Science News
Nuclear Commission fines VA over botched prostate cancer radiation therapies
The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is being fined for botching 97 of 116 procedures to treat prostate cancer among men seeking care at the agency's medical center in Philadelphia. Although the punishment, which adds up to a mere $227,500, might not sound like more than a slap on the wrist, it is coming from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and is one of the largest the commission has ever given out for medical mistakes. [More]
Whale sedation aids conservation
By Daniel Cressey
Only around 300 endangered right whales remain in the North Atlantic, and a number of them end up tangled in fishing gear off the east coast of the United States. [More]
Room for Debate: Where, If Anywhere, Is NASA Headed?
On complex issues, as is often said, it is possible for intelligent people to disagree. That was certainly the case March 15 at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, when five leaders of the space exploration intelligentsia met to discuss NASA's plans for human spaceflight. [More]
Mexican police ask spirits to guard them in drug war
Pakistan denies arrests thwarted Taliban talks
Court orders Fed to release bailout documents
Sierra Leone minister denies mine collapse
Dismiss dinosaurs as failures...and pave a path to a bleak future
Dinosaurs are frequently cited as the ultimate exemplars of failure. “Dead as a dinosaur” is now deeply embedded in our vernacular. Yet death for a species, and even for groups of species, is as inevitable as your death. Somewhere around 99 percent of all species that have ever existed are now extinct. The 10 million to 50 million species that comprise the modern day biosphere (the uncertainty due mostly to our lack of understanding of microbial diversity) are but the latest players in a four-billion-year drama--“The Greatest Show on Earth,” to borrow the title of Richard Dawkins most recent book. [More]
