ScienceDaily: Strange Science News

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• The hoo's hoo of gibbon communication
• Archaeologists Uncover Ancient ‘Spooning’ Couple in Greece
• New mechanisms of 'social networking' in bacteria discovered
• Anesthetic gases raise Earth's temperature (a little) while you sleep
• Carbon nanotube computing?
• Launch a drone with a toss: New technology making drones safer and smarter
• Bumblebees differentiate flower types when arranged horizontally but not vertically
• Gotcha! Ultra-realistic robot proves there's more than one way to scare a fish
• Brontosaurus is back! Brontosaurus is a unique genus after all
• Mysterious desert fairy circles share pattern with skin cells
• Near-death brain signaling accelerates demise of the heart
• Rice can borrow stronger immunity from other plant species, study shows

The hoo's hoo of gibbon communication Posted: 07 Apr 2015 06:08 PM PDT The secret communication of gibbons has been interpreted for the first time, researchers report. The research reveals the likely meaning of a number of distinct gibbon whispers, or 'hoo' calls, responding to particular events and types of predator, and could provide clues on the evolution of human speech.

Archaeologists Uncover Ancient ‘Spooning’ Couple in Greece Posted: 07 Apr 2015 02:15 PM PDT Almost 6,000 years ago, the man was placed behind the woman with his arms around her body, and their legs were intertwined. They were buried. Why they were interred in this manner is not yet determined, but the international team that discovered them in Greece is still searching for answers.

New mechanisms of 'social networking' in bacteria discovered Posted: 07 Apr 2015 09:42 AM PDT Bacteria have traditionally been viewed as solitary organisms that 'hang out on their own,' says a molecular biologist. However, scientists now realize that in fact, bacteria exhibit social behavior within groups. In a new paper, researchers describe how they deciphered this bacterial communication to reveal new mechanisms of regulating gene expression in the model bacterium Bacillus subtilis.

Anesthetic gases raise Earth's temperature (a little) while you sleep Posted: 07 Apr 2015 09:42 AM PDT The gases used to knock out surgery patients are accumulating in the Earth's atmosphere, where they make a small contribution to climate change, report scientists who have detected the compounds as far afield as Antarctica. Like the well-known climate warmer carbon dioxide, anesthesia gases allow the atmosphere to store more energy from the Sun. But unlike carbon dioxide, the medical gases are extra potent in their greenhouse-gas effects, scientists say.

Carbon nanotube computing? Posted: 07 Apr 2015 09:31 AM PDT Scientists are using single-walled carbon nanotube composites (SWCNTs) as a material in "unconventional" computing. By studying the mechanical and electrical properties of the materials, they discovered a correlation between SWCNT concentration/viscosity/conductivity and the computational capability of the composite.

Launch a drone with a toss: New technology making drones safer and smarter Posted: 07 Apr 2015 07:20 AM PDT Researchers have unveiled new technology enabling drones to recover stable flight from any position and land autonomously in failure situations. It will even be possible to launch drones by simply tossing them into the air like a baseball or recover stable flight after a system failure. Drones will be safer and smarter, with the ability to identify safe landing sites and land automatically when necessary.

Bumblebees differentiate flower types when arranged horizontally but not vertically Posted: 07 Apr 2015 07:20 AM PDT It is well known that bumblebees and other pollinators can tell the difference between plants that will provide them with nectar and pollen and those that won't. However, until now little has been known about how the arrangement of flowers affects their decision making.

Gotcha! Ultra-realistic robot proves there's more than one way to scare a fish Posted: 07 Apr 2015 05:53 AM PDT In a side-by-side comparison, a robotic predator can frighten zebrafish just as well as the real thing, a new experiment demonstrates. These results may help advance understanding of fear and anxiety in animal populations, including humans. Zebrafish are increasingly taking the place of more complex animals in behavioral studies. Experiments have shown the advantages of using robots in studies of fish behavior, including repeatability and consistency.

Brontosaurus is back! Brontosaurus is a unique genus after all Posted: 07 Apr 2015 05:52 AM PDT Although well known as one of the most iconic dinosaurs, Brontosaurus (the 'thunder lizard') has long been considered misclassified. Since 1903, the scientific community has believed that the genus Brontosaurus was in fact the Apatosaurus. Now, an exhaustive new study by palaeontologists from Portugal and the UK provides conclusive evidence that Brontosaurus is distinct from Apatosaurus and as such can now be reinstated as its own unique genus.

Mysterious desert fairy circles share pattern with skin cells Posted: 07 Apr 2015 05:48 AM PDT Patterns appearing on both the very large and very small scale are extremely rare, but researchers have found a similar pattern in two apparently unrelated systems -- skin cells and fairy circles in the Namibian desert.

Near-death brain signaling accelerates demise of the heart Posted: 06 Apr 2015 12:28 PM PDT What happens in the moments just before death is widely believed to be a slowdown of the body's systems as the heart stops beating and blood flow ends. But there's a brainstorm happening, strongly synchronized with heart rhythm. Blocking this brain outflow may change the odds of survival for those who suffer cardiac arrest.

Rice can borrow stronger immunity from other plant species, study shows Posted: 03 Apr 2015 10:08 AM PDT Rice, one of the world's main staple foods, can boost its built-in immunity against invading disease-causing microbes when immune receptor genes are transferred via genetic engineering from a totally different plant group, a new study shows.

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