An unexpected source of new, clean energy has been found: the Plant-Microbial Fuel Cell that can generate electricity from the natural interaction between living plant roots and soil bacteria. The technique already works on a small scale and will soon be applied in larger marshland areas throughout the world. On 23 November, researcher Marjolein Helder will defend her PhD research on generating electricity... 

In the Swedish Academy of young translators, new recruits study a crash course in complex languages. It is not only about military discipline: specialists discovered that intensive study of foreign tongues stimulates the growth of the hippocampus and causes changes in other structures of the brain. Learning languages also helps in preventing Alzheimer’s disease. In the Swedish Academy, young... 

Bald men can regain hair with eye drops for glaucoma. Drug interactions and pre-existing diseases can make the therapy risky. However, eye drops for glaucoma have become a macho thing. It may even end one of the world’s greatest male torments, baldness. So a survey, published by researchers in the journal FASEB, reveals. Eye drops for glaucoma have become a macho thing. It may even end one of... 

Beluga white whale, NOC American scientists have identified a male beluga whale capable of making human-like sounds and spontaneously mimicking human conversations. According to a paper published online in Current Biology, researchers heard a nine-year-old whale named NOC emitting sounds octaves below normal ones. The discovery occurred when a diver at the National Marine Mammal Foundation in California... 

Conversion: Dr Ebon Alexander claims he had an out-of-body experience whilst in a coma When it came to the after-life, Eben Alexander used to be just like most scientists — a firm non-believer. By his own account only ‘nominally’ a Christian, the 58-year-old, Harvard-educated neurosurgeon knew too much to have time for the tales of out-of-body experiences that patients would sometimes describe... 

A little-known plant with a truly bizarre name is now making headlines as a cancer killer, with the compound of the plant vanishing tumors in mice with pancreatic cancer. Known as the “Tripterygium Wilfordii” or Lei Gong Teng sometimes called “Thunder God Vine”, the Chinese plant is actually integrated into Chinese medicine and has been used for ages in remedying a number of... 

Who doesn’t wish to live on this earth for ever? But death is inevitable. Human beings under the natural process of aging slowly move towards death. Of course, dreadful diseases like cancer often cause human beings to die young. Scientists in advanced countries are now working vigorously on finding out the ways and means to extend human life expectancy, they are even aspiring to make humans... 

100-million-year-old fossilized spider attack Scientists have discovered a rare fossil of a spider, featuring the animal hunting a wasp during the dinosaur age. The finding as the first fossil ever discovered of a spider attack, was found in the Hukawng Valley of Myanmar and dates back to Early Cretaceous period between 97 to 110 million years ago. Researchers suggest that both the attacking spider... 

A Chinese scientist has said that prehistoric man ate the bears in what is now part of the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing. In an interview with The Chongqing Morning Post, Wei Guangbiao, the head of the Institute of Three Gorges Paleoanthropology at a Chongqing museum, said that many excavated fossils “showed that pandas were once slashed to death by man,” The Associated Press reported... 

Kyoto University Professor Shinya Yamanaka (L) and John Gurdon of the Gurdon Institute in Cambridge John Gurdon from the UK and Shinya Yamanaka from Japan have won the 2012 Nobel Prize for medicine or physiology for their research on stem cell. Both scientists were awarded for their groundbreaking discovery of changing adult cells into stem cells, which can become any other type of cell in the body. The... 

A team of researchers at the Centre for Neuroscience (CNC) and the Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Coimbra (UC), Portugal, has developed a groundbreaking test for the detection of cutaneous chemical allergen (skin sensitization assessment), which will significantly reduce the testing animals in the cosmetics industry. Coimbra – Portugal. Pioneering test developed at the University of Coimbra... 

Naegleria fowleri surrounded by white cells in spinal fluid Pakistan’s major city Karachi was struck by an outbreak of Naegleria fowleri, also known as ‘brain-eating amoeba.’ The deadly freshwater microbe kills 98 percent of those infected. The source of the infection has yet to be identified. The amoeba is transmitted from contaminated water through the nasal cavity and travels to the brain,... 

Monsanto, Bill Gates, the Rockefellers, Craig Venter and other investors are working behind-the-scenes to bring genetically engineered (GE) algae to market with products that include fuel, animal feed made with manure, human food and vaccines. The US government have a stake in this enterprise, too. Obama put a moratorium on drilling for oil on federal land and voted down the Keystone pipeline, in... 

The debate about the possible harmful effects of GM foods came roaring back after a French scientific research linked the appearance of cancerous tumors in rats consuming GM corn. The study caused an uproar and the French Prime Minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, came to announce incentive measures for banning GMOs (genetically modified organisms) in all of Europe, if it confirms the result of the harmfulness... 

After a French study suggested that rats fed on Monsanto GMO corn suffered tumors, Russian researches plan their own, this time public, experiment. The unique reality show with rats is expected to prove or deny GMO’s health-threatening influence. ­The Russian scientists, who oppose genetically modified organisms (GMO) in food, expect that their year-long experiment will show whether the controversial...