Surprising Science

This map shows that your chances of rising above your birth class vary tremendously depending on where you live.

While a History course, for and of the ages, this “class” is ultimately the Cosmology of modern day Science. It encompasses the entirety of academia in one sweeping story of physics, astronomy, geology, biology, ecology, sociology, technology and beyond.

When we look at the sculpture of Auguste Rodin, we can’t help but feel what his figures feel. Every inch of those sculpted bodies “speaks” the language of passion, whether […]

Designed by a team of University of Pennsylvania students, the Titan Arm just received a $45,000 award from the James Dyson Foundation.

University of Cincinnati researchers have designed technology that channels sunlight to dark interior rooms through grids of tiny adjustable cells. The energy can also be stored to power electrical systems.

In more creative mobile tech news: Kinsa consists of the thermometer — which attaches to the headphone jack — and an app that tells a user the local “health weather” as well as their temperature.

UCLA scientists have created an imaging system that can display particles as tiny as 100 nanometers via a smartphone’s camera. Such a system could be useful for detecting certain viruses, such as HIV.

Researchers used zinc oxide nanorods to create a solar cell, then played music to determine the sound waves’ effect on performance. Pop and rock music bumped up efficiency levels by 40 percent.

With help from NASA’s Kepler space telescope, astronomers have calculated that of all the stars in our galaxy that resemble our sun, one in five hosts an Earth-sized planet at a distance that allows for liquid water at the surface.

As Adobe recovers from a security breach involving information from 38 million active users, a security researcher has identified the most common passwords employed. At the top of the list: “123456.”

It’s one of several new guidelines provided last week by the American Academy of Pediatrics that are designed to address the problems associated with excessive media use, including obesity and sleep deprivation.

The plan would allow the world’s space agencies to share information about potentially dangerous asteroids, create a special task group to detect smaller asteroids, and collaborate on ideas for diverting them from Earth.

By creating a computer-generated 10-year-old Filipina girl, Terre des Hommes Netherlands drew attention to the growing problem of webcam child sex tourism. To date they’ve given the identities of over 1,000 predators to authorities.

Anecdotal evidence has now been backed up by research: Using eyetracking technology, scientists found that both men and women looked at sexualized body parts when asked to evaluate appearance.

Experiments with people wearing blindfolds demonstrated that “what we normally perceive of as sight is really as much a function of our brains as our eyes,” says one researcher.

Newly published in PLoS Computational Biology is a study describing new technology that safely delivers controlled anesthesia without requiring consistent human monitoring.

Dutch design school graduate Alejo Bernal created a toy car that can be driven using a commercially-available EEG headset. The amount of concentration required to move it could provide exercise for those with attention deficit disorders.

In research done on mice, a compound inside the venom of Chinese red-headed centipedes performed as well as, and in some cases even better than, morphine.

The last above-ground map of the ancient water system was completed a century ago. Now, a group of scientists is using 21st-century technology to provide the first-ever map containing both underground and surface data.

Two new studies agree that Kepler-78b is about the same size and composition as Earth, but because it orbits its star at one-tenth the distance of our orbit, it’s way too hot to support life.

If new research from Spain can be further developed into a viable model, it could mean great things for tobacco growers worried about the future of their business.

Currently being tested in Iowa and Florida, Starchase fires the bullets from the grill of a pursuing police car, which then stick to the fleeing vehicle and deliver coordinates to a computer or smartphone.

Yaron Milgrom’s Local Mission Market will offer, among other things, homemade pasta, bread, jams, and cured meats to San Francisco residents at what he claims will be affordable prices.

Last week the parliament passed the measure by one vote, overturning a ban implemented by the country’s former colonial ruler and creating a potentially radical shift in the rare earths market.

Stockholm-based SMSLifesaver was created in response to the challenge of delivering timely ambulance services. CPR certification is the only requirement for volunteering. So far 9,600 residents have signed up.

While professional players are schooled in the art of the stoic visage, new research indicates that their arm movements — specifically, the smoothness of them — may give away the quality of their hand.

In 2010, Duke researchers scored infants according to their innate number sense. Three years later, further tests show a correlation between those scores and mathematical aptitude: The higher the score, the better the skill.

A survey found that parents greatly underestimate the extent to which their children were either perpetrators or victims of cyberbullying. Also, the younger the child, the less likely the parent was aware.

A UK study is one of a very few to address this commonly-held belief from a scientific perspective. It also suggests that multitasking should be considered when evaluating worker performance.

Diabetics may someday be able to test their blood sugar levels using a simple, painless laser device that registers glucose in skin cells.