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The operation known as a hemispherectomy—the removal of half the brain—sounds too radical to ever consider, much less perform. In the past century, however, surgeons have done it hundreds of times for disorders that cannot be controlled any other way. Perhaps surprisingly, the surgery has no apparent effect on personality or memory. Does that mean a person needs only half a brain? Yes and no. People can survive and function pretty well after the procedure, but they will have some physical disabilities....

Earth’s last passenger pigeon—Martha—died in 1914 at the Cincinnati Zoo, the final remnant of flocks that once darkened the sky. What’s unknown, even nearly a century after this extinction, is how many of the plants in the eastern woodlands of the U.S. might have suffered as a result—or even gone extinct themselves. Now, new findings from halfway around the world suggest plants may indeed suffer in the absence of the animals they have relied on for pollination or dispersing seeds....

Marijuana has been legalized in some capacity in 31 U.S. states, in large part due to a softening stance around the potential harms of the drug and recognition of its medical benefits. As a result, cannabis has become the most commonly used illicit drug during pregnancy. One recent study revealed that in 2016 7 percent of pregnant women in California used marijuana, with rates as high as 22 percent among teenage mothers....

By Katharine Sanderson It was an instrument that much of the astronomical community didn’t want, but times change: to get time now on the Hubble Space Telescope, which is celebrating its 20th anniversary this week, an astronomer usually faces competition from at least 11 other eager scientists. Hubble, named after American astronomer Edwin Hubble, has been orbiting Earth for 20 years, sending back images in the visible, near-infrared and ultraviolet parts of the spectrum....

Adapted from The Copernicus Complex: Our Cosmic Significance in a Universe of Planets and Probabilities, by Caleb Scharf, by arrangement with Scientific American/Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC (US) and Penguin Press (UK). Copyright © 2014 by Caleb Scharf. We all reside on a small planet orbiting a single, middle-aged star that is one of some 200 billion stars in the great swirl of matter that makes up the Milky Way galaxy....

TO SLEEP, TO DREAM Where does dreaming fit into the information provided in “Quiet! Sleeping Brain at Work,” by Robert Stickgold and Jeffrey M. Ellenbogen? Does dreaming interfere, improve or have no effect on sleep’s enhancement of memory? “old curmudgeon” adapted from a comment at www.SciAmMind.com ELLENBOGEN REPLIES: One proposed mechanism for how sleep leads to memory enhancement is that while we are asleep, the brain is busy replaying previously learned information—kind of like an actor rehearsing his lines....

Deception gains a slight edge over deception detection when the interactions are few in number and among strangers. But if you spend enough time with your interlocutors, they may leak their true intent through behavioral tells. As Trivers notes, “When interactions are anonymous or infrequent, behavioral cues cannot be read against a background of known behavior, so more general attributes of lying must be used.” He identifies three: Nervousness. “Because of the negative consequences of being detected, including being aggressed against … people are expected to be more nervous when lying....

Future astronauts may return to Earth with valuable samples of Mars. However, space agencies face a daunting challenge—they have to both protect life on Earth from potential aliens and defend potential aliens against contamination from Earth. Now scientists have identified 25 gaps in knowledge when it comes to limiting interplanetary contamination by human crews during future space missions. NASA, with international and industry partners, is developing the capability to take humans deeper into space than ever before....

Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park in the Bahamas has existed since 1959 and been protected from fishing since 1986—but it took until now to prove that such fisheries management could actually help corals rebound. One of the Caribbean’s largest marine reserves at 171 square miles (442 square kilometers), the park has been studied as part of the Bahamas Biocomplexity Project—an effort to learn about the interaction of water, wildlife and human activity in this subtropical archipelago....

Many biologists assume that bizarre quantum phenomena play a relatively negligible role inside the cell. A recent theoretical analysis of the chemical bonds holding DNA together, however, suggests that these effects might occur far more frequently than once thought—and act as a major source of genetic mutations. Researchers led by Louie Slocombe of the University of Surrey in England focused on the molecular “bases” that make up the rungs linking DNA’s double strands and the hydrogen bond, formed with a proton, that holds the two sides of these rungs together....

Key concepts Human biology Water Mummification Desiccation Decomposition Introduction Mummies are frequently featured in movies and television shows—often playing the part of a scary, undead monster. But in ancient Egypt and in other cultures, mummification was a serious religious burial ritual. In this activity you will learn about the science behind the process of mummification by mummifying a hot dog. Background A mummy is a corpse—human or other animal—whose tissue has been preserved, whether intentionally by a process developed by humans or in nature by an accident of chemistry or weather....

Borrower nations participating in China’s Belt and Road Initiative will have a big say in whether its net effect helps the world meet the Paris Agreement’s carbon objectives or puts them forever out of reach. Climate experts who track China’s massive infrastructure and trade scheme say that in its first five years the initiative has overwhelmingly supported fossil fuels infrastructure while giving short shrift to renewables and low-carbon technology. The early track record, experts say, may be due in part to China using coal-fired power in its own development or may be linked to China’s domestic shift away from conventional fossil fuels that has forced its domestic industries to seek new markets....

By Steve Quinn JUNEAU Alaska (Reuters) - An earthquake with a magnitude of 5.9 struck the coast of Alaska early on Friday, shaking people awake in the capital Juneau and cutting off some communications in the southeast part of the state, officials said. An underwater fiber cable linking the area with the rest of the state was damaged, knocking out service for an unknown number of Internet and telephone users, said a spokeswoman for Alaska Communications....

California lawmakers are weighing a bill aimed at protecting their state’s citizens from surreptitious genetic testing but scientists are voicing their growing concerns that, if passed, such a law would have a costly and damaging effect on research. The bill, dubbed the Genetic Information Privacy Act, would require an individual’s written consent for the collection, analysis, retention, and sharing of his or her genetic information—including DNA, genetic test results, and even family disease history....

BOULDER, Colo. Here’s what this affluent Rocky Mountain city of 100,000 does about a revenue shortfall in the darkest economic hour since the Great Depression: It raises its carbon tax. The city just west of Denver was the first in the nation to slap a levy on carbon emissions so it could meet Kyoto Protocol obligations. As it became apparent this summer the city was slipping and needed more cash to revitalize emissions-cutting programs, town leaders raised the modest tax - tacked to city utility bills - to its maximum....

Egyptian–US chemist Ahmed Zewail, the ‘father of femtochemistry’ who received the chemistry Nobel prize in 1999 for his work using ultrafast lasers to study chemical reactions, has died aged 70. Born in Damanhour, Egypt, in 1946, Zewail gained his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the University of Alexandria before moving to the US where he studied for a PhD at the University of Pennsylvania. He then started postdoctoral research first at the University of California, Berkeley and then later at the California Insititute of Technology....

Many animals, ranging from the rat to the puffer fish, have had their genome sequenced, and now humankind’s closest living relative, the chimpanzee, has joined the group. The publication of a draft sequence of this primate’s genome today in the journal Nature provides the most detailed look yet at the similarities, and differences, between humans and chimps. Previous studies comparing DNA between the two analyzed randomly selected regions of the genetic codes that comprised around 500 base pairs each....

If a dark wizard chops down a forest – technically a renewable biofuel – to feed the machine of industry, is his carbon footprint still zero? What are the fugitive methane levels of dwarfish gem mines? How much carbon is sequestered by the average adult Ent? If these are the questions that keep you awake at night, rest easy – researchers at the University of Bristol in England are on the case....

Like many of us, Theodoros Zanos hates going to the doctor. A researcher at The Feinstein Institute for Medical Research in Manhasset, N.Y., he tends to avoid his general practitioner unless he’s already sick or in pain. But because he loves his smartphone and other gadgets, he wondered why a piece of hardware couldn’t tell him when he really ought to see a doctor—no ifs, ands or buts. Zanos and his colleagues are working on technology they hope might one day be able to listen to and decode the body’s electrical signals, catching warning signs of illness....

Rice farming still shapes the personalities of people in southern China, according to new research from a group of psychologists. The cooperation required to plant, tend and harvest rice grown paddy-style makes those born in southern China think more communally than those born in northern China, where the primary crop is easier-to-farm wheat. The study purports to help explain why some Asian cultures remain more communal despite growing as rich as their European and more individualistic peers....