Food and drink pairing isn’t just for winos. From a very young age, we form opinions about what we should drink with, say, pizza (soda), Lunchables (Capri Sun), and vegetables (plain ol’ water). Mix these pairings up and we’ll lose a little interest in one or the other. “Preferences start to develop very early in children,” explains Annemarie Olsen, a postdoc researcher at the University of Copenhagen who has studied child food preferences. “Several studies have demonstrated that they start to form already in the uterus!” To test how beverage might influence food choices, ... Read More
Our Streets Aren’t Hard Enough (to Save Fuel)
June 18, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
The roads are getting some heat for their interactions with our tires. The problem? Pavement has gone soft—or rather has been too soft from the beginning. Researchers at MIT, who recently conducted a study looking at the space between the rubber and the road, compare the present interaction to walking barefoot in the sand. The vehicle’s load ends up trailing behind the travel path due of the way the energy is dissipated. But by swapping in stiffer materials, the researchers found, the United States could reduce fuel consumption by as much as 3 percent—a savings of more than 250 ... Read More
Out of Their Shell, Are Turtles More Like Birds or Lizards?
June 11, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
The turtle’s family tree has always been a bit of a mystery. “Turtles have a lot of unique morphological characters,” explains Nick Crawford, a post-graduate biology researcher at Boston University. “Basically, having a shell makes the rest of you look really different from your closest relatives.” Scientists looking at the turtle’s muscles and bones tend to think that they belong next to snakes and lizards. But scientists doing molecular analysis have placed their bets with turtles and birds. A recent paper in the journal Biology Letters hopes to put the issue to rest. By ... Read More
Genetically Modified Goats Take on Child Killers
May 24, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
Researchers at the University of California at Davis are teaming up with a herd of goats to attack the world’s second leading cause of childhood death. The target: diarrhea. The weapon: goat’s milk. The dozen-plus Davis goats have been altered with a single human gene that gives their milk extraordinary bacterial fighting abilities. Since the early 1990s, UC Davis animal scientist James Murray has been pushing mice, cows and goats to do a better job of producing the protein lysozyme. His early work focused on how the protein could make processing milk into products like cheese ... Read More
Building a Better Banana
May 9, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
For the last nine years, James Dale has been working to build a better banana. But his aim was not to make the fruit sweeter or easier to peel. The director of the center for tropical crops and biocommodities at Australia’s Queensland University of Technology has been tweaking the banana’s genes to transform it from a humble fruit into an incognito lifesaver. Dale has been working to make the food staple a better source of vitamin A and iron. If he can pull it off at scale, Dale will have engineered a sustainable solution to a major global health problem. What is called micronutrient ... Read More
Greenhouse Gas Reports Send Stock Prices Higher?
May 3, 2012 • By • Leave a Comment
Coming clean about greenhouse gas emissions can make some companies squeamish. Because emissions are bad, businesses fear that talking about them might be, too. But a new study out of the University of California, Davis finds that by entering into the conversation voluntarily, companies can boost their bottom line. A study of 172 companies found that stock prices jumped, on average, a half a percent in the five days surrounding an emissions-related press release. While that change might not seem substantial, bundling all those little benefits together meant an extra $10 billion for the ... Read More
