New Adhesive will let you climb up the wall

First there was Velcro (R), now there is Gecko!Seriously, the wonders and joys of biomimicry are at it again.The new adhesive is first to mimic quick catch and rapid release traits of a gecko's footA gecko sits atop a glass surface in this image from...

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Cancer and Myc

Myc is a gene that has been studied for over 20 years and is found to be overexpressed in many human cancers. The protein it codes for (which for simplicity we'll also refer to as Myc) is a transcription factor, like members of the FoxO family, which...

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Science News Stories

It's a bit a bit of a smorgasborg, but here are 3 interesting links.1. The Mississippi River is a little under the weather. Why? Way too much cabon dioxide and it's all being dumped into the Gulf of Mexico. Too much CO2 in the ocean throws off the pH...

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Top science stories of 2007

Well, 2007 has been over for three weeks now. Must be time to look back and figure out what happened there. Overall, I'd say it was a good year, but not a great year. Let's have a look at what others picked for the "top" stories.Science usually makes...

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Sirtuin news

Back in November we had a series of posts about sirtuin proteins. This included an overview, with a particular focus on the relevance to calorie restriction and longevity, especially in light of recent research announcements at the time. This was followed...

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School of Business confirms recipe for herd behavior

Popular opinion not always so popularWhether you're a voter choosing the next president, a manager making policy decisions or a consumer selecting a brand, it's likely your decision is influenced by the opinions of others.But beware: Your estimate may...

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Supernova Remnants Dance in the LMC

Supernova Remnants Dance in the LMC The Gemini South Multi-Object Spectograph (GMOS) recently captured a dramatic image of a vast cloud complex named DEM L316 located in the Large Magellanic Cloud. The peanut-shaped nebula appears to be a single object,...

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Interactive Science Lesson - Cancer

Okay, it's not urban ecology, but it is an important matter -- your health. Cancer is a comm0n disease that affects every living creature (yes, any kind of animal or plant can get cancer) and every tissue (any part of your body can get cancer). Not all...

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Teens, Sex, and Technology

My intended audience for this site are teens and families. Though the main purpose is to share urban ecology and urban wildlife science, I sometimes feel compelled to share information I think would be generally useful for young people. I post about...

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Cool New Science Discoveries

Discovery #1: Photosynthesis...not just for plants and algae anymore.Well, something like that. A new discovery has found that a species of clam can actually gulp air and covert it to protein. Yes, using microbes that live in its gut, the clam can...

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Book Review: Little Lost Bat

Each year the Animal Behavior Society selects an Outstanding Children's Book that accurately presents animal behavior and behavior ecology in literature for children in grades 3-5.The following title was one of the finalist for the 2007 Award. This book...

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Urban Wildlife Watch - Earthworms

During hot summer days, my younger sibling often tryies to rescue poor little earthworms trying to cross the hot sidewalk. It's as if the little guys started out early that morning, when the day was fresh and cool and still moist with dew at the edge...

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Physical sciences news, 12/24/07 - 12/30/07

High-energy galactic objectsObjects in our galaxy that are capable of generating hard X-rays or the even higher-energy gamma-rays are quite unusual, and therefore of significant scientific interest. A European ground-based observatory known as H. E....

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Science.TV

Guess what I just learned about...ScienceTV, an online video-sharing website for people interested in science. It was just recently launched, but it includes channels and categories of science topics and target groups.It's been a while since I've thougt...

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Economics 101

I'm going to broaden the focus here with a lesson in elementary economics. This is a fairly standard example used by economists everywhere, to illustrate how competitors position themselves to divide up a market.Suppose there is a nice beach somewhere....

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