Courtesy of Allen ChartierDavid Crews' lab resembles an exotic pet store; there's not a mouse or rat in sight. This professor of integrative biology at the University of Texas, Austin, studies animals such as the inches-long whiptail lizard."I'm interested in the evolution of brain mechanisms involved in social and sexual behaviors," Crews says. "You have to have ancestral species." The lizard, Cnemidophorus uniparens, reproduces parthenogenetically, though it evolved from the still extant C. in

US NSB report warns that nation's labs shouldn't count on foreign-born researchers

ImageSource Photography It seems that the adolescent brain may be particularly vulnerable to the effects of nicotine and alcohol. At a recent conference where researchers discussed published and unpublished work, studies showed that alcohol's impact on a variety of brain activities appears more severe in adolescent rats. Similarly, though results don't always agree, the adolescent brain also appears to be extremely sensitive to the effects of nicotine. Adolescent drinking in the United States

Large cash infusion will upgrade facility and expand research and education

Research universities lack creativity when it comes to training the next generation of biologists

New report details rhesus macaque shortage, made worse by added biodefense demand

Courtesy James Weaver and Daniel Morse  These starburst structures of silica are produced as a rudimentary form of skeletal support by the sponge Tethya aurantia found in shallow waters off California. Yeast, diatoms, sponges: Already occupying mundane places in modern households, these organisms may yet inspire important new manufacturing developments. From minute and intricate computer chip components, to nanoscale gold-plated wires, to superior drug manufacturing capabilities, univers

Mono Lake, Courtesy of Jonathan P. Zehr, University of California, Santa Cruz They are the oldest forms of life, and by sheer quantity, they dominate the planet. But how bacteria and archaea interact with each other and their environment is essentially unknown. "It's really difficult to understand how the natural world functions if we don't know its most abundant and diverse component," says Matthew Kane, who runs the National Science Foundation's microbial program. Ninety-nine percent of the

In Brief Courtesy of The Bradford Laboratory, University of Helsinki, Finland Some Viruses Elicit Immune Response Before Entering Cell Human cytomegalovirus triggers an immune response before it actually enters the cell, according to a report from researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Massachusetts (T. Compton et al., "Human cytomegalovirus activates inflammatory cytokine responses via CD14 and toll-like receptor 2," J Virol, in press). The immune syste

What a yawn that old horror flick The Fly might have been, had the screenwriter known then about a new piece of Drosophila research. In the movie, a fly gets trapped with a half-mad inventor inside his "matter transporter," an accident that somehow results in a fly-man whose over-amped style includes no apparent need for sleep. But flies do enjoy a "sleep-like state," says Douglas Nitz of the Neuroscience Institute in San Diego. Indeed, his group's work suggests that the fruit fly may be a g

National Academies chiefs say US science suffering due to barriers for foreign researchers.

Report urges US agriculture research focus on improving health and environment.