A. V.

city-birds

City Birds Have Upped the Volume of Their Songs to Compete With Noise Pollution

Human music has borrowed liberally from the animal kingdom over the years, consciously and otherwise: from cuckoo-impersonating classical composers such as Beethoven; to the rainforest-sampling jungle music producers of the ’90s; to today’s dance music programmers, who use electronic instruments to replicate organically occurring sounds. Our canon is rich with nature-inspired devices, yet there’s still …

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crater-mexico

Did the Asteroid that Caused the Chicxulub Crater in Mexico Also Have a Positive Impact?

Scientists studying the Chicxulub crater in Mexico believe that the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago may also have created habitats for new forms of early life. The impact made rocks more porous, which provided niches in which organisms could thrive. These rocks also contained nutrients from water that had been …

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zebra-fish

The Zebra Fish Brings Scientists One Step Closer to Understanding Regeneration

Scientists from Duke University have discovered the Connective Tissue Growth Factor A (CTGFA) protein in zebra fish. Why is this important? Because it helps to heal spinal-cord damage. Tests showed that when the zebra fish’s spinal cord ruptured, a bridge of cells formed, followed by nerve cells and tissue. In about eight weeks, paralysed fish …

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hot-air-balloon

What Would Kill Me First If I Went Up In a Balloon Unprotected?

1. Hypothermia Air temperature drops by 5°C for each 1km you rise. By the edge of the stratosphere (around 15km), it’s below -50°C and the wind blows at over 100km/h. Exposed skin will suffer frostbite in less than five minutes and hypothermia will soon follow. The temperature starts rising again after 20km, but not quickly …

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thunderstorm-rain

Why Does Thunderstorm Rain Contain More Nitrogen Than Ordinary Rain?

Air is 78 per cent nitrogen, and plants need it to grow. Nitrogen gas is chemically very stable because it is made from two atoms that form strong bonds with one another. Breaking these bonds requires lots of energy before they can react. Lightning can provide this energy, breaking the bonds and leaving the free nitrogen …

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alexa

Everyone Loves Alexa

This year’s CES was positively bursting with gadgetry that works with Amazon’s AI personal assistant Alexa – the Siri/Cortana-like ‘voice’ of Amazon Echo. Ranging from an outright Echo competitor (the Lenovo Smart Assistant) to Ford’s SYNC3 in-car infotainment system, via robot vacuum cleaners, security cameras, Huawei’s Mate 9 phone and ’smart’ light bulbs, plugs and kitchen appliances galore, there were over 30 such products …

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stem-cells

Could Stem Cell Therapy Restore Sight?

Say goodbye to your reading glasses. Researchers at Japan’s RIKEN Centre for Developmental Biology have restored vision in mice with end-stage retinal degeneration – the leading cause of irreversible vision loss and blindness in elderly humans – by transplanting retinal tissue grown using stem cells. Patients with conditions such as age-related macular degeneration and retinitis …

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