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A Japanese stem-cell scientist is the first to receive government support to create animal embryos that contain human cells and transplant them into surrogate animals since a ban on the practice was overturned earlier this year. Hiromitsu Nakauchi, who leads teams at the University of Tokyo and Stanford University in California, plans to grow human cells in mouse and rat embryos and then transplant those embryos into surrogate animals. Nakauchi’s ultimate goal is to produce animals with organs made of human cells that can, eventually, be transplanted into people....

LEADERS AND DICTATORS I read with great interest “The New Psychology of Leadership,” by Stephen D. Reicher, S. Alexander Haslam and Michael J. Platow. In light of my own experience, the article does capture the salient points of good leadership, but I feel it has not given proper weight to the idea of achievement. Achievement is satisfaction (or accolades) received by a group for supporting its leader. In short, achievement acts as feedback that demonstrates to the group that its faith in supporting the leader’s vision has not been in vain....

Hurricanes are unstoppable, right? Apparently not. An intriguing new computer simulation shows that 78,000 large wind turbines spread across 35,000 square kilometers of ocean outside of New Orleans would have cut Hurricane Katrina’s category 3 winds at landfall by 129 to 158 kilometers per hour (80 to 98 miles per hour) and reduced the storm surge by 79 percent. The same collection of turbines offshore of New York City would have dropped Hurricane Sandy’s winds by 125 to 140 kph and the surge by up to 34 percent....

Ten years after introducing the world to Dolly the sheep, the first cloned animal, University of Edinburgh biologist Ian Wilmut announced last November that he was quitting the cloning game. He was not going out on a high note—neither Wilmut nor any of his colleagues had succeeded in cloning an adult human cell by implanting its nucleus into a properly prepared egg, yielding precious embryonic stem cells. Rather his announcement heralded the publication a few days later of a method for directly transforming human skin cells into a form that was essentially equivalent to the embryonic kind....

“I really tortured others. At night we went out and raided villages. We killed whomever we saw. If we happened to see a woman, we raped her…. Fighting is all there is in the life of a man. Whenever I hear guns go off, I want nothing more than to fight. This thirst lies deep within me.” The young man who is describing these unbelievable horrors has a gaunt but friendly face....

By Alison AbbottThe Leopoldina, Germany’s national academy of sciences, has published a report strongly recommending that preimplantation genetic diagnosis of early embryos be allowed by law when couples know they carry genes that could cause a serious incurable disease if passed on to their children. The report, published on January 18, is “about making it possible for a woman to decide” whether to undergo the preimplantation genetic diagnosis procedure “according to her own conscience,” says ethicist Hans-Peter Zenner at the University of Tübingen, who headed the panel of authors....

New research in specially bred mice has elucidated how the antidepressant Prozac works. Scientists have long known that in addition to discouraging synapses from reabsorbing the neurotransmitter serotonin, Prozac (known generically as fluoxetine) also increases the number of neurons (neurogenesis) in the adult brain. But exactly how the drug manages this multiplication trick has proved difficult to pin down. Now researchers have traced the development cascade of new neurons and determined where fluoxetine exerts its multiplying–and beneficial–effect....

Before Katie Meyler came to West Point, Liberia, the children living there had little hope for the future. The crowded township, which lies on a peninsula that juts into the Atlantic Ocean at the northern end of Monrovia, Liberia’s capital, is the worst slum in the country. Less than two square miles in size, West Point is home to more than 75,000 people crammed into decaying tin shanties without electricity, running water or sanitation....

While every STAT story aims to stimulate your cortex, if this one falls short and makes you yawn, you can thank us anyway—at least if a study published Tuesday is right. If you have a big brain, you can credit yawning for promoting brain growth and activity, the researchers found. And if you have a small brain, you can blame the fact that you don’t yawn long enough. By “you,” psychologist Andrew Gallup of the State University of New York at Oneonta and his colleagues mean “your species....

Physicist Anton Zeilinger may not understand quantum mechanics, but he has not let that stand in his path. Besides paving the way for ultrapowerful computers and unbreakable codes that run on quantum effects, the 62-year-old Austrian has a gift for pushing the limits of quantum strangeness in striking ways. Recently he observed the delicate quantum link of entanglement in light flickered between two of the Canary Islands, 144 kilometers apart. He dreams of bouncing entangled light off of satellites in orbit....

Outside Tapachula, Chiapas, Mexico—10 miles from Guatemala. To reach the cages, we follow the main highway out of town, driving past soy, cocoa, banana and lustrous dark-green mango plantations thriving in the rich volcanic soil. Past the tiny village of Rio Florido the road degenerates into an undulating dirt tract. We bump along on waves of baked mud until we reach a security checkpoint, guard at the ready. A sign posted on the barbed wire–enclosed compound pictures a mosquito flanked by a man and woman: Estos mosquitos genéticamente modificados requieren un manejo especial, it reads....

Although the skies in central Europe were clouded over, observers in Mediterranean countries had an unobstructed view of this unique natural spectacle. A few flight hours were all it took to reach the totality zone of the eclipse, which extended over North Africa and the Mediterranean. Side, on the Turkish Riviera, and As Sallum in the extreme northwestern corner of Egypt on the Libyan border, were among the most promising observation sites....

Climate change is an issue that is deeply entwined with lifestyle and one that requires collective action to solve. However, fake news and misinformation on climate change is interfering with how the scientific community engages with people interested in making lifestyle changes to mitigate the effects of climate change. Furthermore, taking into account the diversity of fake news on other scientific topics such as COVID-19 vaccination, socially effective methods to engage and persuade the majority of the public are a must....

Did you like this article? Editorial Review This article has been reviewed for accuracy, reliability and adherence to academic standards prior to publication. Although the Greek historian Herodotus (l. c. 484-425/413 BCE) is often criticized for inaccuracy in his Histories, his frequently-anthologized On the Customs of the Persians is regarded as accurate. The passage is all the more interesting in that he contrasts the behavior and values of the Persians with those of the Greeks, with the Persians shown in a much more flattering light....

Did you like this article? Editorial Review This article has been reviewed for accuracy, reliability and adherence to academic standards prior to publication. Fortifications of one kind or another had been used in Japan since ancient times, but in the period from 1576 until 1639, a new and distinctive style of castle was constructed. Rather than being used for fighting, these were impressive structures intended to enhance the power and prestige of the person that built them....

As I type this letter, I am sitting in a hotel room in Barcelona, Spain, having just completed an important but little-known meeting: the twice-a-year gathering of editors and other members of Scientific American’s international editions. Reflecting the scientific enterprise itself, the producers of the 14 local-language editions are spread around the world. Although we are in frequent e-mail and phone contact through­out the year, we also meet in person in various cities, the better to learn from one another....

ONE IN SIX PEOPLE lacks access to clean water worldwide, making diarrheal illness—a direct result of poor sanitation—the leading cause of death globally. Water filters would do the trick, but they are generally too expensive to distribute in great enough quantities. By combining nanotechnology with cheap materials such as cotton and tea bags, however, researchers have recently developed mobile water filters that can be manufactured for less than a penny. Most conventional water filters are equipped with small pores that “trap” bacteria, but the pores have a tendency to get clogged, which requires expensive maintenance....

By Chris Arsenault ROME, March 25 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Scientists have bred 30 new varieties of “heat-beating” beans designed to provide protein for the world’s poor in the face of global warming, researchers announced on Wednesday. Described as “meat of the poor”, beans are a key food source for more than 400 million people across the developing world, but the area suitable for growing them could drop 50 percent by 2050 because of global warming, endangering tens of millions of lives, scientists said....

Petroleum alternatives include renewable fuels such as biodiesel, derived primarily from soybeans, and ethanol, distilled mostly from corn grain. In the first comprehensive analysis of the energy gains and environmental impact of both fuels, University of Minnesota researchers determined biodiesel to be the better choice. Ethanol from corn grain produces 25 percent more energy than all the energy people invested in it, whereas biodiesel from soybeans returns 93 percent more. Compared with fossil fuels, ethanol produces 12 percent fewer greenhouse gas emissions, whereas biodiesel produces 41 percent fewer....

Blue whales along the US west coast seem to have recovered from decades of hunting, surprising researchers and regulators who had listed them as threatened. The population of Balaenoptera musculus, the largest animal known to have ever existed, was devastated by whaling. In addition to the global whaling ban, the hunting of blue whales is now legally protected in the US amid widespread fears over the impact of collisions with ships on its long term survival....