Naked mole-rats cancer resistance revealed, spiders who die for sex and toddler's grammar skills are just a few of the cool stories we found this week.
10. 3D map reveals brain in deep detail
The post-mortem brain of a 65-year-old woman has been transformed into a new 3D map revealing the intricate architecture of the human noggin on a scale finer than a human hair.
The map, known as "BigBrain," is freely available online, and has a resolution of 20 microns in each dimension, researchers report in a new study.
9. Brain scans can read emotions
In the latest leap of mind-reading, scientists say they were able to decipher a person's emotions through brain scans.
Patterns of neural activity can give away what people are thinking and feeling, that is, if scientists can make meaning out of brain scans obtained through functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). In past studies, researchers have shown they can determine what number a person is thinking of, predict where people are standing in a virtual reality environment, and even figure out what a person is dreaming about, all by looking at brain scans.
8. Six degrees of Francis Bacon
Credit: SixDegreesofFrancisBacon.com
Online social networks and data mining make it possible for researchers today to trace the spread and influence of ideas across webs of connected individuals in real time. But piecing together those links is trickier for scholars studying thinkers and leaders of the 16th and 17th centuries who used letters instead of Facebook.
A new project called Six Degrees of Francis Bacon aims to gather known connections of the Early Modern era in a vast visual network to track the spread of tropes, images and ideas, ranging from religious toleration to the circulation of blood.
7. Illegal drone business thrives
Popularized by their military applications, drones are now taking flight over U.S. skylines with at least hundreds of small, unmanned aircraft hard at work buzzing over football stadiums, Hollywood sets and farms. Despite regulations banning commercial drone use in the United States, a thriving black market is on the rise, sending the Federal Aviation Administration into a tailspin.
As the domestic debate over drones and associated privacy and safety issues heats up in Washington, D.C., companies aren't waiting for formal rules that would permit their commercial use. President Obama has mandated that Congress come up with rules that would permit commercial drone use, but they are not due until 2015.
6. Rats' anti-cancer secret revealed
Apart from their hairless appearance, naked mole rats are known for several distinguishing characteristics: They have an unusually long life span for a rodent, and they seem to be protected from developing cancer. Now, researchers have pinpointed a natural substance found between the rodents' tissues that may explain their cancer resistance.
Understanding how this substance, known as hyaluronan, protects naked mole rats from developing cancerous tumours could lead to novel cancer-prevention techniques for humans, said study lead author Vera Gorbunova, a professor in the department of biology at the University of Rochester in New York.
5. Legend of lost city spurs debate
Deep in the dense rain forests of Honduras, a glittering white city sits in ruins, waiting for discovery. The inhabitants there once ate off plates of gold; the metropolis was, perhaps, the birthplace of a god. A recent high-tech survey of the region by air reveals possible pyramids and other structures. Has the lost city of Ciudad Blanca been found? Or did it ever exist at all?
Probably not, according to archaeologists and anthropologists, who generally agree there was once something in the eastern Honduras rain forest - though likely not a city of mythical wealth and luxury. In fact, the legend of this ancient city may be a relatively new one, said John Hoopes, an archaeologist and specialist in southern Central American cultures at the University of Kansas.
4. Male spiders die for sex
An eight-legged love tragedy may go something like this: The male spider approaches the female, who is four times his size. She scuttles away, but he creeps closer and closer. Finally, he takes hold of her with his spindly legs, climbs aboard and inserts his "penis" into her genital opening and discharges a jet of sperm. Then - quite abruptly - his legs curl underneath his body, he hangs motionless from his lover, and his heart stops beating.
The male dark fishing spider (Dolomedes tenebrosus) mates with just one female, and the act results in spontaneous death and genital disfiguration for the male, new research finds. The bride then makes a meal of her mate.
3. Poop parasites revealed on ancient toilet
Intestinal parasites have been found lurking in ancient poop in the toilet of a medieval castle in western Cyprus, scientists report.
The findings paint a less than pretty picture of the health and hygiene of crusaders stationed on the Mediterranean island 800 years ago. Poor sanitation likely meant that food and water supplies were contaminated by faecal material, allowing parasitic infections to spread, the study suggests.
2. Grammar hidden in toddler babble
The little sounds and puffs of air that toddlers often inject into their baby babble may actually be subtle stand-ins for grammatical words, new research suggests.
For their study, Cristina Dye, a Newcastle University researcher in child language development, made recordings of tens of thousands of utterances of French-speaking children between 23 months and 37 months old.
1. Mind uploading by 2045?
By 2045, humans will achieve digital immortality by uploading their minds to computers - or at least that's what some futurists believe. This notion formed the basis for the Global Future 2045 International Congress, a futuristic conference held here June 15-16.
The conference, which is the brainchild of Russian multimillionaire Dmitry Itskov, fell somewhere between hard-core science and science fiction. It featured a diverse cast of speakers, from scientific luminaries like Ray Kurzweil, Peter Diamandis and Marvin Minsky, to Swamis and other spiritual leaders.
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