When Shirley Ann Jackson was in elementary school in the 1950s, she would prowl her family’s backyard, collecting bumblebees, yellow jackets and wasps. She would bottle them in mayonnaise jars and test which flowers they liked best and which species were the most aggressive
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When Shirley Ann Jackson was in elementary school in the 1950s, she would prowl her family’s backyard, collecting bumblebees, yellow jackets and wasps. She would bottle them in mayonnaise jars and test which flowers they liked best and which species were the most aggressive.
Read More »The First African-American Woman to Receive a Doctorate from M.I.T. Champions the Dividends of Education
The president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., came to that job in 1999 with a stellar resume. Besides being the first African-American woman to earn a doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Shirley Ann Jackson headed the U.S
Read More »The First African-American Woman to Receive a Doctorate from M.I.T. Champions the Dividends of Education
The president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., came to that job in 1999 with a stellar resume. Besides being the first African-American woman to earn a doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Shirley Ann Jackson headed the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission during the Clinton administration and was a physicist at Bell Laboratories and other notable research institutions
Read More »Feds Seek Cell Ban Behind the Wheel
The National Transportation Safety Board has called for a nationwide ban on the use of all portable electronic devices by drivers, except in an emergency. That means no more phone calls or texting from behind the wheel. It would also ban drivers from using iPods or GPS units not integrated into a car's controls
Read More »How the U.S. Federal Government Pushes Energy Efficiency–On Itself
Standing on the north roof of the James Forrestal building in Washington, D.C., Brian Costlow gestures to the black solar photovoltaic array lying flat against the cement tiles. The system generates 235 megawatt-hours of electricity annually in an effort to boost the energy efficiency of this office complex, the headquarters for the U.S. Department of Energy.
Read More »How the U.S. Federal Government Pushes Energy Efficiency–On Itself
Standing on the north roof of the James Forrestal building in Washington, D.C., Brian Costlow gestures to the black solar photovoltaic array lying flat against the cement tiles. The system generates 235 megawatt-hours of electricity annually in an effort to boost the energy efficiency of this office complex, the headquarters for the U.S
Read More »Mosquitos Use Drop of Blood to Keep Cool
Being a mosquito can really suck. Not only do you have to gulp down your food because your dinner can turn around and swat you if you’re not fast enough, but a bellyful of hot blood can really do a number on your little body, which prefers to keep things cool. [More]
Read More »Mosquitos Use Drop of Blood to Keep Cool
Being a mosquito can really suck. Not only do you have to gulp down your food because your dinner can turn around and swat you if you’re not fast enough, but a bellyful of hot blood can really do a number on your little body, which prefers to keep things cool. [More]
Read More »China Scales Up Solar Power by 50 Percent
BEIJING (Reuters) - China has further revised up its solar power development target for 2015 by 50 percent from its previous plan, state media reported on Thursday. [More]
Read More »How Bacteria Break a Magnet
By Ewen Callaway of Nature magazine Bacteria that contain an internal compass face an unusual challenge when they come to divide: snapping their internal magnets in two.
Read More »Ultrafast Camera Records at Speed of Light
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) have developed an imaging system that can acquire visual data at a rate of one trillion exposures per second–fast enough to produce a slow-motion video of a burst of light traveling the length of a one-liter bottle, bouncing off the cap and reflecting back to the bottle’s bottom. As Ramesh Raskar, an associate professor in M.I.T.’s Media Lab, explains in the video below, a high-speed camera can capture the image of a bullet mid-flight. The M.I.T
Read More »Body Hair Senses Parasites While Slowing Their Blood Quest
We "naked apes" aren't as hirsute as our primate cousins. We still have an ape-like density of hair follicles--but we sprout out peach fuzz, instead of a thick coat. Those downy hairs may be more than an evolutionary leftover, though
Read More »U.S. Stillbirths Still Prevalent, Often Unexplained
Infant mortality has continued to drop in the U.S. during the past several decades. But stillbirths--when a fetus dies after 20 or more weeks of gestation--have remained relatively steady--and account for almost as many deaths as those of babies who die before their first birthday .
Read More »Scrubbing Carbon Dioxide from Air May Prove Too Costly
One of the seemingly ideal and direct solutions to climate change is to efficiently vacuum up greenhouse gases straight from the atmosphere. But a new study finds that such a proposal is very far-fetched and tremendously expensive.
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