Philippe Matthews Show Guru Advice, Author Reviews, Tech Reviews, Entertainment News

Stretches of DNA that move around the brain, colloquially known as jumping genes, may play a role in fostering one pernicious form of autism. It has long been known that a a mutation that switches off a gene called MECP2 is involved in Rett syndrome, the most physically disabling form of autism. Rett, which mostly affects girls, results in speech and motor defects that appear just after children learn to speak their first words and start walking.

A simple math problem lies at the heart of a heated debate over whether scientists should be allowed to publish provocative research into the transmissibility of H5N1 flu . Assuming the avian virus could spread easily among people, just how deadly would an H5N1 pandemic be for humans?

When a couple plays online games together, they say they are happier in their marriage than couples in which only one spouse games (Credit: Elvis untot, Wikimedia Commons) If someone asked you to sketch a portrait of a gamer who spends countless hours each week inhabiting an avatar say, an elf or a warlock in a virtual fantasy world, what kind of person would you draw? A teenage boy whose pimply forehead hovers mere centimeters from the computer screen? [More]

Crickets make a big contribution to the sounds of a summer night. And they’ve been doing so for some 165 million years

PET image of an Alzheimer's brain [More]

The vocal folds (seen from above) sit within the larynx, between the throat and the trachea. When hemorrhaging occurs on either flap, the normally flexible folds swell and impair proper functioning

Sex, speed dating, monogamy--for Valentine's Day, we look at the science behind the mating game [More]

Artist's conception of ExoMars mission, from which NASA has withdrawn.

As a psychologist, I have always found the concept of speed dating fascinating.

Love might be in the air on Valentine's Day, metaphorically speaking.

The cloud forests of the Andes mountains, bound between the Amazonian lowlands to the west and the peaks of the Andean uplift to the east, harbor worlds upon worlds. Within the mountains' mosaic of high plateaus, deep-cut valleys and steeply climbing slopes, unique ecosystems have flourished side by side for centuries, their equilibrium protected by the rugged terrain and 12,000 years of relatively stable climate. Home to nearly one-sixth of the world's plant species, as well as hundreds of kinds of mammals, birds and amphibians, the Andean cloud forests are one of the most biologically diverse regions on Earth

By Nina Chestney LONDON (Reuters) - Global warming will get worse as agricultural methods accelerate the rate of soil erosion, which depletes the amount of carbon the soil is able to store, a United Nations' Environment Programme report said on Monday. [More]

EL HIGUERON, Peru – Carlos Cruz Chanta lives just off a rutted dirt road, almost lost in the mist, outside this village on a steep ridge of jungle-covered mountains. Like his neighbors, he makes his living raising livestock and growing corn, fruit, beans, and coffee.

Chimpanzees have a bad reputation. Maybe it’s because humans have a thing about wanting to feel unique among primates. Some have argued that humans are the only species that truly behaves altruistically, the only species that actively helps out other individuals even when there is no direct benefit

A preventive treatment for Alzheimer’s disease is one of medicine’s holy grails. [More]