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New research indicates that reductions in the kind of human-generated air pollution that causes global warming could create unexpected agricultural benefits in India, one of the world’s poorest regions.

Rice harvests increased dramatically in India during the “Green Revolution” of the 1960s and 1970s, making the country self-sufficient in rice, which is its staple food. But harvest growth has slowed since the mid-1980s, raising concerns that food shortages could recur in this densely populated and poor nation.
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What makes people creative? Scientists think that left-handed people are more creative, but does their birth order matter too?

While parents may not have control over their baby’s brains and looks?or what hand they?re going to write with?researcher Markus Baer says they CAN influence their baby’s creativity, especially if it’s their first child.

There are three factors that seem to impact creativity for firstborn children: the number of younger siblings he or she has; having siblings of the opposite sex; and having siblings close in age (less than three years apart).
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Increased underwater noise is making it hard for whales to communicate. Now ambient noise is causing birds to sing louder, so they can still attract a mate.

Charles Q. Choi writes in LiveScience.com that bird songs are becoming faster and higher-pitched, so that other birds of the same species can hear them above the din of airplane and street noise.

Netherlands behavioral biologist Hans Slabbekoorn drove a car and rode his bike through Europe, in order to record a bird called the great tit, which has a song that sounds like “a bicycle hand pump.”
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Will the border fence between the US and Mexico, which was signed into law on Oct. 26 but has not yet been funded, keep out illegals? Should we be trying to keep them out?
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