Time to revise the high school biology textbooks: contrary to their typical portrayal as being precisely X-shaped, chromosomes are in fact much more complex — and much messier looking. That’s the finding of a new project that relied on DNA sequencing to produce accurate 3D images of chromosomes.
via The Verge</ … Read More → "X doesn’t mark the spot: real shape of chromosomes revealed"
In a piece on octopus farming, Katherine Harmon mentions a fascinating fact — octopuses don’t have an adaptive immune system, the handy-dandy network of different immune-response cells that allow us vertebrates to more easily fight off infections our bodies have encountered before.
That’s a problem if you’re trying to raise a bunch of invertebrates in close quarters (as per a farm) … Read More → "You can’t vaccinate an octopus"
Some three years ago, Nest changed the way we think about thermostats with a feature rich sculpture of an object that works as a smart thermostat. Now, the company is going to conquer the world of smoke detectors, according to a scoop from formerWall Street Journal reporter Jessica Lessin.
via Read More → "Nest’s next big product will reportedly be a smoke detector"
Some comment sections are enlightening, some are depressing, and many — according to Popular Science — are actively hurting the scientific community. In a post today, the online wing of the magazine explained its decision to close … Read More → "Popular Science says comments are ‘bad for science,’ shuts them down"
Hormel probably wishes “spam” hadn’t become entrenched with such a negative meaning—the company lost a 2007 trademark lawsuit against a software company called Spam Arrest. In spite of the association with cash-strapped Nigerian princes and erectile dysfunction drugs, however, the canned meat titan isn’t hurting. Revenues shot up by 24 percent in the first quarter of 2013, and the company recently launched its first digital ad campaign, meaning we could be on the brink of getting spam for SPAM.
via Mental Floss</ … Read More → "Did calling junk email “spam” hurt SPAM sales?"
Supreme Court opinions have come down with a bad case of link rot. According to a new study, 49 percent of the hyperlinks in Supreme Court decisions no longer work.
This can sometimes be amusing. A link in a 2011 Supreme Court opinion about violent video games by Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. now leads to a mischievous error … Read More → "Supreme Court opinions have come down with a bad case of link rot"
Manhattan has many great qualities, but trash isn’t one of them. Since the island has no space for alleys, trash is piled onto the streets for early-morning pickups by loud garbage trucks making their rounds. But there might be a better way: what if trash was moved around the city using pneumatic tubes? It might sound like a crazy idea, … Read More → "Proposal maps out pneumatic tube system to take out New York’s trash"
