ScienceDaily: Strange Science News

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• Missing hormone in birds: New discovery made
• Keep calm and don your video glasses: Television shows keep patients calm during medical treatment
• Guarding grapes and other tales from papyri
• 'RoboClam' replicates a clam's ability to burrow while using little energy
• Unconscious mind can detect a liar -- even when the conscious mind fails
• Mice give ticks a free lunch
• New bodily illusion: Would you believe your hand could turn into marble?
• Biased sex ratios predict more promiscuity, polygamy and 'divorce' in birds
• Shrink wrap used to enhance detection of infectious disease biomarkers
• All the better to see you with, my dear! New fish discovered with upward looking eye

Missing hormone in birds: New discovery made Posted: 24 Mar 2014 03:42 PM PDT How does the Arctic tern (a sea bird) fly more than 80,000 miles in its roundtrip North Pole-to-South Pole migration? How does the Emperor penguin incubate eggs for months during the Antarctic winter without eating? These physiological gymnastics would usually be influenced by leptin, the hormone that regulates body fat storage, metabolism and appetite. However, leptin has gone missing in birds -- until now.

Keep calm and don your video glasses: Television shows keep patients calm during medical treatment Posted: 24 Mar 2014 10:32 AM PDT Music may soothe the soul, but it takes video to calm a patient undergoing medical treatment, notes a study in which individuals watched television shows or movies through special video glasses while having a biopsy or other minimally invasive treatment. "Patients told us the video glasses really helped calm them down and took their mind off the treatment, and we now offer video glasses to help distract patients from medical treatment going on mere inches away," said a researcher. "It is really comforting for patients, especially the ones who tend to be more nervous," he said.

Guarding grapes and other tales from papyri Posted: 24 Mar 2014 08:19 AM PDT A new article throws light on the perils of produce patrol and more stories from ancient times. The researcher details what he deciphered from a roughly 3-by-5 inch shred of dark brown papyrus dating back to the fourth century. In large, cursive script, the hired guard outlines his labor contract, as well as details from a vineyard guard who was beaten by "violent and rapacious" criminals while attempting to chase them from the vineyard.

'RoboClam' replicates a clam's ability to burrow while using little energy Posted: 24 Mar 2014 08:19 AM PDT The Atlantic razor clam uses very little energy to burrow into undersea soil at high speed. Now a detailed insight into how the animal digs has led to the development of a robotic clam that can perform the same trick.

Unconscious mind can detect a liar -- even when the conscious mind fails Posted: 24 Mar 2014 07:45 AM PDT When it comes to detecting deceit, your automatic associations may be more accurate than conscious thought in pegging truth-tellers and liars, according to research. The findings suggest that conscious awareness may hinder our ability to detect whether someone is lying, perhaps because we tend to seek out behaviors that are supposedly stereotypical of liars, like averted eyes or fidgeting. But those behaviors may not be all that indicative of an untrustworthy person.

Mice give ticks a free lunch Posted: 24 Mar 2014 07:45 AM PDT Mice are effective at transferring disease-causing pathogens to feeding ticks. And, according to a new paper, these 'super hosts' appear indifferent to larval tick infestations. Drawing on 16 years of field research performed at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New York, the paper found that white-footed mice with hundreds of larval ticks survived just as long as those with only a few ticks. Even more surprising, male mice with large tick loads were more likely to survive during a given season.

New bodily illusion: Would you believe your hand could turn into marble? Posted: 24 Mar 2014 07:44 AM PDT Our bodies are made of flesh and bones. We all know this, and throughout our daily lives, all our senses constantly provide converging information about this simple, factual truth. But is this always the case? A new study reports a surprising bodily illusion demonstrating how we can rapidly update our assumptions about the material qualities of our bodies based on recent multisensory perceptual experience.

Biased sex ratios predict more promiscuity, polygamy and 'divorce' in birds Posted: 24 Mar 2014 06:03 AM PDT More birds break pair bonds or 'divorce' in populations where there are more females, according to new research. Researchers also found that short-term infidelity increases in male-dominated environments. The research has some striking parallels in human societies.

Shrink wrap used to enhance detection of infectious disease biomarkers Posted: 20 Mar 2014 07:15 AM PDT A new nanotechnology method -- employing common, everyday shrink wrap -- may make highly sensitive, extremely low-cost diagnosis of infectious disease agents possible. The new technique offers a way to significantly boost the signal of fluorescent markers used in biosensing, by depositing a combination of metals onto shrink wrap.

All the better to see you with, my dear! New fish discovered with upward looking eye Posted: 19 Mar 2014 06:40 AM PDT A fish with a previously unknown type of eye has been discovered by scientists. The aptly-named glasshead barreleye lives at depths of 800 to 1000 meters. It has a cylindrical eye pointing upwards to see prey, predators or potential mates silhouetted against the gloomy light above. But the eye also has a mirror-like second retina which can detect bioluminescent flashes created by deep-sea denizens to the sides and below, report researchers.

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