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The Truth About Quicksand Is Beginning to Sink In
By KENNETH CHANG, The New York Times, October 4, 2005
Real quicksand, the kind that is almost impossible to extricate yourself from, is not just water and sand. Salt and clay are also major ingredients in this B-movie plot device, scientists report in the current issue of Nature.
( Read More )
Two Win Nobel Prize for Discovering Bacterium Tied to Stomach Ailments
By LAWRENCE K. ALTMAN, The New York Times, October 4, 2005
Two Australian scientists who upset medical dogma by discovering a bacterium that causes stomach inflammation, ulcers and cancer won the 2005 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine yesterday.
The winners were Dr. Barry J. Marshall, 54, a gastroenterologist from the University of Western Australia in Nedlands, and Dr. J. Robin Warren, 68, a retired pathologist from the Royal Perth Hospital.
The findings by the Australians in the early 1980's went so against medical thinking, which held that psychological stress caused stomach and duodenal ulcers, that it took many more years for an entrenched medical profession to accept it.
( Read More )
Serious Riders, Your Bicycle Seat May Affect Your Love Life
By SANDRA BLAKESLEE, The New York Times, October 4, 2005
A raft of new studies suggest that cyclists, particularly men, should be careful which bicycle seats they choose.
The studies add to earlier evidence that traditional bicycle saddles, the kind with a narrow rear and pointy nose, play a role in sexual impotence.
Some saddle designs are more damaging than others, scientists say. But even so-called ergonomic seats, to protect the sex organs, can be harmful, the research finds. The dozen or so studies, from peer-reviewed journals, are summarized in three articles in September's Journal of Sexual Medicine.
( Read More )
The Claim: If Attacked by a Bear, Play Dead
By ANAHAD O'CONNOR, The New York Times, October 4, 2005
THE FACTS As bear populations from New Jersey to Yellowstone rebound, so do reports of tense human encounters with them.
Common wisdom holds that the way to react, when all else fails, is simple: curl up in a ball and play dead.
But that is not always the best idea. Attacks can generally be divided into two groups: predatory and defensive. Each calls for a different strategy.
( Read More )
One Legend Found, Many Still to Go
By WILLIAM J. BROAD, The New York Times, October 2, 2005
The human instinct to observe nature has always been mixed with a tendency to embroider upon it. So it is that, over the ages, societies have lived alongside not only real animals, but a shadow bestiary of fantastic ones - mermaids, griffins, unicorns and the like. None loomed larger than the giant squid, the kraken, a great, malevolent devil of the deep. "One of these Sea-Monsters," Olaus Magnus wrote in 1555, "will drown easily many great ships."
Science, of course, is in the business of shattering myths with facts, which it did again last week when Japanese scientists reported that they hooked a giant squid - a relatively small one estimated at 26 feet long - some 3,000 feet down and photographed it before it tore off a tentacle to escape. It was the first peek humanity has ever had of such animals in their native habitat. Almost inevitably, the creature seemed far less terrifying than its ancient image.
Scientists celebrated the find not as an end, but as the beginning of a new chapter in understanding the shy creature. "There're always more questions, more parts to the mystery than we'll ever be able to solve," said Clyde F. E. Roper, a squid expert at the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution.
Monster lovers take heart. Scientists argue that so much of the planet remains unexplored that new surprises are sure to show up; if not legendary beasts like the Loch Ness monster or the dinosaur-like reptile said to inhabit Lake Champlain, then animals that in their own way may be even stranger.
A forthcoming book by the noted naturalist Richard Ellis, "Singing Whales, Flying Squid and Swimming Cucumbers" (Lyon Press, 2006), reinforces that notion by cataloguing recent discoveries of previously unknown whales, dolphins and other creatures, some of which are quite bizarre.
( Read More )
By KENNETH CHANG, The New York Times, October 4, 2005
Real quicksand, the kind that is almost impossible to extricate yourself from, is not just water and sand. Salt and clay are also major ingredients in this B-movie plot device, scientists report in the current issue of Nature.
( Read More )
Two Win Nobel Prize for Discovering Bacterium Tied to Stomach Ailments
By LAWRENCE K. ALTMAN, The New York Times, October 4, 2005
Two Australian scientists who upset medical dogma by discovering a bacterium that causes stomach inflammation, ulcers and cancer won the 2005 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine yesterday.
The winners were Dr. Barry J. Marshall, 54, a gastroenterologist from the University of Western Australia in Nedlands, and Dr. J. Robin Warren, 68, a retired pathologist from the Royal Perth Hospital.
The findings by the Australians in the early 1980's went so against medical thinking, which held that psychological stress caused stomach and duodenal ulcers, that it took many more years for an entrenched medical profession to accept it.
( Read More )
Serious Riders, Your Bicycle Seat May Affect Your Love Life
By SANDRA BLAKESLEE, The New York Times, October 4, 2005
A raft of new studies suggest that cyclists, particularly men, should be careful which bicycle seats they choose.
The studies add to earlier evidence that traditional bicycle saddles, the kind with a narrow rear and pointy nose, play a role in sexual impotence.
Some saddle designs are more damaging than others, scientists say. But even so-called ergonomic seats, to protect the sex organs, can be harmful, the research finds. The dozen or so studies, from peer-reviewed journals, are summarized in three articles in September's Journal of Sexual Medicine.
( Read More )
The Claim: If Attacked by a Bear, Play Dead
By ANAHAD O'CONNOR, The New York Times, October 4, 2005
THE FACTS As bear populations from New Jersey to Yellowstone rebound, so do reports of tense human encounters with them.
Common wisdom holds that the way to react, when all else fails, is simple: curl up in a ball and play dead.
But that is not always the best idea. Attacks can generally be divided into two groups: predatory and defensive. Each calls for a different strategy.
( Read More )
One Legend Found, Many Still to Go
By WILLIAM J. BROAD, The New York Times, October 2, 2005
The human instinct to observe nature has always been mixed with a tendency to embroider upon it. So it is that, over the ages, societies have lived alongside not only real animals, but a shadow bestiary of fantastic ones - mermaids, griffins, unicorns and the like. None loomed larger than the giant squid, the kraken, a great, malevolent devil of the deep. "One of these Sea-Monsters," Olaus Magnus wrote in 1555, "will drown easily many great ships."
Science, of course, is in the business of shattering myths with facts, which it did again last week when Japanese scientists reported that they hooked a giant squid - a relatively small one estimated at 26 feet long - some 3,000 feet down and photographed it before it tore off a tentacle to escape. It was the first peek humanity has ever had of such animals in their native habitat. Almost inevitably, the creature seemed far less terrifying than its ancient image.
Scientists celebrated the find not as an end, but as the beginning of a new chapter in understanding the shy creature. "There're always more questions, more parts to the mystery than we'll ever be able to solve," said Clyde F. E. Roper, a squid expert at the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution.
Monster lovers take heart. Scientists argue that so much of the planet remains unexplored that new surprises are sure to show up; if not legendary beasts like the Loch Ness monster or the dinosaur-like reptile said to inhabit Lake Champlain, then animals that in their own way may be even stranger.
A forthcoming book by the noted naturalist Richard Ellis, "Singing Whales, Flying Squid and Swimming Cucumbers" (Lyon Press, 2006), reinforces that notion by cataloguing recent discoveries of previously unknown whales, dolphins and other creatures, some of which are quite bizarre.
( Read More )
