pValentine#39;s Day can lead to plenty of broken hearts. But for cardiac wounds that time alone won#39;t heal, science has made some major advances. When it comes to heart attack, for example, a big development is emerging from a tiny source. Stem cells are coming of age.nbsp;/p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=stem-cells-help-heal-broken-hearts-12-02-14[More]/a
pHow healthy are you? Your best guess might be pretty accurate: researchers found that people who gave their health a positive rating were less likely to fall ill or die over the next 30 years than were those who thought they werenrsquo;t as healthy. The work is in the journal Public Library of Science ONE . [Matthias Bopp et al, Health Risk or Resource? Gradual and Independent Association between Self-Rated Health and Mortality Persists Over 30 Years ]/p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=self-rated-health-predicts-mortalit-12-02-14[More]/a
pLet#39;s face it, most animals get around. Only about 5 percent of mammals are considered to be monogamous . What a biologist means by monogamy is not necessarily what a marriage counselor might assume. In the animal kingdom, what we think of as commitment-type monogamy should really be separated out into at least three types of bonds, explained Diane Witt, who leads the Neural Systems Cluster at the National Science Foundation, in a live chat last week. There is sexual fidelity, social attachment and parental behavior. Research in a number of animal species suggests that differences in neurochemicals and receptors might influence various degrees of these sorts of pairing./p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=love-for-life-animals-mostly-monogamous[More]/a
pBy Deborah Zabarenko/ppWASHINGTON (Reuters) - The elusive, endangered snow leopard is apparently thriving in a park in Bhutan, as seen in camera trap images released on Tuesday by the government of Bhutan and World Wildlife Fund./ppOver 10,000 pictures of the snow leopards were captured last October and November by four cameras placed in Wangchuck Centennial Park as part of a survey conducted by Bhutan and WWF./ppUnaware of the camera, one animal walks up to the lens, while an adult female and a young snow leopard pace a few steps away. a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=elusive-snow-leopards-seen-thriving[More]/a
p Tuur van Balen gives a provocative how-to presentation at the Next Nature Power Show, showing how to use the Synthetic Biology Parts Registry to engineer yogurt bacteria to produce prozac:/pp /p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=how-to-genetically-modify-yogurt[More]/a
Organize and publish nature sightings for enjoyment, education and to aid conservation efforts a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/citizen-science/project.cfm?id=wildlife-sightings[More]/a
p The environment is already affecting patterns of human migration. On the island of Hatia , along coastal Bangladesh, 22 percent of households have migrated to cities as a coping strategy following tidal surges. But we would be wrong to assume that our only concern should be for the millions of people who might try to leave areas of environmental stress that are affected by hazards such as droughts, floods, water scarcity and land degradation. In fact, a recent UK report has shown that a focus on populations migrating away from environmental change neglects two key groups of vulnerable people: the many millions who will actually migrate into areas of environmental threat, and those who will be trapped there by economic, social or indeed environmental challenges./ppThe report, Foresight: Migration and Global Environmental Change , released by the U.K. Government Office for Science, has found that the decision to migrate is a complex and multi-faceted one. This two year study, which I oversaw, involved 350 leading experts from more than 30 countries. It found that migration patterns are influenced by a wide range of inter-related drivers, including social ties, political situations and the desire of individuals to earn a wage. Global-scale changes to our environments will increasingly affect these factors, for instance through further eroding rural livelihoods and eliminating income streams. Yet, paradoxically, a deteriorating environment is also likely to make migration more difficult for many of the world s most vulnerable, because it eats away the assets that local inhabitants need to make this move. This is what makes identifying environmental migrants so problematic just because a person s environment is deteriorating doesn t mean he or she will move./p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=people-displaced-by-climate-change-need-our-help-but-so-do-those-who-cannot-leave[More]/a
pYour brain is special./p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=what-makes-each-brain-unique[More]/a
pYour brain is special./p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=what-makes-each-brain-unique[More]/a
pStretches 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./p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=jumping-genes-brain-tied-autisim[More]/a
pStretches 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./p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=jumping-genes-brain-tied-autisim[More]/a
pIs there anything more everyday and familiar (given that we all possess one) and yet still so mysterious and puzzling as our own human brain? In about three pounds of tissue with the consistency of Jell-O, it packs 100 billion neurons, tens of trillions of neural connections and the low-watt processing power that has enabled our species to dominate this planet./p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=the-moving-mind[More]/a
pA 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?/p a href=http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=h5n1-bird-flu-case-fatality-calculations[More]/a
This Valentines Day, Scientific American traces the flow of chemicals in the brain during different phases of romance and describes surprising insights from the science of attraction.
