Science News

LINDAU, Germany--Play hard. Learn to explain what you do to people who know nothing about science. Put your collaborators’ needs first. A Thursday panel here at the 60th annual Nobel Laureate Lectures at Lindau gave young scientists tips--sometimes counterintuitive--about what it takes to succeed.

Play Hard . “I really don’t think you have to work hard,” said Oliver Smithies, winner of a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2007, whose charming lecture earlier in the week showed many pages of handwritten notes jotted over five decades, often dated on Saturday mornings. “You should choose a field of work that is not work, that is so fun” that you won’t mind the time it takes. Added John C. Mather (2006 Nobel in Physics), “Since childhood I dreamed of building telescopes and I’ve continued to pursue that.”

By Steve Gorman and Ernest Scheyder

LOS ANGELES/FORT JACKSON, Louisiana (Reuters) - Despite the images of oil-soaked pelicans flooding the media in recent weeks, wildlife experts say the toll on sea birds from BP's Gulf Coast oil spill is smaller than was anticipated, so far.

Over the years, people have put forth a lot of theories to explain why intelligence differs, from person to person and even around the world. Health, wealth, schooling, nutrition, and even climate have all come up. Now, researchers at the University of New Mexico suggest that parasites might play a role. They find that the prevalence of infectious diseases can be a powerful predictor of regional smarts. Their work appears in the Proceedings of the Royal Society . [Christopher Eppig, Corey Fincher and Randy Thornhill, http://bit.ly/c2E4wD ] [More]

Anyone who's ever seen a dog move around on three limbs knows that canines are remarkably resilient creatures. Scientists are now wondering whether such adaptability could likewise be programmed into robots, in the event they experience damage or malfunction far from a repair shop (look no further than NASA's Mars Spirit rover to see why this is important). [More]

By Daniel Cressey

A study suggesting that organic agriculture gives better pest control and larger plants than conventional farming is sure to reignite longstanding debates about the merits of organic versus conventional agriculture. [More]

Well that didn't take long: Just six months after the U.S. Supreme Court turned down requests to close the locks between Chicago area waterways and Lake Michigan to stop the spread of invasive Asian carp the giant, voracious fish has almost made its way to the Great Lakes.

Last week, a one-meter-long, nine-kilogram bighead carp (pictured) was found in Lake Calumet, along the Chicago Area Waterway System (CAWS), just six miles from Lake Michigan. According to the Asian Carp Regional Coordinating Committee , this is the first carp that has been found in the CAWS above the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer's Electric Barrier System, a system put in place to try to control the spread of the fish.

Students from across the globe converged on the University of Hawaii at Hilo last week to test their abilities to build and pilot remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) at the ninth annual Marine Advanced Technology Education (MATE) Center's 2010 International ROV Competition. A team from Russia's Institute of Marine Technology Problems in Vladivostok took first place in the advanced "Explorer" division, while North Carolina's First Flight High School in Kill Devil Hills topped the intermediate "Ranger" division. [More]

Your hair contains a record of everywhere you've been. That's because your body uses the hydrogen and oxygen from water (and other beverages and foods) to make proteins--like the keratin in your hair. Because the ratio of the exact isotopes of hydrogen and oxygen varies depending on location--for instance, Denver's isotopic signature in liquids is quite different from Dallas's--forensic scientists may have a new way to piece together your past travels. [More]