Category archives: Humanities & Social Sciences

Ancient tooth shows signs of early dentistry One of the first examples of dentistry has been found in an ancient molar. Researchers say the 14,000-year-old tooth had been infected and was partially cleaned using flint tools. It predates any undisputed evidence of dental and cranial surgery, currently represented by dental drillings and cranial trephinations dating […]

The European Association of Environmental and Resource Economics has awarded its 2015 Erik Kempe Award to Ralf Martin, Mirabelle Muûls, Laure B. de Preux, and Ulrich J. Wagner for their research “Industry Compensation Under Relocation Risk: A Firm-Level Analysis of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme,” published recently in the American Economic Review. I summarize their […]

Mice regain some hearing after gene therapy Researchers were able to partially repair hearing loss in mice using gene therapy, according to a study. The mice were either missing the gene TMC1, responsible for a protein required for proper inner ear hair cell functioning, or it had mutated, and scientists introduced a normal copy of […]

Signals from Milky Way’s center may be from pulsars, not dark matter The abundance of gamma rays seen at the at the center of the Milky Way in data from the Fermi satellite may just be remnants of dead stars and not evidence of dark matter. Two separate research teams say signals coming from the […]

Quantum mechanics represented a revolution in physics with implications in many other fields like chemistry and biology. It also conducted changes on some of the main scientific lines of thought, including a farewell to determinism. In the science before quantum mechanics probability was accepted only as a lack of knowledge from the system being studied […]

Rats’ desires to go certain places revealed in their dreams Rats dream about places they want to go, according to a study published in eLife. Researchers showed an inaccessible treat to rats, then coaxed them to sleep in a comfortable nest, monitoring their brain activity, and when they woke, they went directly to the place […]

Polar winds found on Saturn’s moon Titan Titan, one of Saturn’s moons, has polar winds that take gases from its atmosphere and throw them into space, very much like Earth’s polar winds, according to data collected by the Cassini space probe, which has been studying Saturn and its moons since 2004. Space.com Supermassive black hole’s […]

In Economics, there is a number of what may be called equivalence theorems. They indicate how two seemingly different economic mechanisms are equivalent in most or all of their consequences. Typically the equivalence may be established under certain conditions that are considered general enough for the theorem to be relevant. Perhaps the oldest and one […]

Saturn’s massive, invisible outermost ring Saturn’s invisible outermost ring is even larger than scientists thought and made mostly of tiny particles. NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer has helped researchers get a better look at the Phoebe ring’s enormity since it can only be seen as a faint halo at infrared wavelengths. Los Angeles Times Colossal […]

Scientists piece together what Milky Way might look like to outsiders Researchers have pieced together clues to conceptualize what our galaxy looks like from the outside. An artist’s concept shows the Milky Way’s four spiral arms. The Washington Post Friction all but disappears with new technique Scientists have created a technique that simulates friction down […]