Tuesday Science News – Advertising for Monkeys, Bird Grammar, Asbestos, Yeast Evolution, and More

It’s time again for this week’s Tuesday Science News. There will also be a Tuesday Science Video posted today at 2:00 pm MDT. I’m changing the formating a little to make it more uniform as to where the link for the article will be. If it’s just one article at the end of that section there will be a (Full Article) link. If its a synthesis several sources then there will be links found in the sections that are gleaned from each article. If I found the article thanks to another source then you’ll see (Full Article via Source).

  • Los Alamos National Laboratory has been closed due to a fire that’s less than a mile from the lab. (Full Article)
  • A Yale primatologist is working with some advertising executives to develop non-human primate advertising. While the images aren’t available yet, they will be “branding” two different types of almost identical jello and then display images that a monkey would find sexy to see if they’re influenced by the advertising. (Full Article)
  • It turns out that finches follow grammatical rules in their songs. (Full Article)
  • Canada helped block the adding of Chrysotile Asbestos to the UN’s list of hazardous chemicals, despite all of the factual evidence. This doesn’t surprise me since when I was representing the US in the International Air Cadet Exchange in Canada I was given a tour of the massive open pit Asbestos mine in Thedford Mines, Quebec. Canada is the world’s second largest producer of Asbestos. So way to go Canada for blocking the attempt of science to promote good health. (Full Article)
  • Yeast in a laboratory has been observed to evolve into multicelluar organisms. Last time I checked, a change like that would be macro-evolution. As it turns out, all that takes is a series of selected mutations over time. Due to the artificial selective pressures this evolution occurred in just a few weeks. (Full Article via RichardDawkins.net)
  • Another uncontacted tribe has been discovered in the Amazon. (Full Article)
  • Parrots have now been found to have the ability to apply logical reasoning. They now join humans and other apes as the only species found with this ability. (Full Article)