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Q & A: More Than Skin Deep
By C. CLAIBORNE RAY, The New York Times, March 31, 2009
Q. My mother used to tell me that the white stuff sticking to orange segments was good for me. Is it?
A. The underside of the peel, called the albedo, contains carbohydrates and vitamin C but is especially rich in a soluble fiber called pectin, said Dr. Renee M. Goodrich, associate professor of food science and human nutrition at the University of Florida. “We are beginning to see links between consumption of such fiber and cholesterol lowering,” she said.
( Read More )
Observatory: Near-Complete Fossil Offers Insight on Early Fish
By HENRY FOUNTAIN, The New York Times, March 31, 2009
In trying to make evolutionary sense of the bony fish (and, by extension, land vertebrates) scientists have been hampered by a lack of completeness. Most of the earliest fossils of bony fish, dating to the Silurian period more than 416 million years ago, are fragmentary — a jawbone here, a tooth there.
A new find from limestone deposits in southern China is helping to clarify the situation. In a paper in Nature, Min Zhu and colleagues at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences describe a well-preserved and practically complete fish fossil that is 418 million years old.
( Read More )
Concrete Is Remixed With Environment in Mind
By HENRY FOUNTAIN, The New York Times, March 31, 2009
Soaring above the Mississippi River just east of downtown Minneapolis is one remarkable concrete job.
There on Interstate 35W, the St. Anthony Falls Bridge carries 10 lanes of traffic on box girders borne by massive arching piers, which are supported, in turn, by footings and deep pilings.
The bridge, built to replace one that collapsed in 2007, killing 13 people, is constructed almost entirely of concrete embedded with steel reinforcing bars, or rebar. But it is hardly a monolithic structure: the components are made from different concrete mixes, the recipes tweaked, as a chef would, for specific strength and durability requirements and to reduce the impact on the environment. One mix, incorporated in wavy sculptures at both ends of the bridge, is designed to stay gleaming white by scrubbing stain-causing pollutants from the air.
( Read More )
Visual Science: Fine-Grained Genetic Data
By NICHOLAS WADE, The New York Times, March 31, 2009
The English and Irish are raised in the knowledge that they are very different from one another, so are bemused to find that in the United States often no such difference is recognized. Which perspective is correct?
A team of Australian geneticists interested in assessing the sources of emigration to Australia has now provided a judicious answer. From the genetic perspective, as is shown in the graphic above, the two populations are very similar, yet with the help of powerful gene chips they can be distinguished from one another, as well as from other northern European populations such as the Dutch, Danes, Swedes and Finns.
( Read More )
By C. CLAIBORNE RAY, The New York Times, March 31, 2009
Q. My mother used to tell me that the white stuff sticking to orange segments was good for me. Is it?
A. The underside of the peel, called the albedo, contains carbohydrates and vitamin C but is especially rich in a soluble fiber called pectin, said Dr. Renee M. Goodrich, associate professor of food science and human nutrition at the University of Florida. “We are beginning to see links between consumption of such fiber and cholesterol lowering,” she said.
( Read More )
Observatory: Near-Complete Fossil Offers Insight on Early Fish
By HENRY FOUNTAIN, The New York Times, March 31, 2009
In trying to make evolutionary sense of the bony fish (and, by extension, land vertebrates) scientists have been hampered by a lack of completeness. Most of the earliest fossils of bony fish, dating to the Silurian period more than 416 million years ago, are fragmentary — a jawbone here, a tooth there.
A new find from limestone deposits in southern China is helping to clarify the situation. In a paper in Nature, Min Zhu and colleagues at the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences describe a well-preserved and practically complete fish fossil that is 418 million years old.
( Read More )
Concrete Is Remixed With Environment in Mind
By HENRY FOUNTAIN, The New York Times, March 31, 2009
Soaring above the Mississippi River just east of downtown Minneapolis is one remarkable concrete job.
There on Interstate 35W, the St. Anthony Falls Bridge carries 10 lanes of traffic on box girders borne by massive arching piers, which are supported, in turn, by footings and deep pilings.
The bridge, built to replace one that collapsed in 2007, killing 13 people, is constructed almost entirely of concrete embedded with steel reinforcing bars, or rebar. But it is hardly a monolithic structure: the components are made from different concrete mixes, the recipes tweaked, as a chef would, for specific strength and durability requirements and to reduce the impact on the environment. One mix, incorporated in wavy sculptures at both ends of the bridge, is designed to stay gleaming white by scrubbing stain-causing pollutants from the air.
( Read More )
Visual Science: Fine-Grained Genetic Data
By NICHOLAS WADE, The New York Times, March 31, 2009
The English and Irish are raised in the knowledge that they are very different from one another, so are bemused to find that in the United States often no such difference is recognized. Which perspective is correct?
A team of Australian geneticists interested in assessing the sources of emigration to Australia has now provided a judicious answer. From the genetic perspective, as is shown in the graphic above, the two populations are very similar, yet with the help of powerful gene chips they can be distinguished from one another, as well as from other northern European populations such as the Dutch, Danes, Swedes and Finns.
( Read More )
