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From Nature magazine. Hair-like filaments called pili enable some bacteria to remove uranium from contaminated groundwater

From Nature magazine. Our ancestors bred with other species in the Homo genus, according to a study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

(PhysOrg.com) -- Sometimes the simplest of things become complicated and complex when looked at more closely.

Chikungunya is a scary-sounding virus with some scary symptoms: joint pain so excruciating that patients often can’t stand or even sit upright for months. The mosquito-borne virus got its start thousands of years ago in southeastern Africa, where it generally caused a slow but steady stream of cases. About 50 years ago a mild strain of the virus spread to Asia.

Self-control--the ability to regulate our attention, emotions and behaviors--emerges in childhood and grows throughout life, but the skill varies widely among individuals. Past studies have reported that self-control is partially inherited and partially learned and that those with less self-control are more likely to be unemployed, en

Despite common parlance, oil is not a singular substance but rather a toxic stew of many different hydrocarbons that comes out of the ground mixed with natural gas. The oil that spewed from BP's Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico last year was no different--and now a precise measurement of its chemical composition has been published July 18 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences .

The trial of the 25-year-old just cleared of murder charges was this generation's OJ drama. Only this time, the regular market of questionably tasteless T-shirts and tchotchkes was flooded with apps, tweets, streams, and SMS alert services

Mark Twain called the cherimoya and its cousin the sugar apple “the most delicious fruit known to men.” Though little more than exotic edibles to most Americans, such fruits of the Annona family have been cultivated by people in Central and South America for generations. Even in pre-Columbian times, Annona fruits were enjoyed for their sherbetlike texture and a flavor that resembles a mixture of banana and pineapple

Jellyfish blooms might be more than just a nuisance to beach-goers. These explosions of stinging swarms might also be doing some major disruption to marine food webs , according to a study published online June 6 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Money can’t buy you love.

If you want to guess how many jelly beans are in a jar, you should ask your friends.

Ethonomic Indicator of the Day: 26% -- the amount of global CO2 emissions that come from the production of traded goods and services.

Mosquitoes maintain a body temperature of about 70 degrees Fahrenheit. But when a mosquito sucks some toasty warm blood, its body temperature can rocket up.

People may advise you to listen to your gut instincts: now research suggests that your gut may have more impact on your thoughts than you ever realized. Scientists from the Karolinska Institute in Sweden and the Genome Institute of Singapore led by Sven Pettersson recently reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that normal gut flora, the bacteria that inhabit our intestines, have a significant impact on brain development and subsequent adult behavior. We human beings may think of ourselves as a highly evolved species of conscious individuals, but we are all far less human than most of us appreciate.

Sometimes people complain when trying to learn a new skill: “I’m not that young anymore. It’s harder to learn anything new.” But adult brains may be more pliable than we thought.