121
Fasting Affects the Brain
Mark Mattson reveals the surprising brain benefits of fasting.
Topics /
Science & Space
The most popular blog posts about science & space on Hacker News. 192 posts.
122
123
Nitrogen-fixing trees “eat” rocks, play pivotal role in forest health
CORVALLIS, Ore. – By tapping nutrients from bedrock, red alder trees play a key role in healthy forest ecosystems, according to a new study. The study published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
124
125
Opioids and the Labor Market (2018)
This paper finds evidence that opioid availability decreases labor force participation while a large labor market shock does not influence the share of opioid abusers. We first identify the effect of availability on participation using the geographic variation in opioid prescription rates. We use a combination of the…
126
127
Public's Dread of Nuclear Power Limits Its Deployment
In the ongoing effort to decarbonize U.S. energy production, one energy source often attracts great controversy.
128
What I learned from reading over 100 weight loss studies
The average overweight American looking to lose weight will set a goal of losing 30 lbs. Most people will never come close. Does anything actually work?
129
Calculating a record-breaking 31.4T digits of Pi with GCP
Pi in the sky: Calculating a record-breaking 31.4 trillion digits of Archimedes’ constant on Google Cloud
130
M 7.1 SoCal Earthquake: What's Next?
The 50-km-long rupture has triggered widely dispersed aftershocks. However, almost none of these struck on the faults that the M 7.1 brought closer to failure: The major Garlock Fault; or the Blackwater, Panamint Valley, or Sierra Nevada Faults.
131
Energy Storage Investments Boom as Battery Costs Halve in the Next Decade
Access the latest perspectives on the energy transition with samples of research reports and data-driven analysis from BNEF experts.
132
133
A material way to make Mars habitable
Silica aerogel could warm the Martian surface similar to the way greenhouse gasses keep Earth warm
134
Death rates from energy production per TWh
Death rates are measured based on deaths from accidents and air pollution per terawatt-hour of electricity.
135
What predicts students’ drinking habits? How much they think others are drinking
A new study by researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University examined students’ genetic risk of alcohol use, roommates’ drinking habits and the perception of peer drinking.
136
137
Announcing the New PubMed
The National Library of Medicine (NLM) is replacing the current version of the PubMed database with a newly re-designed version. The new version is now live and can be found at You can still acces…
138
Spiders and ants inspire metal that won't sink
Rochester researchers have created a metallic structure so water repellent, it refuses to sink—no matter how often it is forced into water.
139
Study suggests surgery alternative for rotator cuff pain: push-ups, pull-ups
On a Sunday morning in 2006, Cecilia Wu was mugged after leaving church. The pain became unbearable. Discouraged with her treatment options, Wu opted to participate in a pilot study at an orthopedics lab for patients with a full-thickness rotator cuff tear. “It was better than surgery,” Wu said.
140
Cambridge spin-out starts producing graphene at commercial scale
A recent University of Cambridge spin-out company, Paragraf, has started producing graphene – a sheet of carbon just one atomic layer thick – at up to eight inches (20cm) in diameter, large enough for commercial electronic devices.
141
Breaching a “carbon threshold” could lead to mass extinction
Today’s carbon dioxide emissions may trigger a reflex in the carbon cycle with devastating consequences, according to a new MIT study.
142
The Riemann Hypothesis (Part 2)
Note: These pages make extensive use of the latest XHTML and CSS Standards . They ought to look great in any standards-compliant modern browser. Unfortunately, they will probably look horrible in older browsers, like Netscape 4.x and IE 4.x. Moreover, many posts use MathML, which is, currently only supported in…
143
The Apollo 11 Moon Landing: Spacecraft Design Then and Now
To mark the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11, we revisit a first-hand account of designing the Lunar Module digital autopilot, and compare the approach used then with the way it could be done today.
144
145
CO₂ and Other Greenhouse Gas Emissions
Human emissions of greenhouse gases are the primary driver of climate change. The world needs to decarbonize to reduce them.
146
147
Ketogenic diet helps tame flu virus in mice
Mice fed a ketogenic — or very low-carb — diet were better able to combat the flu virus than mice fed food high in carbohydrates, according to a new Yale study.
148
149
The case against plant consciousness
Botanist Lincoln Taiz and colleagues argue against the suggestion that plants have neurobiology or consciousness.
150
Linguistics Using Category Theory (2018)
Note: These pages make extensive use of the latest XHTML and CSS Standards . They ought to look great in any standards-compliant modern browser. Unfortunately, they will probably look horrible in older browsers, like Netscape 4.x and IE 4.x. Moreover, many posts use MathML, which is, currently only supported in…