Frontiers in Psychology Numerical cognition in bees and other insects In this article, Dr. Mario Pahl and colleagues review the main studies on the ability of insects to perceive number, and discuss the possible mechanisms involved in number recognition. Recent behavioral investigations have shown that several invertebrate species (animals without backbones) share various numerical activities with bigger animals, such as birds and mammals. This is because the ability to assess the number of food items, competitors or mates can help animals – even smaller ones like insects ...

In one of the most detailed studies of its kind, a team of Greek and U.S. researchers have vividly chronicled the harmful public health impacts of the economic austerity measures imposed on Greece's population in the wake of the global economic crisis. Writing in today's [Thursday, April 18] American Journal of Public Health, the researchers cite data showing the economic recession and subsequent austerity policies in Greece have led to a sharp deterioration of health services and health outcomes. Researchers at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece and ...

College Park, MD - A new study of brain rhythms in bats and rats challenges a widely used model - based on studies in rodents - of how animals navigate their environment. To get a clearer picture of the processes at work in the mammal brain during spatial navigation, neuroscientists must closely study a broad range of animals, say the two University of Maryland College Park scientists involved in the study. In the April 19, 2013 issue of Science, the University of Maryland researchers and two colleagues at Boston University reported significant differences between rats' ...

Claremont, CA – The first new species of dinosaur from Madagascar in nearly a decade was announced today, filling an important gap in the island's fossil record. Dahalokely tokana (pronounced "dah-HAH-loo-KAY-lee too-KAH-nah") is estimated to have been between nine and 14 feet long, and it lived around 90 million years ago. Dahalokely belongs to a group called abelisauroids, carnivorous dinosaurs common to the southern continents. Up to this point, no dinosaur remains from between 165 and 70 million years ago could be identified to the species level in Madagascar–a 95 ...

The proportion of young women diagnosed with genital warts in Australia has seen a significant decline thanks to the HPV vaccine, suggests a paper published today on bmj.com. In 2007, Australia became one of the first countries to implement a nationally funded quadrivalent human papillomarivus (HPV) vaccination programme for girls and young women, which offers free vaccinations to girls aged 12-13 years in schools. From 2007 – 2009 there were a further two catch-up programmes: for 13-18 year olds and 18-26 year olds. The vaccine protects against the types of HPV that ...

Menstrual problems among adolescents with learning and physical disabilities are more common compared to the general population and there is no one-size fits all solution when managing the symptoms, says a new review published today (19th April) in The Obstetrician & Gynaecologist (TOG). The review looks at the behavioural and emotional changes associated with menstruation in adolescents with learning and physical disabilities and examines the advantages and limitations of therapeutic and surgical options for managing menstrual problems. Menstrual problems in girls ...

Additional legislation and guidance around surrogate pregnancy is needed for healthcare professionals, says a new review published today (19th April) in The Obstetrician & Gynaecologist (TOG). The review looks at the medico-legal challenges of surrogacy in modern obstetrics, highlighting recent changes in UK laws, the guidelines and legislation available and the legal requirements for parenthood and parental rights. The number of surrogate pregnancies in the UK is unknown, since many arrangements proceed without any medical or legal input, states the review. In April ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. — America's K-12 teachers are not fully prepared to meet a new set of science standards, a Michigan State University education scholar argues in Science. Writing in the April 19 issue, Suzanne Wilson said the professional training landscape for teachers is woefully inadequate to handle the Next Generation Science Standards. The voluntary guidelines, unveiled this month by the advocacy group Achieve in collaboration with 26 states, call for more hands-on learning and analysis and cover fewer science topics but in greater depth. Science in U.S. classrooms ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. — When the woods get crowded, female squirrels improve their offspring's odds of survival by ramping up how fast their offspring grow. In a study led by Michigan State University and the University of Guelph (Canada), researchers showed for the first time how females' use social cues to correctly prepare their offspring for life outside the nest. The results, published in the current issue of Science, confirm that red squirrel mothers boosted stress hormone production during pregnancy, which increased the size and the chances of survival of their pups. "Natural ...

Researchers for the first time have identified Earth-sized planets within the habitable zone of a Sun-like star. Images of the star taken by Notre Dame astrophysicist Justin Crepp rule out alternative explanations of the data, confirming that five planets orbit Kepler 62, with two located in the habitable zone. The results were published in Science magazine today. "A five-planet system with planets of 1.41 and 1.61 Earth-radii in the habitable zone of a K2V star has been detected with the Kepler spacecraft and validated with high statistical confidence," the paper reports. ...

Animals navigate and orient themselves to survive – to find food and shelter or avoid predators, for example. Research conducted by Dr. Nachum Ulanovsky and research student Michael Yartsev of the Weizmann Institute's Neurobiology Department, published today in Science, reveals for the first time how three-dimensional, volumetric, space is perceived in mammalian brains. The research was conducted using a unique, miniaturized neural-telemetry system developed especially for this task, which enabled the measurement of single brain cells during flight. The question of how ...

Up to 10 per cent of the population are affected by specific learning disabilities (SLDs), such as dyslexia, dyscalculia and autism, translating to 2 or 3 pupils in every classroom according to a new study. The study – by academics at UCL and Goldsmiths - also indicates that children are frequently affected by more than one learning disability. The research, published today in Science, helps to clarify the underlying causes of learning disabilities and the best way to tailor individual teaching and learning for affected individuals and education professionals. Specific ...

Boston (April 18, 2013) – Natural lubricants play an important role in health, including a well-known effect to help prevent osteoarthritis in knee and ankle joints. However, much is still unknown about their role and function in other areas of the body. Researchers for the first time have discovered that the surface of the eye produces "lubricin," the same substance that protects the joints, and have explained its role in this sensory organ. These findings provide new hope for the millions suffering from dry eye disease and complications from contact lens wear and refractive ...

Frankfurt/Main, Germany, April 18, 2013. The circum-Antarctic Southern Ocean is an important region for global marine food webs and carbon cycling because of sea-ice formation and its unique plankton ecosystem. The origin of its ecosystems can be traced back to the emergence of the Antarctic ice sheets approximately 33.6 million years ago. This discovery was made by an international team including scientists from the Goethe University and the Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre in Frankfurt, Germany. Their study, published today in Science, shows that the development ...

BOSTON (April 18, 2013) – Dry eye disease (DED) is a common condition that causes discomfort, visual disturbance and potentially damaging ocular surface inflammation that greatly impacts a person's quality of life. An estimated nine million people in the United State alone suffer from significant DED; millions more may have milder forms or experience discomfort when exposed to low humidity or contact lens use. DED, the most common reason people visit ophthalmologists, is estimated to cost $55 billion in annual direct and indirect costs to society in the nation alone. In ...

CAMBRIDGE, MA -- Throughout decades of research on solar cells, one formula has been considered an absolute limit to the efficiency of such devices in converting sunlight into electricity: Called the Shockley-Queisser efficiency limit, it posits that the ultimate conversion efficiency can never exceed 34 percent for a single optimized semiconductor junction. Now, researchers at MIT have shown that there is a way to blow past that limit as easily as today's jet fighters zoom through the sound barrier — which was also once seen as an ultimate limit. Their work appears ...

A research team from NPL and the University of Edinburgh have invented a new way to zip and unzip DNA strands using electrochemistry. The DNA double helix has been one of the most recognisable structures in science ever since it was first described by Watson and Crick almost 60 years ago (paper published in Nature in 25 April 1953). The binding and unbinding mechanism of DNA strands is vital to natural biological processes and to the polymerase chain reactions used in biotechnology to copy DNA for sequencing and cloning. The improved understanding of this process, and ...

Sales of chicken products in China plummeted recently during an outbreak of a deadly new strain of bird flu. From bird flu to mad cow disease, numerous food scares have made global headlines in recent years. A technique developed by University of Missouri Professor of Engineering Shubhra Gangopadhyay's group may make food contamination testing more rapid and accurate. The detection test also could accelerate warnings after bioterrorism attacks. "Quickly stopping the spread of toxins saves lives, whether those toxins are from natural processes or enemy attacks," said lead ...

Health disparities between white and black adults in the South are not connected to a lack of exercise but more likely related to other factors such as access to health care, socioeconomic status and perhaps genetics, according to a Vanderbilt study published in the journal PLOS ONE. In fact, more than 80,000 residents enrolled in the long-term Southern Community Cohort Study (SCCS) spent an equal amount of time — about nine hours or 60 percent of their waking day — in sedentary behaviors regardless of race. "Our conclusion is that physical activity is not a significant ...

LONDON, ON – For women diagnosed with a form of breast cancer known as estrogen receptor positive (ER+) breast cancer, tamoxifen is an essential drug used in the treatment and prevention of recurring breast cancer. Currently, tamoxifen is used in a one-size-fits-all approach where the same dose is prescribed for every patient. New research at Lawson Health Research Institute has found that in addition to patient-specific genetic factors, lack of exposure to vitamin D during the long winter months affects the body's ability to metabolize the drug. The findings, which ...

Cracking the DNA code for a complex region of the human genome has helped 14 North American scientists, including five at Simon Fraser University, chart new territory in immunity research. They have discovered that a good number of our antibody genes, how well they operate and, potentially, what they fight off, actually vary from person to person. That means even though drugs, treatments and vaccinations are designed to treat whole populations our response to them could be individualistic. After completely sequencing the immensely repetitive DNA in the human genome's ...

Using observations gathered by NASA's Kepler Mission, the team, led by William Borucki of the NASA Ames Research Center, found five planets orbiting a Sun-like star called Kepler-62. Four of these planets are so-called super-Earths, larger than our own planet, but smaller than even the smallest ice giant planet in our Solar System. These new super-Earths have radii of 1.3, 1.4, 1.6, and 1.9 times that of Earth. In addition, one of the five was a roughly Mars-sized planet, half the size of Earth. Kepler-62 is one of about 170,000 stars observed by the Kepler Space Telescope, ...

Concrete objects — such as toys, tiles and blocks — that students can touch and move around, called manipulatives, have been used to teach basic math skills since the 1980s. Use of manipulatives is based on the long-held belief that young children's thinking is strictly concrete in nature, so concrete objects are assumed to help them learn math concepts. However, new research from the University of Notre Dame suggests that not all manipulatives are equal. The types of manipulatives may make a difference in how effectively a child learns basic counting and other basic math ...

Smoking tobacco through a hookah is a pastime gaining popularity among the college crowd, but many of them mistakenly believe that using the fragrant water pipe is less harmful than smoking cigarettes. In a new study at UC San Francisco, researchers measuring chemicals in the blood and urine concluded that hookah smoke contains a different – but still harmful – mix of toxins. The findings are published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research. Peyton Jacob III, PhD, a UCSF research chemist, and Neal ...

A team of geoscientists from Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) using newly available remote-sensing technology has achieved unprecedented detail in quantifying subtle, long-period changes in the water levels of shallow lakes and ponds in hard-to-reach Arctic wetlands. Analysis comparing time-lapsed, high-resolution satellite imagery of the Ahnewetut Wetlands in Kobuk Valley National Park, Alaska, revealed an accelerated loss of surface water in shallow thaw lakes and ponds over a recent 27-year period compared to the preceding 27-year timespan. Those periods generally ...