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2:02pm

Mon October 22, 2012
Science

Study: Kids get developmental boost from phones, social media

Credit Summer Skyes 11 / Flickr

Instead of increasing kids’ isolation, a new study from the University of Washington suggests life on the digital frontier is helping kids reach developmental milestones.

Phones and social media help kids share personal problems and build a sense of belonging, the UW noted in a press release.

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9:45am

Thu October 18, 2012
Culture

So, would you eat a panda?

Credit Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

A Chinese scientist recently suggested that prehistoric humans ate pandas. The evidence, based on cut marks on panda bones, strikes me as thin, but the report led me to a thought experiment.

How would people in the modern world react if the some population or subculture today made panda-foraging a goal? I imagine most of us would be horrified, and not only because the panda is an endangered species. The panda has become a symbol of cuteness, an animal we love to love.

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1:05am

Thu October 18, 2012
Health

Treatment for Alzheimer's should start years before disease sets in

Originally published on Thu October 18, 2012 8:12 am

Credit Charles Dharapak / AP

Treatment for Alzheimer's probably needs to begin years or even decades before symptoms of the disease start to appear, scientists reported at this week's Society for Neuroscience meeting in New Orleans.

"By the time an Alzheimer's patient is diagnosed even with mild or moderate Alzheimer's there is very, very extensive neuron death," said John Morrison of Mount Sinai Medical School in New York. "And the neurons that die are precisely those neurons that allow you to navigate the world and make sense of the world."

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2:39pm

Mon October 15, 2012
Health

Where you live may determine what lives inside your mouth

Originally published on Fri October 12, 2012 2:28 pm

Credit Sharon Dominick / iStockphoto

Lately, we've been learning more and more about the teeming masses of bacteria inside our bodies - essentially trillions of tiny organisms that make us sick and keep us healthy.

Now two scientists at the University of Colorado have dared to ask what kinds of bacteria lives inside our mouths. And they're finding some pretty surprising things in there.

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8:39am

Fri October 12, 2012
NPR science

The secret to genius? It might be more chocolate

Originally published on Fri October 12, 2012 2:13 pm

Credit John Loo / Flickr.com

Nerds, rejoice! It's Nobel season — the Oscars for lab rats, peacemakers and cognoscenti alike. Every fall, big thinkers around the world wait for a middle-of-the-night phone call from Sweden, dreaming of what they might do with the $1.2 million prize.

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2:56pm

Thu October 11, 2012
NPR science

Mystery not yet solved: 'Softball-sized eyeball' washes up in Florida

Originally published on Mon October 15, 2012 7:41 am

Credit Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission

Tell us you can resist clicking on this headline from Florida's Sun Sentinel:

"Huge Eyeball From Unknown Creature Washes Ashore On Florida Beach."

It's big, it's blue and the newspaper says "among the possibilities being discussed are a giant squid, some other large fish or a whale or other large marine mammal."

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has sent the eye off for study.

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1:39pm

Thu October 11, 2012
Science

Mystery solved: Who the 'Kennewick Man' really was

Credit Brittney Tatchell

For one thing, Kennewick Man – the 9,500-year-old remains found in the shallows of the Columbia River more than 16 years ago – was buff. We’re talking beefcake.

So says Doug Owsley, head of physical anthropology at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. Owsley led the study of the ancient remains.

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