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Software turns dog barks into bytes What are dogs really saying when they bark? A team of researchers (led by ethologist Csaba Molnár from Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest) set out to find out. Using specially designed software, the group studied the acoustic qualities of more than 6,000 barks from 14 Hungarian sheepdogs in six different situations: alone, engaged in a dogfight, in an encounter with a stranger, on a leisurely stroll, exercising with a ball, and playing....

Bobby Burgholzer has cystic fibrosis, a genetic disease that throughout his life has made him vulnerable to bacterial infections in his lungs. Until a few years ago antibiotics held his symptoms mostly at bay, but then the drugs stopped working as well, leaving the 40-year-old medical device salesman easily winded and discouraged. He had always tried to keep fit and played hockey, but he was finding it harder by the day to climb hills or stairs....

To live life is to make decisions, yet who actually makes the choices? Everyone makes their own, is the obvious response. And yet this is not quite right. In “Invisible Influence: The Hidden Forces that Shape Behavior,” Jonah Berger traces the myriad ways that social queues guide us, often without our knowledge. Berger, a marketing professor at the Wharton School of Business, is the author of the 2013 bestseller “Contagious: Why Things Catch On....

In the late 20th century the humanities took a turn toward postmodern deconstruction and the belief that there is no objective reality to be discovered. To believe in such quaint notions as scientific progress was to be guilty of “scientism,” properly said with a snarl. In 1996 New York University physicist Alan Sokal punctured these pretensions with his now famous article “Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity,” chockablock full of postmodern phrases and deconstructionist tropes interspersed with scientific jargon, which he subsequently admitted were nonsensical gibberish....

Personally, I practiced social distancing long before the term became a household phrase during the COVID-19 pandemic—not because I am germophobic, but because the only way to remain creative within the turbulence of mediocrity is to float like a boat above its crashing waves. When seashells and pebbles are dragged by back and forth by ocean waves and rub against each other, they erode and eventually become indistinguishable. The final product is sand....

The board of editors at Scientific American is not simply made up of wordsmiths who assist contributors with grammar and spelling—as vital as those tasks are to a polished publication. Rather, one of our critical roles for readers is that we keep up with what’s happening in science, enabling Scientific American to be the authoritative source for the information that matters to our audience. We go to conferences and meetings, pore over other publications, and routinely confer with our researcher sources and authors....

More than two dozen Democratic senators staged a rare Senate talkathon last night and through the early morning hours, often posing next to a sign that said, “Time to Wake Up,” as the nation’s capital slumbered. Their issue was the need for Congress to do more to combat climate change. As the night wore on, their speeches touched on topics including the devastating impacts of Superstorm Sandy, a New Jersey man who started a community garden, the cost of energy for Hawaiian hotels and the oysters that have been hurt by acidic waters....

In my December 2010 column, “Talk to the Machine,” I describe how speech-recognition programs have advanced. I’ve used such software since 1997, when a year-long bout with a painful wrist ailment called tenosynovitis forced me to try it. Over the years, I’ve picked up enough tips and tricks to give me 100 percent accuracy most of the time. Replace the headset. Nuance’s Mac and Windows dictation programs come with a cheap USB headset....

On a Sunday morning in a decaying and dangerous inner-city barrio in Lima, Peru, an unmarked white van carrying nearly a dozen bodies rumbles to a stop on the grounds of the National Institute of Neurological Sciences. Seated in a small waiting area to the rear of the building, a throng of well-dressed researchers and government officials watches intently. As the driver clambers out, an assistant hustles off in search of a hospital gurney....

A brilliant student, Jonathan sailed through grade school. He completed his assignments easily and routinely earned As. Jonathan puzzled over why some of his classmates struggled, and his parents told him he had a special gift. In the seventh grade, however, Jonathan suddenly lost interest in school, refusing to do homework or study for tests. As a consequence, his grades plummeted. His parents tried to boost their son’s confidence by assuring him that he was very smart....

The Argentine ant has spread to every continent except Antarctica, overwhelming native ants with its sheer numbers and fierce battle tactics. But this invader may have met its match in a recent U.S. arrival: the Asian needle ant. The cross-species face-off, a surprise to entomologists, could harm ecosystems where the battle lines are drawn. Although invading ants make up just a handful of the more than 12,400 described ant species in the world, they have an outsized impact on ecosystems, economies and human health....

Got It Covered iPhone shield www.agent18.com Protect the planet while also protecting your iPhone. Agent 18 has a hard phone cover that is made from postconsumer plastic bottles. For $20, it’s a sleek fit. You’ll still need to take some care, however, because the slip does not have a screen protector. Blackberry users are out of luck; so far the eco-covers are just for iPhones. Wash without Water car cleaner www....

Editor’s note: The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research. Most people believe that they are moral and good. They also believe cheating on a partner is wrong. So how do cheaters live with themselves after their infidelity? Understanding how they reconcile their indiscretions with their beliefs about themselves can help us figure out why “good people” cheat. Dissonance theory predicts that when individuals’ thoughts and behaviors are inconsistent, something has to give....

Space scientists are used to moments of high tension. They often have just one chance to get things right, and experiments can hinge on the success of equipment that may be millions of kilometers away. So there will be considerable anxiety on January 20 at the European Space Agency (ESA) when the comet-hunting spacecraft Rosetta is due to stir after almost three years of hibernation. With Rosetta now some 800 million kilometers from Earth, and rapidly approaching its target—comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko—the first sign that things are going to plan on Rosetta will be the activation of a pre-set alarm....

While large-scale efforts to curb greenhouse gases aren’t likely to happen in the near future, advocates are thinking of smaller ways to reduce emissions in the meantime. Recently, Vanderbilt University professor Michael Vandenbergh and two others proposed the idea of voluntarily labeling carbon footprints on products in the journal Nature Climate Change. “We know from other areas of labeling that labels do have some effect on behavior,” said Vandenbergh, an environmental law professor and director of the Climate Change Research Network....

Few scientific challenges are more complex than understanding the health risks of a chemical or drug. Investigators cannot feed toxic compounds to people to see what doses cause cancer. Instead laboratory researchers rely on animal tests, and epidemiologists examine the human exposures that have already happened in the field. Both types of studies have many uncertainties, and scientists must extrapolate from the evidence to make causal inferences and recommend protective measures....

Key concepts Physics Fluids Flow Process Introduction Do you ever wonder why we perform tasks in a particular way? Very often we learn by copying someone and never stop to question if there is a more efficient or easier way to do something. This activity is about the tricky task of pouring from a full container. Could there be an easier way to do it? Background Almost everything around us is either a solid (such as a wooden block), a liquid (like water you drink) or a gas (as in the air you breathe)....

The association between darkness and depression is well established. Now a March 25 study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reveals for the first time the profound changes that light deprivation causes in the brain. Neuroscientists at the University of Pennsylvania kept rats in the dark for six weeks. The animals not only exhibited depressive behavior but also suffered damage in brain regions known to be underactive in humans during depression....

Iran has accumulated 1,200 kilograms of enriched uranium—more than doubling the stockpile it had just three months ago, according to a statement from a senior official at the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran on 25 January. That’s enough to build one atomic bomb, if the uranium is further refined to make it weapons-grade—a process that could take just two to three months , says David Albright, a nuclear-policy specialist at the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington DC....

The two Voyager spacecraft launched in 1977 are now the farthest man-made objects from Earth, at more than 19.5 billion and 16 billion kilometers away, respectively. In 2012 Voyager 1 became the first spacecraft to leave the solar system and enter interstellar space—and its sister spacecraft is not far behind. Both probes were the first to visit the solar system’s giants, Jupiter and Saturn, and Voyager 2 flew by the other outer planets; they changed our understanding of those worlds profoundly....