Oct 13 Watch Reconstructing Black Death: Why Was Plague Microbe so Deadly? Researchers announced Wednesday that they've managed to reconstruct the genome of the Black Death, the illness that wiped out around half of Europe's population in just a few years in the mid-1300s. Ray Suarez discusses the developments with geneticist Hendrick… Continue watching
Oct 13 Black Death’s DNA Decoded Using Teeth From London’s ‘Plague Pits’ Illustration of the Black Death from the Toggenburg Bible An international consortium of researchers announced this week that they've managed to reconstruct the genome of Black Death -- the "great-grandmother" of modern plagues and the same illness that wiped… Continue reading
Oct 13 Ancient Paint Studio Unearthed The abalone shell before excavation from the 100,000 year old, Middle Stone Age-levels at the Blombos Cave in South Africa. Photo by Science/AAAS. Researchers have unearthed two abalone shells from a South African cave that they believe were used… Continue reading
Oct 12 Why Do Leaves Change Color? By Jenny Marder Photo by Flickr user Tom Olliver. Not long after ad marketing turns from waterparks and beach getaways to maple spice lattes and pumpkin facials, fall colors begin to announce the arrival of autumn -- and some years, more loudly… Continue reading
Oct 11 Academia and Big Pharma Partner to Put New Drugs on the Market Bloomberg via Getty Images Big Pharma and university scientists are hopeful that a wave of new research collaborations between the two will speed up the drug discovery process and help put new drugs on a relatively stagnant market. Continue reading
Oct 10 Watch Environment, Economy at Heart of Keystone XL Pipeline Debate A Canadian company wants to build a $13 billion, 1,700-mile pipeline to carry crude oil from the so-called tar sands region in Alberta through six states and a major aquifer to Texas for refining. Correspondent Tom Bearden reports from Nebraska… Continue watching
Oct 10 Keystone Oil Pipeline Project Divides Nebraska Residents The NewsHour's Tom Bearden and photographer Brian Gill traveled to Nebraska's Sand Hills for a recent story. Photo by Tom Bearden. If your car ever dies in the middle of nowhere, you better hope you're in Nebraska. While working… Continue reading
Oct 10 In Wake of Qwikster’s Hasty Death, Netflix Faces Questions of Its Own Can you declare a company dead if it never actually began doing business? It's a slightly existential question one might pose to those who would have run Qwikster, the DVD-by-mail business that Netflix said it was launching just… Continue reading
Oct 10 DIY Genetics, Dwindling Water and Seismologists on Trial By Jenny Marder Updated 6:00 pm Are We Entering a New Geologic Age? Some scientists say human activity has pushed the planet into a new geologic age. It has it's own name: Anthropocene, or Age of Man. (Nobel laureate Paul Crutzen coined… Continue reading
Oct 07 Virus Hunters Stalk the Next Global Epidemic Virus hunter Nathan Wolfe. Photo by Tom Clynes. Ask the not-so-simple question of one of the world's leading virologists, "What is a virus?" and the reaction is immediate. He sits up in his chair, throws one leg over another. Continue reading