sure, there are plenty of road races, but to experience all our amazing planet has to offer, go off-road during one of the summer's stunning trail races.
Many of the races here are ultramarathons, which is any run farther than 26.2 miles (42.1 kilometers). But there's something here for everyone; traditional marathons (26.
[Read More]Walking or Biking to Work May Make You Happier
Posted on May 29, 2023
| 3 minutes
| 506 words
| Patria Henriques
Walking to work is not only good for your body; it may also benefit your psychological health, a new study from England suggests.
In the study, the researchers analyzed information from nearly 18,000 commuters in England who answered questions about their well-being, such as whether they experienced feelings of worthlessness, unhappiness or sleepless nights in the last few weeks. Based on those answers, the researchers gave each participant a well-being score.
[Read More]Will Hurricane Irene's Name Be Retired?
Posted on May 29, 2023
| 2 minutes
| 312 words
| Patria Henriques
Hurricane Irene caused billions of dollars in damage and forced millions of people to evacuate, which could force the name "Irene" into retirement even though the storm was only a Category 1 when it made landfall and was downgraded to a tropical storm as it ravaged the Northeast.
Hurricane name retirement decisions are made by high-level committees, which take months to decide, so it's still too early to know if the name "
[Read More]Your Name Impacts How Others Judge You
Posted on May 29, 2023
| 3 minutes
| 489 words
| Trudie Dory
WASHINGTON — Alexandra will get an A in class but Amber won't. At least, that's what their peers expect, according to a small new study of the meanings encoded in people's names.
"The name you give your kid is sort of a proxy for a whole bunch of things in our culture," study researcher John Waggoner of Bloomberg University of Pennsylvania told LiveScience. Names have been linked to many life choices, including what kind of work people do and how they donate to charity.
[Read More]3 Lifestyle Changes May Turn Bad Fat to Good Fat
Posted on May 28, 2023
| 3 minutes
| 562 words
| Arica Deslauriers
Researchers may have found a new way to put ordinary fat cells to work, changing them from lazy blobs that store our extra calories into energy-burners.
The method is surprisingly simple: keep the mice busy, and give them lots of friends and plenty of room to run around.
After one month in such an "enriched" environment, mice saw some of their white fat cells, which store energy, take on characteristics of brown fat, which burns calories.
[Read More]A Hot Blob in the Pacific Ocean Caused 1 Million Seabirds to Die
Posted on May 28, 2023
| 3 minutes
| 589 words
| Mittie Cheatwood
Five years ago, tens of thousands of emaciated seabirds washed ashore on the Pacific Coast. Now, scientists know why: a long-lived marine heat wave known as "the blob."
The common murre (Uria aalge) is a black and white seabird that reaches about 1 foot (0.3 meters) long and can dive hundreds of meters deep into water in search of prey. These seabirds feast on tiny "forage fish" such as sardines, herring and anchovies, and need to consume about half of their body weight every day in order to survive.
[Read More]Brain Changes Cause Drug Addiction, Researchers Say
Posted on May 28, 2023
| 4 minutes
| 677 words
| Trudie Dory
Drug addicts and their nonaddict siblings share the same brain abnormalities linked with poor self-control and drug dependence, a new study suggests.
Researchers looked at pairs of siblings and healthy, unrelated people, and compared their brain structures and their ability to control their impulses — which is known to be compromised among drug abusers.
They found that the addicts and their siblings shared similar abnormalities in the brain, while healthy participants did not have these abnormal traits.
[Read More]Do Higher Speed Limits Cause More Accidents?
Posted on May 28, 2023
| 3 minutes
| 441 words
| Mittie Cheatwood
Everything is bigger in Texas even the speeding limit. The Texas House of Representatives has approved a bill that would raise the speed limit to 85 miles per hour on some highways, with the bill now making its way to state Senate. But the increased limit may have deadly consequences, as research shows that higher speeds result in more fatal accidents.
Currently, Texas has more than 520 miles of interstate highways that have 80-mph speed limits.
[Read More]Gallery: Tantalizing Images of Plant Sex
Posted on May 28, 2023
| 2 minutes
| 414 words
| Mittie Cheatwood
Plant SexPlant reproduction and its human counterpart aren't all that different, a new study detailed in April 2013 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests. When a pollen grain, which stores plant sperm, lands on top of the stigma, a structure that sits atop the carpel where the female sex cells are stored, the pollen grows a long tube that pushes through the surrounding tissue. The pollen tube swells up like an inflating balloon, navigating a narrow channel to deliver sperm to the ovules, where it fertilizes an egg cell.
[Read More]Highly effective malaria vaccine could be a game-changer, early trial suggests
Posted on May 28, 2023
| 3 minutes
| 482 words
| Arica Deslauriers
A malaria vaccine developed by the University of Oxford proved to be 77% effective in early clinical trials, suggesting it could be a possible breakthrough in the fight against the one of the world's deadliest infectious disease.
Malaria is caused by the Plasmodium parasite transmitted to people through the bite of Anopheles mosquitoes. In 2019, there were 229 million cases of malaria worldwide and 409,000 deaths, according to The World Health Organization's (WHO) World malaria report.
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