ScienceDaily: Strange Science News

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• Researchers design trees that make it easier to produce paper
• Moonwalker flies backing up
• Monster 'El Gordo' galaxy cluster is bigger than thought
• Energy breakthrough uses sun to create solar energy materials
• Cave-dwelling fish examination finds possible genetic link to human disorders
• 'Unbreakable' security codes inspired by nature
• Tiny power generator runs on spit
• 'Homo' is the only primate whose tooth size decreases as its brain size increases
• Ocean-going freighter without crew
• Eyes in the cereal aisle: How Cap'n Crunch's gaze is influencing your purchasing
• Well-rested flies: Therapeutic agent reduces age-related sleep problems in fruit flies
• Ancient stormy weather: World's oldest weather report could revise bronze age chronology
• Could depression be treated with Botox?
• Vibration may help heal chronic wounds
• Using your loaf to fight brain disease: Baker's yeast to combat neurological conditions like Parkinson's and even cancer?

Researchers design trees that make it easier to produce paper Posted: 03 Apr 2014 11:20 AM PDT Researchers have genetically engineered trees that will be easier to break down to produce paper and biofuel, a breakthrough that will mean using fewer chemicals, less energy and creating fewer environmental pollutants.

Moonwalker flies backing up Posted: 03 Apr 2014 11:18 AM PDT A team of researchers managed to isolate "moonwalker flies" in a high-throughput screen. Screening a large collection of fruit flies, the scientists found specimens that seemed locked in reverse gear. Researchers were able to trace these changes in walking direction back to the activity of specific neurons in the brain.

Monster 'El Gordo' galaxy cluster is bigger than thought Posted: 03 Apr 2014 11:18 AM PDT Astronomers have weighed the largest known galaxy cluster in the distant universe and found that it definitely lives up to its nickname: El Gordo (Spanish for "the fat one"). By precisely measuring how much the gravity from the cluster's mass warps images of far-more-distant background galaxies, a team of astronomers has calculated the cluster's mass to be as much as 3 million billion times the mass of our Sun. The Hubble data show that the cluster is roughly 43 percent more massive than earlier estimates based on X-ray and dynamical studies of the unusual cluster.

Energy breakthrough uses sun to create solar energy materials Posted: 03 Apr 2014 10:23 AM PDT Researchers have discovered a way to tap the sun not only as a source of power, but also to directly produce the solar energy materials that make this possible. This breakthrough could make the sun almost a 'one-stop shop' that produces both the materials for solar devices and the eternal energy to power them.

Cave-dwelling fish examination finds possible genetic link to human disorders Posted: 03 Apr 2014 10:23 AM PDT Researchers have identified a genetic association with facial asymmetry in an ancient cavefish, a natural trait that may solve mysteries surrounding facial asymmetries in humans -- conditions such as cleft palate or hemifacial microsomia. "By understanding how genes are behaving differently on the right versus the left sides, we hope to discover why many craniofacial alterations are more severe or present on only one side of the face in humans," says Gross.

'Unbreakable' security codes inspired by nature Posted: 03 Apr 2014 10:21 AM PDT A revolutionary new method of encrypting confidential information has been patented by scientists inspired by their discoveries from human biology, which model how the heart and lungs coordinate their rhythms by passing information between each other.

Tiny power generator runs on spit Posted: 03 Apr 2014 07:58 AM PDT Saliva-powered micro-sized microbial fuel cells can produce minute amounts of energy sufficient to run on-chip applications, according to engineers. Biomedical devices using micro-sized microbial fuel cells would be portable and have their energy source available anywhere.

'Homo' is the only primate whose tooth size decreases as its brain size increases Posted: 03 Apr 2014 06:54 AM PDT Scientists have discovered a curious characteristic of the members of the human lineage, classed as the genus Homo: they are the only primates where, throughout their 2.5-million year history, the size of their teeth has decreased in tandem with the increase in their brain size.

Ocean-going freighter without crew Posted: 02 Apr 2014 06:56 AM PDT Ships of the future will soon be steered across 'the Seven Seas' – autonomously. A new simulator is helping propel these plans forward. The core of the autonomous freighter is served by a centralized software application. It analyzes the data from all sensors and determines, for example, if and how the ship changes its course in order to avoid collisions with, for example, a loose container floating around that may have fallen from another freighter.

Eyes in the cereal aisle: How Cap'n Crunch's gaze is influencing your purchasing Posted: 02 Apr 2014 06:51 AM PDT Consumers are 16 percent more likely to trust a brand of cereal when the characters on the boxes on the supermarket shelves look them straight in the eye. Not surprisingly, the study also found that the gaze of characters on children's cereal boxes is at a downward, 9.6-degree angle, while characters on adult cereal boxes look almost straight ahead.

Well-rested flies: Therapeutic agent reduces age-related sleep problems in fruit flies Posted: 01 Apr 2014 02:31 PM PDT Elderly flies do not sleep well -- they frequently wake up during the night and wander around restlessly. The same is true of humans. The sleeplessness experienced by the fruit fly Drosophila is therefore a model case for human sleeping behavior. Scientists have now discovered molecules in the flies' cells that affect how the animals sleep in old age: if insulin/IGF signalling is active, the quality of the animals' sleep is reduced and they wake up more often.

Ancient stormy weather: World's oldest weather report could revise bronze age chronology Posted: 01 Apr 2014 02:29 PM PDT An inscription on a 3,500-year-old stone block from Egypt may be one of the world's oldest weather reports -- and could provide new evidence about the chronology of events in the ancient Middle East. A new translation of a 40-line inscription on the 6-foot-tall calcite block called the Tempest Stela describes rain, darkness and "the sky being in storm without cessation, louder than the cries of the masses."

Could depression be treated with Botox? Posted: 01 Apr 2014 07:22 AM PDT Patients injected with onabotulinumtoxin A ("Botox") demonstrated substantial improvement in their depressive symptoms, results from a recent study show. The study showed that Botox may help relieve depressive symptoms both as a stand-alone and an adjunctive treatment.

Vibration may help heal chronic wounds Posted: 31 Mar 2014 12:36 PM PDT Wounds may heal more quickly if exposed to low-intensity vibration, report researchers. The finding, in mice, may hold promise for the 18 million Americans who have type 2 diabetes, and especially the quarter of them who will eventually suffer from foot ulcers. Their wounds tend to heal slowly and can become chronic or worsen rapidly.

Using your loaf to fight brain disease: Baker's yeast to combat neurological conditions like Parkinson's and even cancer? Posted: 31 Mar 2014 12:36 PM PDT Experts analyze baker's yeast to discover potential for combating neurological conditions like Parkinson's and even cancer. The current research takes advantage of the simplicity and genetic power of the baker's yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae to understand basic cellular processes underlying Parkinson's disease. The team studied a family of proteins in yeast which are related to a human protein known as DJ-1. Mutations in the human DJ-1 protein cause early-onset inherited forms of Parkinson's disease, and alterations in the human protein have been associated with more common forms of Parkinson's disease as well.

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