The Korea Herald

Number of Korean science students abroad growing

Dec 27, 2012

The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology said Thursday that the number of Korean students studying science and engineering abroad continues to increase, but has been offset by a high inflow of foreign students.Citing data by Korea’s Science and Technology Policy Institute, the ministry said that the number of undergraduate Korean students who went overseas to study science and engineering doubled to 24,674 in 2011 from 2003.However, the inflow of foreign undergraduates into Korean unive
Korean Peninsula hit by 56 quakes in 2012

Dec 27, 2012

As many as 56 earthquakes hit the Korean Peninsula this year, the second largest number since the nation began seismic observations in 1978, the state weather agency said Thursday.A 3.9 magnitude earthquake that was reported in Muju in the central region on May 11 was the strongest one of the year, according to the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA).This year's tally compares with the annual average of 43.6 quakes between 1999 and 2011, the weather agency said, adding a record-setting 60
Study: Hawaiian island slowly dissolving

Dec 24, 2012

The mountains on Oahu in the Hawaiian Islands are dissolving from within under the slow but inexorable onslaught of groundwater, researchers say.Sometime in the distant future the mountainous tropical island will be reduced to a flat, low-lying island similar to Midway, scientists at Brigham Young University reported Friday.While external erosion is the primary force that wears down mountains, that's not the case on Oahu, they said."We tried to figure out how fast the island is going away and wh
Revealed: The mystery of Rudolph‘s nose

Dec 24, 2012

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer‘s snout has been immortalised in movies, books and song. But until now, no-one has offered a scientific explanation for the glow that allows the world’s most famous antlered herbivore to guide Santa‘s sleigh through the night before Christmas.In a study released Monday, researchers in the Netherlands and Norway used a hand-held microscope to examine the nasal lining of five healthy humans, two reindeer and a sixth person with a non-cancerous nasal growth.Reindeer n
Ecuador volcano blasts more hot rock from crater

Dec 23, 2012

The Tungurahua volcano in central Ecuador keeps spewing gas, ash and red-hot rock, forcing hundreds to evacuate from their homes.The country’s Geophysical Institute says incandescent rock shot from the crater of the 5,023-meter high mountain fell about half (a kilometer) down its flanks. Explosions early Wednesday rattled windows 14 kilometers away, while rain-borne ash has been falling to the southwest of the crater.Regional emergency director Lourdes Mayorga says that about 100 families are st
Scientists draw diabetes-depression link

Dec 23, 2012

Patients with chronic diseases such as diabetes often gradually show symptoms of depression as their illness progresses.The link between diabetes and depression had long been suggested, but not proven, by scientists as far back as the 1680s when renowned English doctor Thomas Willis first stated the hypothesis.A team of Korean and American scientists, led by Dr. Lyoo In-kyoon of Ewha Brain Institute and Division of Life and Pharmaceutical Sciences at Ewha Womans University, corroborated this thr
Neighbor star found to have five planets

Dec 20, 2012

Five planets are orbiting a sun-like star not far the Earth, one in the so-called "habitable zone" where liquid water can exist, British astronomers say.An analysis of existing planet-hunting data by astronomers at the University of Hertfordshire with international colleagues uncovered the quintet of planets circling the star Tau Ceti, the BBC reported.The star is the second nearby one known to host planets, joining Alpha Centauri, our sun's closest neighbor.The five planets include worlds with
Frogs in milk could lead to new drugs

Dec 18, 2012

An old Russian way of keeping milk from going sour by putting a frog in the bucket of milk has led to the finding of new antibiotic substances, scientists say.Organic chemist A.T. Lebedev of Moscow State University and colleagues have identified a number of potential new antibiotic compounds in the skin of the Russian Brown frog, a study published in the American Chemical Society‘s Journal of Proteome Research reported.Amphibians secrete antimicrobial substances called peptides through their ski
Study: Early humans had a taste for grass

Dec 18, 2012

　About 3 million years ago the diet of our very early ancestors in central Africa is likely to have consisted mainly of tropical grasses, researchers say.　A new study led by Oxford University of the fossilized teeth of three early hominim Australopithecus bahrelghazali individuals analyzed carbon isotopes in the teeth and found the signature of a diet rich in foods derived from tropical grasses and sedges, flowering plants resembling rushes, a university release reported.　The discovery suggests
Saber-tooth cat fossil found in Nevada

Dec 18, 2012

Paleontologists working near Las Vegas say they‘ve made an important and rare fossil find, the bones of a saber-tooth cat.“I hate to say we hit the jackpot, this being Vegas -- but we did!” Eric Scott, curator of paleontology at the San Bernardino County Museum in California, told the Highland (Calif.) News.“Meat-eaters are generally uncommon in the fossil record. This makes fossil remains of extinct carnivores very rare and special -- and very tough to find.”Saber-toothed cats, so named for the
Watching porn may hurt short-term memory: study

Dec 17, 2012

People who watch Internet pornography may suffer from short-term memory loss immediately afterward, German scientists have claimed.Researchers from University of Duisberg-Essen conducted a study where they asked 28 German heterosexual men to look at a series of sexual images mixed with non-sexual images such as people laughing, playing sports or carrying a weapon. The average age of participants was 26.The participants were then asked to answer “yes” or “no” on whether or not the image they were
Huge DNA code of the Christmas tree being revealed

Dec 16, 2012

To millions of people, the Christmas tree is a cheerful sight. To scientists who decipher the DNA codes of plants and animals, it’s a monster.We’re talking about the conifer, the umbrella term for cone-bearing trees like the spruce, fir, pine, cypress and cedar. Apart from their Yuletide popularity, they play big roles in the lumber industry and in healthy forest ecosystems.Scientists would love to identify the billions of building blocks that make up the DNA of a conifer. That’s called sequenci
Hormone finding could lead to diabetes cure

Dec 16, 2012

Korean scientists have discovered the role of a hormone that could help develop medicines to treat and cure diabetes and obesity-associated diseases.Dr. Lee Myung-sik of Samsung Medical Center, who is also a professor at Sungkyunkwan University School of Medicine, led a study into “mitokine” signals, which are sent by cells having trouble with their metabolism. They identified that the signal involved a hormone, encoded as the fibroblast growth factor 21, or FGF21. The hormone is induced by mito
Research: Tiny robots may think as a group

Dec 16, 2012

A U.S. researcher says a swarm of tiny robots could be a better solution to accomplishing tasks than one big one and has made "ping-pong" ball-sized examples.University of Colorado at Boulder computer scientist Nikolaus Correll and his research team have developed a basic robotic "building block" which they hope to reproduce in large quantities to develop increasingly complex systems, the university reported Friday.They've created a swarm of 20 robots, each the size of a Ping Pong ball, which th
Distant ‘binge-eating’ black hole observed

Dec 14, 2012

The X-ray jet streaming from a binge-eating black hole in the nearby galaxy of Andromeda has been detected, U.S. and European astronomers say.Classified as an ultraluminous X-ray source or ULX, the object is only the second ever seen in Andromeda, also known as M31, and was the target of an intense observing campaign by orbiting X-ray telescopes and radio observatories on the ground, NASA reported Wednesday.Astronomers say they believe a ULX is a binary system containing a black hole that is rap