With a simple test, Dean Jones, professor of medicine at Emory University, says he can peg a pet owner. “We can pretty much guess who has pets based upon what's in their blood,” he says. That's because an egg-killing chemical used in tick and flea collars also makes its way into owners' systems. That's as far as the information goes at this point, though. Are these chemicals dangerous? Are they bad for your children's health? No one knows. At least not yet.
Life on Earth for a prairie vole is a rough one. Across the dry and windswept grasslands of the Central United States and Canada they stake their claim, rummaging on seeds and insects and scurrying nervously through networks of underground tunnels. Cold winters (they don't hibernate) and a wide array of predators add to the long list of ways to die. Yet, despite the stress and sadness of such a life, the prairie voles carry on with a little help from their friends. A group of scientists from Emory University found that the tiny voles console others in distress, proving that humans and other large-brained animals are not the only species to recognize and help others in need. Their findings are published today in the journal Science.
Humans have been using alcohol as a medicine since ancient times, using it as an antiseptic and a pain killer, among other things. We're not the only species that does so, apparently. According to biologists at Emory University, fruit flies force alcohol on their larvae to protect them from parasitic wasps.
