Science & Technology

How can a car that runs 100 miles per gallon change the world? A car is just a car, and even one that reaches efficiencies never before seen on the world's roads will not make any difference on its own. The real change comes when that car ceases to be just a car, and becomes a paradigm of the future.

Inside the Consilience of Art and Science exhibit at the Pence Gallery is a large sculpture in a corner by a window facing the street. From a distance it appears to be a large piece of white manufactured plastic, about six feet tall and with irregularly shaped holes. On closer inspection, the sculpture is actually constructed from plastic wrap twisted and wired together. Noises of birds and insects softly permeate the small room.

When it comes to nature, I take after my mom. While my dad thinks an unruly shrub needs a good pruning, my mom happily lets sweet-pea plants sprawl across the yard. She's the one who saves worms on the sidewalk and tries to make necklaces out of fox vertebrae. She's no hippie. Like me, she's just fascinated with nature and science.

Here's something I never knew: It takes 500 gallons of blood to produce one gallon of milk.

Nine months after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, researchers John Kessler of Texas A&M University and David Valentine of UC Santa Barbara finally uncovered optimistic data in the haze of tar balls and oil-slicked water.

Few things in this world feel better than a full night's sleep; a night from which you wake up feeling refreshed, energized and clear-headed.

According to the California Tomato Growers Association, the average American eats almost 80 pounds of tomatoes annually.

Tired of fitting those cable or satellite TV bills into a tight school budget? Then you might want to check out this week's tech of the week: the Slingbox.

In the hopes of acquiring the 2022 World Cup, Japan recently submitted a bid proposing that the country would transmit the event via holograms to stadiums throughout the world.

Whisky, Gin, what a night it has been. Taste unbearable, potency strong. Takes the mind from right to wrong.

If dinosaurs lived today, what would they look like?

The world of an insect is something out of a Quentin Tarantino film. Dragonfly nymphs gnash their mandibles to devour minnows, and ant colonies wage war. A female praying mantis lops off her mate's head just as he climaxes. Cue the blood splatters.

Twelve thousand years ago in what is now Jamaica, there lived a small, flightless bird that at first glance would seem harmless. It was about the size of a chicken, just looking for worms. However, if it felt threatened, it would raise its wings; not to fly, but to use them as bludgeons.

When Aron Ralston had to amputate his own right arm to free himself from an 800-pound boulder pinning him to a cliff wall, he thought his outdoor adventures would have to end. Soon, however, the company Hanger Orthotics and Prosthetics was able to fit Ralston with a prosthetic that could support his body weight while hanging or swinging from ledges. An attachment on the end of the arm is an adapted ice ax that he uses for mountaineering and ice climbing.

In the land before Colgate, teeth got grody. Neanderthals died with their last meals lodged between their molars. Today, scientists are using those preserved food bits to analyze the diet and foraging behavior of our prehistoric cousins.