New Species Hotspot In Remote Cambodian Mekong

Cantor's Giant softshell turtle, thought to be extinct in Cambodia since 2003 has been rediscovered in a section of the Mekong River almost untouched by humans.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 7:00 pm

Breakthrough Against Poxviruses May Lead To Medication For Smallpox and Monkeypox

Smallpox has a nasty history throughout the world. Caused by poxviruses, smallpox is one of the few disease-causing agents against which the human body’s immune system is ineffective in its defense. A breakthrough by structural biologists may be the first step towards a pharmaceutical medication for smallpox and the emerging human monkeypox.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 7:00 pm

Researchers Explore What Contemporary Science Cannot Explain

A team philosophers is conducting a three-year research project to explore conscious experiences that contemporary science still cannot explain.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 7:00 pm

New Hope For Restoring Injured Nerves

Scientists have identified a worm gene that is essential for damaged nerve cells to regenerate, and showed they could speed nerve regeneration by over-activating the gene -- a step toward new treatments for nerves injured by trauma or disease.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 7:00 pm

Crib-side Studies Help Struggling Newborns Go Home Without Feeding Tubes

A new strategy is helping premature infants and other newborns with severe swallowing difficulties learn to feed on their own. Physicians were able to help 15 out of 20 infants with severe feeding difficulties and airway concerns learn to feed by mouth.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 7:00 pm

Cooking Up New Gelled Rocket Fuels

Engineers and food scientists are teaming up to develop a new type of gelled fuel the consistency of orange marmalade designed to improve the safety, performance and range of rockets for space and military applications.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 7:00 pm

New Insight Into How Bees See Could Improve Artificial Intelligence Systems

New research on bees could lead to improved artificial intelligence systems and computer programs for facial recognition.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 4:00 pm

Stimulating Recovery From Chronic Stress Disorders: Novel Approach Uses Body's 'Fight Or Flight' Mechanism

A Canadian/US research team has reported a novel approach to stimulating recovery from chronic stress disorders. Researchers have detailed a therapeutic model which exploits the natural dynamics of the body's "fight or flight" system. In contrast to conventional time-invariant therapy, the researchers propose a well-directed therapeutic push delivered according to an optimal treatment schedule.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 4:00 pm

'Astronaut Food Approach' To Medical Testing: Dehydrated, Wallet-sized Malaria Tests Promise Better Diagnoses In Developing World

Bioengineers have created a credit-card sized tool can be stored for months and then used to test for malaria. It's part of a larger project to develop high-tech tools for global health. The prototype delivered a diagnosis in just nine minutes.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 4:00 pm

New Treatment Option For Latent Tuberculosis

Patients who are infected with the latent form of tuberculosis (TB) show no symptoms and are not contagious, yet they pose the biggest challenge when it comes to controlling the disease. A new potential treatment for this particular form of TB has been developed.
Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 4:00 pm

Lizards’ Dance Avoids Deadly Ants

Longer-limbed lizards can make a quicker escape from pesky fire ants.
Source: Livescience.com | 26 Jan 2009 | 1:19 pm

States may gain power over emissions standards (AP)

AP - Plunging into energy policy, President Barack Obama is poised to give states a freer hand in curbing emissions from cars, and to get his government moving on fuel-efficiency standards that could remake the auto industry.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 1:18 pm

Indonesians among the few to witness solar eclipse (AP)

AP - Indonesians were among the few worldwide to witness an eclipse of the sun Monday, some cheering and banging on drums as the moon slowly crossed its path, blocking out everything but a thin, blazing rim of fire.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:20 pm

New Zealand reptile becomes dad at 111 years old (AP)

AP - A captive reptile in New Zealand has unexpectedly become a father at the ripe old age of 111 after receiving treatment for a cancer that made him hostile toward prospective mates.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:18 pm

Meet Henry, probably the oldest first-time dad in the world

A rare New Zealand tuatara lizard become a dad aged 111, possibly for the first time.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:06 pm

Taiwan embraces China's gift of 2 pandas (AP)

AP - Two giant pandas from China captivated thousands of Taiwanese on Monday, but the playful bears failed to completely disarm spectators from the rival island.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 11:01 am

Shortlist for Severn energy plans

A proposed shortlist of schemes is announced to harness renewable energy from the tides of the Severn estuary.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Jan 2009 | 10:47 am

Forgotten origins

Indonesians laud Darwin's Welsh contemporary
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Jan 2009 | 7:07 am

Cautious Optimism for the First Stem Cell Human Trial Approved by the FDA (Time.com)

Time.com - A promising and perilous study could lead to new treatments for spinal cord injury
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 6:20 am

Lies Take Longer Than Truths (LiveScience.com)

LiveScience.com - A new technique that separates truth from lies finds it takes about 30 percent longer to fib.
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:45 am

Lies Take Longer Than Truths

A new technique that separates truth from lies finds it takes about 30 percent longer to fib.
Source: Livescience.com | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:36 am

Genetic 'hotspots' for psoriasis

Scientists are moving closer to identifying the multiple genetic faults which may cause the painful skin condition psoriasis.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:29 am

Single cell 'can store memories'

Just one brain cell is capable of holding fleeting memories vital for our everyday life, according to US scientists.
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:29 am

Food warning

The UN meets to debate rising food prices
Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:12 am

Science Weekly podcast: Which sex has better arm control, plus Obama's scientific promise

In the pod this week, Professor Geoff Sanders, a psychologist from London Metropolitan University, and Maya Mendiratta from the Science Museum's Dana Centre.

They discuss gender stereotypes and testing them with science. In particular, which sex has better arm control, and are men or women better when it comes to visual processing.

In the newsjam, we look at criticism of the UK's chief scientist, how an asteroid made the moon spin, and did Charles Darwin get his tree of life wrong?

After new US president Barack Obama declared he wanted to 'restore science to its rightful place', we look at team he's brought in to help him tackle climate change amongst other things.

Science correspondent Ian Sample and, after a prolonged absence, Nell Boase returns with her wisdom. They battle it out to see who performs best when it comes to speaking 'speed gibberish'.

Feel free to post your comments about this programme on the blog below.

You can also join our Facebook group, where you can scrawl your thoughts on our wall.

Extended audio extracts

Gender stereotypes: 'Women have better control of their hands'
Science adviser criticism: 'He's kept his head down'
Darwin's tree of life: 'It's not such a clean picture'
Obama's promise: 'Restoring science to its rightfiul place'

Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:10 am

Laura Spinney: Is life a tree - or more of a tangled thicket?

Behold, fig 1, a tree of life that Darwin might have considered worthy of the name, and fig 2, the "impenetrable thicket of life", as sketched by W Ford Doolittle, a biologist at Dalhousie University in Canada.

Darwin first sketched something treelike in his notebook in 1837, in an attempt to explain how life evolved on Earth. His basic idea was that life began with an initial founding species, represented by the tree's root. The trunk growing from that root split into two branches, marking the creation of two new species, and this branching continued right on up to the top of the tree - representing those species alive today.

It was a compelling idea. But in the bicentenary of the great man's birth, the tree-of-life concept is in trouble. Doolittle is not alone in thinking that the truth looks less like a nicely trained apple tree, and more like an old gooseberry bush in need of a prune.

The problem is DNA. Darwin didn't know about the stuff, but he did realise that characteristics were inherited - passed along the tree's branches - by some unidentified mechanism that turned out to be DNA. The trouble is, scientists now know that DNA can move between branches as well as along them. Not long ago, a chunk of snake DNA was found in cows. The result is a mass of horizontal cross-links, and a great big tangle.

To be fair to Darwin, says Doolittle, he wasn't in possession of all the facts. Life as we know it is divided into three huge domains: bacteria, other minuscule things called archaea, and eukaryotes, complex organisms that include humans. When he drew his tree, Darwin was thinking only about visible organisms, so he missed out the vast majority of life on Earth: invisible microbes. No wonder his tree was off.

Having said that, he still has his supporters. Peer Bork of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Germany thinks there's life in the old tree yet and that scientists just don't have the tools to reveal its structure. He offers the analogy of a real tree, in full leaf. It has a trunk and branches, all right, but unless you can get behind the canopy, all you see is a big green mess.

Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 26 Jan 2009 | 12:01 am

World's highest drug levels entering India stream (AP)

AP - When researchers analyzed vials of treated wastewater taken from a plant where about 90 Indian drug factories dump their residues, they were shocked. Enough of a single, powerful antibiotic was being spewed into one stream each day to treat every person in a city of 90,000.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Jan 2009 | 10:40 pm

Single Brain Cell Can Hold a Memory

A new study finds single cells can remember things.
Source: Livescience.com | 25 Jan 2009 | 7:25 pm

China dams reveal flaws in climate-change weapon (AP)

AP - The hydroelectric dam, a low wall of concrete slicing across an old farming valley, is supposed to help a power company in distant Germany contribute to saving the climate — while putting lucrative "carbon credits" into the pockets of Chinese developers.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Jan 2009 | 7:11 pm

Genetic Tricks of Parasites

Parasites typically don’t have as many genes as their free-living relatives do.
Source: Livescience.com | 25 Jan 2009 | 4:09 pm

Female Companionship Extends Sex Lives of Male Mice

When male mice live with female mice, their reproductive years are extended by up to 20 percent.
Source: Livescience.com | 25 Jan 2009 | 3:50 pm

The Nation's Weather (AP)

AP - Snow was forecast for much of the West and the central Plains on Saturday, while the Southeast was expected to be wet and bitter cold temperatures were predicted in the Great Lakes region.

Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Jan 2009 | 12:39 pm