Greetings–
Like many of you, I’m in a final scramble to finish off a ridiculous to-do list before the holidays hit me like a falling grand piano. So this will probably be the last issue of Friday’s Elk I’ll send out for 2015. I’ll be up and running again on January 8, 2016. So here’s a quick look at the old and the new. Continue reading “Friday’s Elk, December 18, 2015”
The New York Times, December 17, 2015
Over the past few million years, the ancestors of modern humans became dramatically different from other primates. Our forebears began walking upright, and they lost much of their body hair; they gained precision-grip fingers and developed gigantic brains.
But early humans also may have evolved a less obvious but equally important advantage: a peculiar sleep pattern. “It’s really weird, compared to other primates,” said Dr. David R. Samson, a senior research scientist at Duke University.
Continue reading “Down From the Trees, Humans Finally Got a Decent Night’s Sleep”
Greetings–
I was traveling for much of this week on a reporting trip, part of which I spent suited up in the outfit you can see above. So I don’t have a Matter column this week. Instead, let me direct your attention to the second installment of my “Science Happens” video series for STAT. I pay a visit to a lab where scientists are trying to engineer bacteria to heal our microbiomes.
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Best wishes, Carl
Originally published December 11, 2015. Copyright 2015 Carl Zimmer.
Greetings–
Sorry to be sending out this week’s issue of Friday’s Elk on a Saturday. I blame writing. I’m starting on the first draft of my next book, and I was having so much fun spending a day of uninterrupted writing that I forgot about everything else.
Better late than never, here are a couple new items for you to read. Continue reading “Friday’s Elk, December 4, 2015 (The better late than ever edition)”
The New York Times, December 3, 2015
In 2013, an obese man went to Hvidovre Hospital in Denmark to have his stomach stapled. All in all, it was ordinary bariatric surgery — with one big exception.
A week before the operation, the man provided a sperm sample to Danish scientists. A week after the procedure, he did so again. A year later, he donated a third sample.
Scientists were investigating a tantalizing but controversial hypothesis: that a man’s experiences can alter his sperm, and that those changes in turn may alter his children.
Continue reading “Fathers May Pass Down More Than Just Genes, Study Suggests”