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Your brain is an organ of two halves – the left side and the right side. And there are many brain functions, such as language skills or which hand you write with, which are organized mostly in one side of the brain or the other.
Simple behavioral tests have now allowed us to see how this organization is revealed through biases in how we see and interact with the world – and each other – often without us being aware of it.
Examining how people perceive a ...read more
The first wave of invaders likely numbered 48 or more, according to new research. (Credit: kzww/Shutterstock)
In 1992, Hurricane Andrew ripped it’s way across the southern US. Southern Florida, where Andrew made landfall, was one of the hardest hit areas. It’s estimated that over 100,000 homes were damaged, and 63,000 were destroyed—among them an expensive beachfront house with a very large and memorable aquarium. That aquarium contained six lionfish, and when it br ...read more
The future that never happened: A bustling Mon base as envisioned by a NASA study in 1986. (Credit: NASA/Dennis M. Davidson)
NASA’s human spaceflight program has been in a state of uncertainty pretty much from the moment the Apollo 17 crew left the surface of the Moon 45 years ago this month. The Space Shuttle never became the hoped-for workhorse that would makes space access cheap and routine; the International Space Station never became a glorious gateway to deep-space exploration. Now ...read more
If you’re like me, your family’s Christmas tree is dripping with poorly-made ornaments you and your siblings slapped together in kindergarten. Seriously, one is just a picture of me with some spray-painted puzzle pieces around it.
If you’re lucky enough to live in a small part of Australia, though, you could probably gussy your tree up this year with a festive snail. (Disclaimer: This is a bad idea and will get you in a lot of trouble.)
Attenborougharion rubicundus i ...read more
Animals living on the ocean floor, where it’s too dark for anything to grow, have to wait for food to fall on them. Mostly this means they eat “marine snow,” a steady drift of tiny life forms and detritus from the ocean’s surface. But robotic expeditions off the coast of Mexico have revealed what might be another major dining option on the ocean floor: dead squid moms.
The Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) sent one of its remotely ...read more
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A new male contraceptive is set to begin testing next year.
Beginning in April, about 420 men will begin rubbing a hormonal gel onto their shoulders every morning, with the goal of lowering sperm counts below what’s needed to cause a pregnancy. If all goes to plan, they and their partners will spend a year relying only on the gel for birth control.
Another Try
The study is receiving joint funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Population ...read more
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Those of us brave souls who inhabit America’s northern climes know that it’s not the cold that brings on the winter blues. You go to work and it’s dark. You leave work and it’s dark. The sun? What’s that?
Indeed, as I post this at 3:30 p.m., the sun is already nearing the horizon. The sky above is dark. Today — the Winter Solstice — the sun will set at 4:20 p.m. here in Milwaukee.
But that’s actually pretty weird. It’ ...read more
