The Wildlife Conservation Society has called for protection of a recently discovered site in Nigeria where millions of migratory swallows (Hirundo rustica) gather to roost each night. Scientists say the site is only one of two known roosts in Cross River State, a coastal region in southeastern Nigeria. Preliminary surveys indicate that the site may attract millions of swallows and be of international significance. The roost appears to be under threat of destruction from advancing farms and may require conservation measures to survive.

  A protein influences the response of the heart to a lack of oxygen and blood flow, such as occurs during a heart attack. This finding may present a new therapeutic approach to treating loss of blood flow and oxygen to the heart.

  Using ESO's Very Large Telescope Interferometer, astronomers have probed the inner parts of the disc of material surrounding a young stellar object, witnessing how it gains its mass before becoming an adult.

  New research in Pediatrics offers another reason to rethink blaming the spike in autism diagnoses on thimerosal, a mercury-containing preservative routinely used in several childhood vaccines until the late '90s. Infants' bodies expel the thimerosal mercury much faster than originally thought -- thereby leaving little chance for a progressive building up of the toxic metal.

  Physicists and astronomers have shown how some solids behave like liquids on the nanoscale. This is a major step forward in discovering how to measure polymer substances using nanoscale technology. The researchers explore the properties of the large class of natural and synthetic materials on the nanoscale.

  Patients treated at top-rated hospitals nationwide are nearly one-third less likely to die, on average, than those admitted to all other hospitals, according to a study released today by HealthGrades, the leading independent healthcare ratings organization. Patients who undergo surgery at these high-performing hospitals also have an average five percent lower risk of complications during their stay, researchers found.

  DNA is the blueprint of all life, giving instruction and function to organisms ranging from simple one-celled bacteria to complex human beings. Now researchers have used DNA as the blueprint, contractor and construction worker to build a 3-D structure out of gold, a lifeless material. Using just one kind of nanoparticle the researchers built two very different crystalline structures by changing one thing -- the strands of synthesized DNA attached to the tiny gold spheres.

  Tiny molecules that help cells regulate which proteins they make might one day help doctors predict which liver-cancer patients are likely to live longer than others. Researchers compared levels of microRNA in tumor cells and adjacent nontumor cells from liver-cancer patients, most of whom also had hepatitis and cirrhosis. Patients with poor disease-free survival had low overall levels of 19 particular microRNAs compared with those showing better survival after 16 years of follow-up.

  A new study sheds light on the relationship between women who smoke while pregnant -- or are exposed to secondhand smoke -- and an increased risk of SIDS to their babies. Researchers found that an infant's ability to respond to oxygen deprivation is dramatically compromised by exposure to nicotine in the womb, even light to moderate amounts.

  Neurological surgeons at Jefferson Hospital for Neuroscience are among the first surgeons in the United States using an FDA-approved liquid system for treating wide-necked brain aneurysms, which could eventually replace current treatments. A brain aneurysm is a weakness in a major blood vessel that causes a portion of the vessel wall to balloon out. This abnormality puts an individual at risk should the aneurysm break open and bleed.

  More than 99 percent of all modern potato varieties planted today are the direct descendants of varieties that once grew in the lowlands of south-central Chile. How Chilean germplasm came to dominate the modern potato -- which spread worldwide from Europe -- has been the subject of a long, contentious debate among scientists.

  Scientists have reported the discovery of two common, single-letter variants in the sequence of the human genome that regulate one of the principle motors of evolution. Yet remarkably, the versions of the SNPs that increase recombination in men decrease it in women, and vice versa.

  Researchers have developed prototypes of a rapid, non-disruptive and less expensive method to decontaminate bioterrorism hazards. Using flat panels that produce X-rays and ultraviolet-C light, the researchers can kill anthrax spores, even hidden ones, in two to three hours without any lingering effects.

  People with rheumatoid arthritis, an inflammatory autoimmune disease, tend to die younger and, largely from cardiovascular disease. One explanation for this increasingly recognized fact is that inflammation promotes atherosclerosis.