Los Angeles Times - Science

Many can empathize with Kobe Bryant's back spasms

Tue, 13 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Back pain is one of the most common medical problems and will affect about eight out of 10 people during their lifetimes.

It was the tweak felt around the Southland.

Roy Snelling, 73; renowned entomologist was an expert on ants

Mon, 12 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Roy Snelling, an internationally renowned entomologist who turned his boyhood fascination with insects into a lifelong study of the secret world of ants, wasps and bees, has died. He was 73.

King-Harbor's recovery could take years

Mon, 12 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Prospects for the Willowbrook hospital reopening are grim, officials say. L.A. County's bureaucracy is seen as one impediment.

The once-steadfast promise to reopen Martin Luther King Jr.-Harbor Medical Center by February 2009 has given way in recent weeks to the bleak prediction among some officials that it could be years before the linchpin in south Los Angeles County healthcare is resurrected.

Slow, steady -- and under siege

Sun, 11 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Endangered tortoises airlifted from an Army base face other threats.

As the sun rose over the Mojave Desert, researcher Kristina Drake approached with caution as a creature with weary eyes, a scuffed carapace and skin as rough as rhino hide peered at her from the edge of a dirt road just east of here.

Seaweed confirms Monte Verde village in Chile is among oldest in the Americas

Sat, 10 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

The inland settlement, about 14,000 years old, predates the Southwestern Clovis sites by about a millennium and coincides with findings at Paisley Cave in Oregon, researchers say.

Seaweed found at an inland settlement in Chile confirms that the village is one of the oldest inhabited sites in the Americas and demonstrates that residents had extensive contact with the coastline, 50 miles away, researchers said Friday.

Fat around hips may ward off diabetes

Sat, 10 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

It helps to improve sensitivity to the hormone insulin, which regulates blood sugar, researchers find.

Fat near hips may impede diabetes

New idea in mortuary science: Dissolving bodies with lye

Fri, 9 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Since they first walked the planet, humans have either buried or burned their dead. Now a new option is generating interest -- dissolving bodies in lye and flushing the brownish, syrupy residue down the drain.

British birds adapt to global warming

Sat, 10 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Great tits adjust their breeding season so that chicks hatch when winter moth caterpillars -- their main food source -- are most plentiful, long-term research shows.

Researchers have found that at least one bird population in England has managed to adjust to global warming.

The platypus: A living quilt

Thu, 8 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

The duck-billed oddity contains genes that are mammalian, avian and reptilian, scientists who mapped them say.

The platypus, an odd animal with a mole's fur, a duck's bill and venomous spurs on its rear legs, contains genes that are mammalian, avian and reptilian, said an international team of scientists that mapped its genetic code.

Medicare targets marketing abuses with rules proposal

Fri, 9 May 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Senior citizens in Medicare have reported being sold coverage they don't want or need. Some people aren't sure if the federal government can enforce the proposed rules.

Medicare proposed new rules Thursday to curb marketing abuses that have cropped up as the role of private insurance plans has grown in the giant healthcare program for the elderly and disabled.