SSS 2009-03-25

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. Generally speaking, kids do like their candy. Now scientists say that this sweet tooth may have some basis in biology. Because sugars may help fuel the r

SSS 2009-03-23

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Adam Hinterthuer. Got a minute? Most of us follow the beat of our own drummer. But it turns out that members of our social networks are great predictors of how well respond to future events. In a s

SSS 2009-03-20

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. Some people are worried that the more we learn about genetics, the closer well get to a day when we can choose all sorts of characteristics for our bab

SSS 2009-04-30

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. Forget Polly wanna cracker. Polly wants to boogie. Or so say scientists in a pair of papers in the April 30th issue of the journal Current Biology. They

SSS 2009-04-29

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Adam Hinterthuer. Got a minute? Netflix isnt satisfied with the way its system recommends new movies to customers based on their viewing habits. So the mail-order DVD rental company has offered outsi

SSS 2009-04-28

This is Scientific Americans 60-Second Science. Im Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. Many of the key molecules for life have a specific direction, or handedness: DNA twists to the right, amino acids to the left. Now scientists at the Nation

SSS 2009-04-27

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. April 25th was World Malaria Day. The mosquito-borne disease is still one of the biggest killers in developing countries with a death toll of a million

SSS 2009-04-24

This is scientific Americans 60-Sencond Science. I am Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. When you think about silk, you probably think of gossamer fibers woven into lustrous garments or decadently soft bedsheets. But silk is also prized for

SSS 2009-04-23

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Christie Nicholson. Got a minute? Which would you rather see: a rare Nepalese gharial or a common vole? Even without knowing what these animals are, you might be more intrigued by the gharial, simp

SSS 2009-04-22

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. Just when you thought youd heard everything, scientists have found that the reason you can hear everythingincluding things that are very quietis because

SSS 2009-02-25

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. They say that money cant buy happiness. Ryan Howell believes that it cansometimes. Howell is a researcher at San Francisco State University. He thought

SSS 2009-02-24

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Adam Hinterthuer. Got a minute? Angry or upset? Try picking up a pen. According to psychologist Matthew Lieberman, most people don't think of writing as a way to calm down. When you look at the bra

SSS 2009-02-26

（A segment of President Obamas speech to a joint session of Congress on February 24th dealing with energy and basic research:） We know the country that harnesses the power of clean, renewable energy will lead the 21st century. And yet, it is Chin

SSS 2009-02-27

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Steve Mirsky . Got a minute ? February 28th is International Sword Swallowers Awareness Day, according to practitioner Dan Meyer, who recently demonstrated the technique at the AAAS meeting in Chic

SSS 2009-01-21

Our health care is too costlyand each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind

SSS 2009-01-22

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. For decades, scientists have used an imaging technique called functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, to chronicle the brain in action. But a stu

SSS 2009-01-23

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. As Valentines day approaches, remember, its the thought that counts. Just ask a decorated cricket. Because according to a study published in the January

SSS 2009-01-26

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. There's a huge, gunky brown cloud that lingers over south Asia and the Indian Ocean each winter. Its been known to cause respiratory diseases and even

SSS 2009-01-27

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute. You may have noticed that as you get older, you start forgetting more stuff: like, where you left your glasses, or the names of your children. Well, if y

SSS 2009-01-28

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Cynthia Graber. This will just take a minute. Triceratops, as the name suggests, were huge dinosaurs adorned with three horns on their heads. Scientists now say those horns may have been a sort of