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A study of the impact of the system of intellectual property rights on drug development has highlighted problems that must be addressed. An influential committee meeting this week has the power to bring about change, and should do so.
By snooping on one another's social lives, animals can work out how to behave when they meet in the future. John Whitfield listens in on the natural world's eavesdroppers.
Molecular biologists are deluged with data, and physicists, used to reducing complex systems to basic principles, might help to make sense of it all. But bringing the two disciplines together isn't easy, says Jonathan Knight.
The idea that earthquakes are 'time-predictable' underlies many of today's probabilistic forecasts. In a key test on California's San Andreas fault the concept is found wanting, but the news may not be all bad.
Age reduces the brain's ability to adapt to change. But a surprising measure of neural adaptation does occur, at least in one experimental situation, if change is introduced bit by bit.
Telescopes must respond quickly to pinpoint transient gamma-ray bursts and pick up their afterglow. Mysterious 'dark' bursts seemed to produce no light at optical wavelengths, but a faint signal has now been detected.
The use of mathematical modelling to formulate and test theories is still quite rare in biology. It has now been applied to show how a robust, sharp peak of signalling molecules can be formed in developing fruitfly embryos.
Fluctuations in heart rate can signal disease and may prove fatal. A measurement, based on entropy, of how 'surprising' the beat irregularity is, distinguishes healthy hearts from those suffering common forms of illness.
Sex-allocation theory predicts how the sex ratio of offspring should vary with the mother's physical condition. Applying this theory has helped in retrieving a charismatic parrot from the edge of extinction.
The simple hydrogen exchange reaction was well understood until an unexpected effect emerged in detailed experimental measurements of the process. An explanation for this effect has now been found.
Studies of developmental regulators in worms and cell-cycle regulators in yeast have revealed a new family of enzymes, which may affect the fate of specific messenger RNA molecules.
