Four years ago, Packard and his coworkers built and successfully tested a gyroscope based on quantum whistling in superfluid helium-3. But that required cooling the device to a few thousandths of a degree above absolute zero, a highly specialized and time-consuming process. Because the new phenomenon exists at 2 Kelvin – a temperature achievable with [...]

While earlier studies had focused solely on the X chromosome, one of the two sex chromosomes, the present study examined all 22 pairs of non-sex chromosomes in addition to the X chromosome. The other sex chromosome, called Y, was not explored because it is not believed to contain many genes.

Identical stretches of DNA on three [...]

We like to laugh at people who are obsessed with celebrities, but the tendency may have
a distinguished evolutionary heritage.

A large, muscular man in boxer briefs was shoving a banana down his pants. This wasn’t the sort of show that the audience was used to. The crowd watching the stage in the small private college auditorium was made up of mainly renowned scientists with a few graduate students and news reporters mixed in. The [...]