Shaping Up
Researchers at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York have discovered that a gene known as OVATE is reponsible for the shape of many of the vegetables we eat. It seems that removal of OVATE results in elongation of the neck region in tomatoes. Hence, the pear-tomato is born. Further work may elucidate whether the shape of squash, eggplant, and pears are dicated by an absence of this gene. Read more at
Nature Science Update.
Fossil Find
A recent discovery in China has paleontologists shaking their heads. The 128-million year old skeletal remains of an
Incisivosaurus have been likened to a cross between a chicken and a rabbit. The body and head are reminiscent of the chicken. From a distance one might mistake it for a carniverous
Velociraptor. However, the mouth/beak is filled with the teeth of a vegetarian; complete with buck teeth like a rabbit. Since its discovery, a debate now rages over whether or not the
Incisivosaurus is an primitive member of the group of toothless bird-like dinosaurs known as Oviraptorosaurs. If the rabbit-like mouth of teeth is in fact an ancestral trait to the Oviraptorosaurs, then it is highly unlikely that Oviraptorosaurs could be closely related to modern day birds. It would be more likely that the Oviraptorosaurs derived from a line of meat-eating dinosaurs that later adapted to plant-eating. Read more at
Nature Science Update.
Out of Body?
That feeling of disconnectedness and floating above one's own body known as an "out of body" experience might have a simple neurological basis. Olaf Blanke of Geneva University Hospital in Switzerland and his colleagues been able to use awake human subjects undergoing brain surgery to study the phenomenon. They electrically stimulated an area of the brain that takes information from both the visual system and the system that creates the brain's representation of the body (how you know where your foot is without having to look at it) and puts it all together. This brain area is known as the right angular gyrus. Under increasing stimulation one subject reported feeling lighter, floating, and finally looking down upon her own body. This suggests that "out of body" experiences might be due in part to stimulation of the right angular gyrus. How that stimulation occurs in the first place, if that stimulation is the sole factor involved, and whether "out of body" experiences have alternative causes is still to be determined. Again, read more at
Nature Science Update.
current science news posted by Kirsten at 9/20/2002 01:44:00 PM
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