How long does it take for the Earth to go around the Sun: one day, one month, or one year? On a science literacy survey of 1574 adults, 54% answered this question correctly. But don’t worry—this number jumped to a whopping 66% when it included only those who considered themselves part of an attentive public, […]

NASA Dryden Flight Research Center has a gallery of digitized video clips of some experimental and/or historically significant aircraft. Possibly more unique than the SR-71 (that would be the Blackbird) or Mars Rover is the video of a Controlled Impact Demonstration (pictured right) wherein a Boeing 720 was intentionally crashed in order to record the […]

In most mammals, including humans, sex is decided by the X and Y chromosomes: two Xs create a female, while XY creates a male. In birds, the system is similar: ZW makes for a female, while ZZ makes for a male. But in platypuses, XXXXXXXXXX creates a female, while XYXYXYXYXY creates a male. In other […]

While the internet may help some people with various chronic conditions, a new study seems to indicate that “cyber-medicine” may actually leave others worse off than if they’d simply listened to their doctors. (EurekAlert/University College London: “Knowledge may be hazardous to web consumers’ health” [October 17, 2004])

This is very, very curious: “We found neural activity that frankly surprised us,” says Michael Weliky, associate professor of brain and cognitive sciences at the University of Rochester. “Adult ferrets had neural patterns in their visual cortex that correlated very well with images they viewed, but that correlation didn’t exist at all in very young […]