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MONTREAL—When we’re under immediate stress—say, we are about to give a speech or about to be mugged—we either fight or flee, or so scientists have long preached. But some psychologists are now suggesting that this scenario may apply mainly to males. Men get antisocial under pressure, but women tend to react in the opposite way: they “tend and befriend,” engaging in nurturing and social networking, perhaps as a way to protect their offspring, according to a theory proffered by neuroscientist Shelley Taylor of the University of California, Los Angeles....

The death toll from listeriosis infections linked to contaminated cantaloupes is expected to rise in the coming weeks, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) announced today. So far, the outbreak has sickened 72 people and killed at least 13, the CDC said. “This is the deadliest outbreak of a foodborne disease that we’ve identified in more than a decade,” Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the CDC, said at a news conference today....

Yes, it says “the universe."(Credit:Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)Please imagine you were to spend Saturday enjoying a little reading on the beach and then, perhaps, a couple of drinks.Please imagine you decided to waft down to Northern California’s Half Moon Bay and wandered into an establishment called Sam’s Chowder House.You may or may not have been with someone you shouldn’t have been escorting. Still, you hoped for a little privacy, a little quiet time to contemplate life’s ideas and people (small and large), while staring out at the ocean....

Drones have been used to deliver sunscreen to a conference in Palm Springs, Calif., and pizza to a family in New Zealand, but they’re also in the air for far more urgent purposes — such as saving lives. In fact, in some cases, drones could carry defibrillators to heart attack victims faster than an ambulance, according to a paper published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Researchers simulated emergency situations and found they could get automatic external defibrillators to the scene an average of 16 minutes faster by drone than by ambulance....

From Quanta Magazine (find original story here). In mid-March, a panel of four astrophysicists working on an experiment to probe the first moments of time held an extraordinary press conference at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) in Cambridge, Mass. The scientists announced that a radio telescope located at the South Pole had discovered gravitational waves generated by the Big Bang. They posted a non-peer-reviewed paper on the Internet that proclaimed the beginning of a “new era” in cosmology....

Young adults with autism have an unusual gait and problems with fine motor skills. Researchers presented the unpublished findings today at the 2017 Society for Neuroscience annual meeting in Washington, D.C. Motor problems such as clumsiness, toe-walking and altered gait are well documented in autism. But most studies have been limited to children or have included adults only as part of a broad age range. “Studies haven’t focused on just adults,” says Cortney Armitano, a graduate student in Steven Morrison’s lab at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia, who presented the work....

A Chinese spacecraft service module has entered orbit around the moon, months after being used in the country’s landmark test flight that sent a prototype sample-return capsule on a flight around the moon and returned it to Earth. The service module from China’s circumlunar test flight arrived in orbit around the moon this week, according to Chinese state media reports. The spacecraft is currently flying in an eight-hour orbit that carries it within 125 miles (200 kilometers) of the lunar surface at its closest point, and out to a range of 3,293 miles (5,300 km) at its highest point....

Treasure Island: A polluted military base is being transformed intoa dense green neighborhood. View images from the plans for this city Today it is an almost completely paved naval air base built atop earthen material dredged from the San Francisco Bay in the 1930s. By 2020 it is scheduled to become one of the most sustainable communities in the U.S. According to a master plan from the engineering firm Arup, the 400-acre island would be home to 6,000 new apartments and condominiums surrounded by large buildings along the San Francisco coastline....

One of the world’s most endangered crocodilians, the Cuban crocodile, is facing a genomic identity crisis. The island’s rare, endemic species has been interbreeding with its more abundant cousin, the American crocodile, creating hybrid offspring and posing a threat to its survival. In each baby, a portion of the Cuban crocodile genome is replaced by American crocodile genes. With each subsequent generation, more and more Cuban genes are lost, and eventually the species could go extinct....

For many people of a certain age, the PBS series Cosmos was a major event —a stunning love-letter to astronomy that provided a novel way of thinking about ourselves and our place in the universe, all the stranger and more inspiring because it was based on facts. The neuroscientist David Eagleman counts himself among those moved by Cosmos, and he sees it at as a model for his ambitious new PBS series....

Not sure what to get that special someone on your holiday shopping list who has everything? How about a virtual T-shirt featuring the logo of his or her favorite virtual band—or a snazzy new pair of avatar swimming trunks? Too trite? Well then, how about a prewrapped present to put under his or her Facebook Christmas tree? Many people of a certain age may consider such gifts a waste of their hard-earned and very real money....

The organism was initially called NLF, for “new life form”. Jean-Michel Claverie and Chantal Abergel, evolutionary biologists at Aix-Marseille University in France, found it in a water sample collected off the coast of Chile, where it seemed to be infecting and killing amoebae. Under a microscope, it appeared as a large, dark spot, about the size of a small bacterial cell. Later, after the researchers discovered a similar organism in a pond in Australia, they realized that both are viruses — the largest yet found....

The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research. In the wake of recent violent events in the U.S., many people are expressing concern about the tone and content of online communications, including talk of the “dark web.” Despite the sinister-sounding phrase, there is not just one “dark web.” The term is actually fairly technical in origin, and is often used to describe some of the lesser-known corners of the internet....

FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C.(Credit:Getty Images)Jeffrey Feldman has won a reprieve from a federal court order that had given him until Tuesday to decrypt his hard drives for the FBI – or face contempt of court.A federal judge in Wisconsin today granted an emergency motion filed by Feldman’s attorney for additional time to establish that her client’s Fifth Amendment right to self-incrimination would be violated.U.S. District Judge Rudolph Randa lifted the threat of contempt of court and jail time, at least temporarily, and asked for additional briefs from Feldman’s attorney and Justice Department prosecutors....

Meteoroids streaking through the atmospheres of planets such as Earth, Mars and Venus can change these worlds’ air, in ways that researchers are just now beginning to understand. Most planetary atmospheres are made up of simple, low-mass elements and compounds such as carbon dioxide, oxygen and nitrogen. But when a debris particle, or meteoroid, passes through, it can shed heavier, more exotic elements such as magnesium, silicon and iron. Such elements can have a significant impact on the circulation and dynamics of winds in the atmosphere, researchers say....

The Hubble Space Telescope is still operating, but its successor is already waiting in the wings. The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will be the largest observatory ever sent to space, and one of the most complex instruments ever built. After running seriously over budget and behind schedule until 2011, the project is now on track and heading into an eventful year of assembly and tests in preparation for its 2018 launch....

What exactly causes Parkinson’s disease is far from figured out. But a clue has been lurking in cornfields for years. The data confirm it: farmers are more prone to Parkinson’s than the general population. And pesticides could be to blame. Over a decade of evidence shows a clear association between pesticide exposure and a higher risk for the second most common neurodegenerative disease, after Alzheimer’s. A new study published in Neurology proposes a potential mechanism by which at least some pesticides might contribute to Parkinson’s....

The evening launch of a private spaceship bound for the International Space Station was canceled yesterday (Oct. 27) all because of a wayward sailboat. But the rocket will make another liftoff attempt tonight from the eastern coast of Virginia, and you can watch it live. Orbital Sciences’ unmanned Cygnus spacecraft is now scheduled to blast off atop an Antares rocket at 6:22 p.m. EDT (2222 GMT) from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Virginia....

THE ANTHROPOCENE In “A History in Layers,” Jan Zalasiewicz argues that humans’ effect on the earth calls for the establishment of a distinct geologic epoch called the Anthropocene. If humans stay around on the earth for millions of years, naming the present era the Anthropocene will most likely be justified. On the other hand, there is a distinct possibility that we shall succeed in exterminating ourselves within a short period. In that case, the impact of humanity would rather resemble that of the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs....

Remember the congressional hearings some years ago on the negative effects of video games? To many parents, it made intuitive sense that zapping aliens and zombies probably was a complete waste of time in any case. I know I’ve sometimes chided my daughters about what they are missing “IRL” when they play games on their mobile phones while, for instance, simultaneously trying to attend to a conversation or follow the plotline of a movie....