Science News Archive - June 30, 2009

The equipment used for biomedical research is shrinking, but the physical properties of the fluids under investigation are not changing.

U.S.

The German green group BUND said on Tuesday that the Rhine river between Germany and the Netherlands is an average of three degrees warmer than it did 100 years ago, with power stations carrying a lot of the responsibility.

A new study suggests that a hadrosaur's jaw wasn't hinged in the same way as modern people and animals, answering a question that researchers have long wondered about how these ancient animals handled food.

A survey indicates nearly 9 of 10 U.S.

Researchers at the University of Michigan have devised a microscale tool to help them understand the mechanical behavior of biofilms, slimy colonies of bacteria involved in most human infectious diseases.

Lyme disease in theU.S. is caused by the tick-borne bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi and usually begins with a skin lesion, after which the bacteria spread throughout the body to the nervous system, heart or joints.

U.S.

University of Chicago researchers have discovered dry granular materials such as sand, seeds and grains have properties similar to liquid. The physicists from the university's Materials Research Science and Engineering Center said the granular materials form water-like droplets when poured from a given source.

U.S. scientists say research involving the exhaust plume from a NASA space shuttle launch suggests the 1908 Tunguska explosion was caused by a comet The mysterious explosion leveled 830 square miles of Siberian forest and a cause has never been determined.