Congratulations, Class of 2015. Wishing each of you the best in your future endeavors! -The Institute for Society and Genetics
Scientists at UC San Diego have discovered that planarians, commonly used in high-school biology labs to study regeneration and the primitive nervous system, are actually quite sophisticated when it comes to modeling the response of the developing human nervous system to potentially toxic chemicals. The researchers published their findings in the current issue of the journal Toxicological Sciences. “Because planarians…
Bats are dying by the millions, and there’s no sure way to stop the plague of white-nose syndrome that could cause major ecological change and even extinctions, say biologists at Southern Connecticut State University. “About 7 million bats have died since its initial discovery in 2006” in the Howe Caverns west of Albany, New York, said Wisniewski. The little brown…
When it’s time to travel, wild olive baboons make democratic decisions about where to go, even though they live in hierarchical societies. The discovery is a surprise, researchers report online today in Science, because large, alpha males typically get their way—pushing subordinates aside to get food or mates. But when choosing where to travel, a baboon’s social rank or sex is…
The largest-ever multinational study of parental age and autism risk, funded by Autism Speaks, found increased autism rates among the children of teen moms and among children whose parents have relatively large gaps between their ages. The study also confirmed that older parents are at higher risk of having children with autism. The analysis included more than 5.7 million children…
Chimpanzees are capable of metacognition, or thinking about one’s own thinking, and can adjust their behavior accordingly, researchers at Georgia State University, Agnes Scott College, Wofford College and the University at Buffalo, The State University of New York have discovered. Their findings, published June 6 in the journal Cognition, suggest chimpanzees share with humans the capacity for metacognitive monitoring, which reflects…