CORVALLIS, Ore. – Researchers announced this week the discovery of a mechanism by which Mycobacterium avium – a bacterium which can result in serious lung infections and is prevalent in emphysema and AIDS patients among others – infects tissue cells or “macrophages” and thus compromises the body’s immunity. Results of the study, led by researchers at Oregon State University, will be published online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Other ... [full story]

Ar­chae­o­lo­gists have un­cov­ered the ske­l­e­ton of the first doc­u­mented gun­shot vic­tim in the New World in an In­ca cem­e­tery out­side Li­ma, Pe­ru. The body is thought to be the first fo­ren­sic­ally prov­en cas­u­al­ty of the Span­ish con­quest, one of 72 ap­par­ent vic­tims of an up­ris­ing against the con­quis­ta­dors. The find, from a team led by Pe­ruvian ar­chae­o­lo­gist and Na­tional Ge­o­graph­ic grant­ee Guillermo Cock, was an­nounced June 20 by the Na­tional Ge­o­graph­ic So­ci­e­ty. Courtesy National GeographicCock, who ... [full story]

MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. - NASA recently tested the first nanotechnology-based electronic device to fly in space. The test showed that the "nanosensor" could monitor trace gases inside a spaceship. This technology could lead to smaller, more capable environmental monitors and smoke detectors in future crew habitats. NASA's Nano ChemSensor Unit hitched a ride to Earth orbit on March 9, 2007, as a secondary payload experiment on the U.S. Naval Academy's MidSTAR-1 satellite. The sensor test ... [full story]

NEW YORK - Norwegian researchers have determined that first-born sons tend to have slightly higher IQ's than their younger brothers. The study involved two sets of data, The New York Times reported. The first involved the military records of more than 241,00 men born between 1967 and 1976, while the second compared the scores on intelligence tests of 63,951 pairs of brothers. The team found that older brothers had IQ's averaging just over 103 -- ... [full story]

Re­mains of a co­los­sal, sur­pris­ingly bird-like di­no­saur have been un­cov­ered in In­ner Mon­go­lia, Chi­na, sci­en­tists say. The an­i­mal, which lived in the Late Cre­ta­ceous pe­ri­od, about 70 mil­lion years ago, is thought to have weighed about 1,400 kilo­grams (3,000 pounds). That’s sur­pris­ing, pa­le­on­tol­o­gists said, be­cause most the­o­ries sug­gest car­niv­o­rous di­no­saurs got smaller as they evolved to be­come more bird-like.  The di­no­saur, de­scribed in this week’s is­sue of the re­search jour­nal Na­ture, has been classed as a ... [full story]

In the first study of its kind, researchers at the University of California San Diego and Princeton have projected how changes in climate and land use over the next century will affect the world's 8,750 terrestrial bird species. The news is not good.   HABITAT IMPERILED - The chocolate-backed kingfisher is a common sight in African rain forests, but it is among the many bird species projected to lose more than half of their range by ... [full story]

It's cold, dark and breezy, not the greatest of conditions for a day (or night) at the beach, but good enough, maybe, for grunion. Grunion, of course, are those small fish that famously slither ashore at this time of year to mate and spawn on sandy beaches. Only a few fish species in the world do such a thing.   SAND SCHOLARS - A grunion digs into the sand to lay her eggs on a San ... [full story]

THERE'S A WORD FOR THAT   VERBATIM - 'Space isn't remote at all. It's only an hour's drive away if your car could go straight upwards.' -- scientist Fred Hoyle. CNS Photo.    WHAT IS IT? - This is an ear mite, a common pest of cats. It can cause inflammation, skin disease and even deafness if not treated. Unlike some mites, cat ear mites do not burrow into the skin, but reside within the ear canal. CNS ... [full story]

HOUSTON - NASA announced Monday that two days have been added to the U.S. space shuttle Atlantis' mission to try to fix a gap in the spacecraft's thermal blanket. The announcement came as two astronauts, Jim Reilly and John "Danny" Olivas, finished the first spacewalk of the mission. A fourth spacewalk is being added to the schedule. Atlantis lifted off Friday from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and docked Sunday with the international space ... [full story]

WASHINGTON - The U.S. space shuttle Atlantis arrived at the international space station Sunday for a swap of astronauts and delivery of new parts for the station. The Atlantis crew and the station's crew would have to conduct pressure and leak checks before they could open the hatches connecting the two spacecraft, said a news release on NASA's Web site. During the mission, Mission Specialist Clayton Anderson will be switching places with Expedition 15 Flight ... [full story]

WHERE IN THE WORLD? ANSWER   PRIME NUMBERS - About 40,000 birds die each year in this country from flying into wind turbine blades. CNS Photo.    WHERE IN THE WORLD - This is a picture of the Isles of Scilly, an archipelago of approximately 150 islands 27 miles southwest of the westernmost point of England. CNS Photo.    OUR IGNOBEL HISTORY - Do chickens prefer beautiful people? CNS Photo.    THE AIR UP THERE - Scientists are developing a system to ... [full story]

HOUSTON - On Wednesday, the Expedition 15 crew completed the second spacewalk in eight days and continued preparations for space shuttle Atlantis' arrival at the International Space Station.Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin and Flight Engineer Oleg Kotov opened the hatch on the Pirs docking compartment at 9:23 a.m. CDT to begin a spacewalk lasting 5 hours and 37 minutes. The cosmonauts installed sample containers on the Pirs module for a Russian experiment. The experiment, called Biorisk, looks ... [full story]

EUGENE, Ore. - Many farmers applying pesticides to boost crop yields may instead be contributing to growth problems, scientists report in a new study. According to years of research both in the test tube and, now, with real plants, a team of scientists reports that artificial chemicals in pesticides – through application or exposure to crops through runoff – disrupt natural nitrogen-fixing communications between crops and soil bacteria. The disruption results in lower yields or ... [full story]