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[ad_1] There are lots of reasons one might want to grow brains. For starters, they would allow us to study human neurological issues in detail, which is otherwise quite challenging to do. Neurological diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s have devastated millions of people, and brains in a jar (so to speak) could allow us to study disease progression and test potential medications. The prospect of a lab-grown brain is so compelling that the authors of an editorial in Nature published this week wrote that “the promise of brain surrogates is such that abandoning them seems itself unethical, given the vast amount of human suffering caused by neurological and psychiatric disorders, and given that most therapies for these diseases developed in animal models fail to work in people.” But there’s a problem. The closer we get to growing a full human brain, the more ethically risky it becomes. The editorial co-authors note, however, that we have to grapple with ...

[ad_1] Water is everywhere on our planet. If it's not crashing against the shore, it's pounding on the roof, or dripping from the faucet, or pooling right in that spot where you just stepped. But how did all that water get here? It's a question that has preoccupied planetary scientists for years. Did planets like Earth, Mars, Venus, and Mercury form dry out of the dust and heat of the inner solar system, only to be drenched in water delivered from ice-laden comets later on? Or did drier asteroids and asteroid collisions bring the wet stuff? “Water is critical to life as we know it, and it's also essential to the evolution of planets. Water changes the way rocks behave, so the timing of when water arrives on Earth really affects its geological evolution,” says Terik Daly, a planetary geologist. “We’ve known for awhile that asteroids and comets carry water, and that’s probably how water came to Earth. But the details of that process have kind of been a black ...

[ad_1] Order something from Amazon, and if the right conditions align—you own a recent Chevy or Volvo, for example—a delivery person could find your car, remotely unlock it, and plop your package inside. The new service is part of a system called Amazon Key, which already allowed customers with a smart lock and security camera to receive deliveries inside their homes. Now, the same idea extends to your home on wheels. It’s easy to see why the straight-to-trunk service would appeal to both Amazon and its customers. Would-be package thieves can’t easily nab a box out of your car, and the system can deepen a consumer’s relationship with Amazon. An office worker who orders something could have the item placed directly in their vehicle in the lot outside, and have it skip the trip through the mailroom to their cubicle, for example. Someone on a road trip could receive their bulk beef jerky order straight to their car parked in front of the hotel. But it also hig...

[ad_1] A new study from researchers at the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany found that microplastic—tiny chunks only a few micrometers long that are easily ingested by animals and seem to spread everywhere—now contaminates Arctic sea ice at an unprecedented rate. While alarming, this finding comes as no surprise to those who study ocean contamination. However, quantitative data about the level of sea ice contamination gives scientists a baseline measurement as we work to make things better. The study was published this week in Nature Communications . Its findings highlight “just how pervasive this type of pollution has become in every last corner of our planet,” says study author Melanie Bergmann. The researchers found extremely high concentrations of plastic in their samples—up to 12,000 particles per liter of sea ice, or about 45,000 particles per gallon. Much of it was polyethylene, she says, which likely comes from single-use packaging. That means t...

[ad_1] I spend a lot of time staring into the neatly-stacked, never-ending stream of emails that come through my Gmail account every day. There’s a good chance you do, too—the service has more than 1 billion active users. When a service that big gets a redesign, it’s a big deal. And today, Gmail got a new look and learned a few new tricks. Here’s a look at what you’ll get if you opt into the new layout or update the mobile app. How to get it This isn’t one of those situations where the new design will spring up on you without prompting—at least not yet. If you want to see Gmail’s new look, click on the little gear icon for your settings and click “Try the new Gmail.” If you have a Gmail account through your job or school, you'll have to wait until an admin allows your organization to update. For now, you can switch back and forth between the two, but that likely won’t be the case forever. On the browser If you switch over...

[ad_1] T he bellísimo beaches of southeastern Italy feature golden sand and azure waters—but even on a midsummer’s day, you won’t find many people. The reason: Just offshore, thousands of stinging jellyfish bob in the waves. Savvy locals warn visitors not to wade in too deep or put their heads underwater. “If you were to run into one while swimming, your face would be red like a chili for three days,” says Stefano Piraino, a marine biologist at the University of Salento. It’s an increasingly common problem in the Mediterranean, according to Piraino, costing coastal communities millions of euros in lost tourism revenue, infrastructure damage, and fisheries losses. And jellyfish aren’t only wreaking havoc in southern Europe. In Japan, fishermen often find their catch replaced by netfuls of the throbbing blobs. Sweden even had to shut down one of its main power plants when thousands of jellyfish clogged its cooling pipes in 2011. Marine rese...

[ad_1] Spring has finally arrived, and as I look out my window at the sprawling urban park next door, I see birds in their best feather tuxedos chitter at potential mates and runners in their safety neon chatter with friends. A slight breeze ripples through the scene. The view, I assure you, could not be better, save for just one thing: The wind isn’t just ruffling the new leaves of my neighborhood trees. It’s also sending a shiver through the strips of two ragged plastic bags ensnared in the branches. Each year, Americans use 380 billion plastic bags, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. The plastic in these bags, which is manufactured from fossil fuels, requires approximately 12 million barrels of oil annually, which is enough energy to power 1,400 international flights aboard a 747. And because plastic bags can’t be recycled in your household bin (you have to drop them off at special sites, lest they destroy standard sorting machines), they end up sandw...