A new study analyzing interactions between players in a virtual universe game has for the first time provided large-scale evidence to prove an 80-year-old psychological theory called Structural Balance Theory. The research shows that individuals tend to avoid stress-causing relationships when they develop a society, resulting in more stable social networks.

What can you learn from the 120-year-old body of a parasitoid wasp? Using material from museum collections, researchers report that they can tell how males wasps court their females, based on dead specimens.

Healing powers for one of the world's deadliest diseases may lie within sponges, sea worms and other underwater creatures. A scientist is analyzing more than 2,500 samples from marine organisms collected off deep sea near Florida's coast. Some of them could hold the key to developing drugs to fight malaria, a mosquito-borne illness that kills more than 1 million people worldwide annually.

We are continually exposed to a mélange of potentially toxic chemicals through the air we breathe, food and water we consume, and products that come in contact with our skin. Some of these chemicals are suspected of interfering with hormone function; causing cancer, asthma or other respiratory harm; damaging the brain and nervous system; and promoting reproductive disorders or negatively impacting developing embryos. More than 83,000 chemicals have been registered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) of 1976 for use in U.S. commerce. Most of these substances have not been thoroughly tested for their effects on human health. What's more, we are often exposed to chemicals in various multiple combinations that may produce unpredictable effects.

Some critics say the EPA fails to do enough to protect health and are pushing for reform of the 34-year old TSCA. In recent moves that suggest reform may be closer, the EPA in 2009 issued action plans for compounds that pose serious health or environmental concerns and announced as well the establishment of a "Chemicals of Concern" list . Furthermore, the Safe Chemicals Act of 2010 , a bill that would strengthen TSCA, was introduced in Congress this past April; it may be taken up for consideration later this year.

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Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 - United States Environmental Protection Agency - United States - Chemical substance - Health

It's no secret to any dog-lover or cat-lover that humans have a special connection with animals. But in new research, a paleoanthropologist argues that this human-animal connection goes well beyond simple affection. He proposes that the interdependency of ancestral humans with other animal species -- "the animal connection" -- played a crucial and beneficial role in human evolution over the last 2.6 million years.

Researchers suggests a link between polyfluoroalkyl chemicals (PFCs), industrial compounds which are widely used in many consumer products, and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in children. PFCs are highly stable compounds used in industrial and commercial products like stain-resistance coatings, food packaging, and fire-fighting foams.

In the wake of recent radiation overdoses, researchers excited by CT perfusion's promise for diagnosing stroke, cancer, and possibly heart disease have developed a way to reduce the amount of radiation involved in the procedure -- which, when done properly, already involves very little risk.

Air travel poses no "significant threat" to cardiovascular health, with few conditions likely to warrant restrictions, concludes new guidance.

Specialized brain training targeted at the regions of a rat's brain that process sound reversed many aspects of normal, age-related cognitive decline and improved the health of the brain cells, according to a new study.

Do electrons have a fourth property in addition to mass, charge and spin, as popular physics theories such as supersymmetry predict? Researchers from Germany, the Czech Republic and the United States want to find the answer to this fundamental question of physics. In order to improve the precision of previous measurements, they have created a new material with the aid of the Juelich supercomputer JUROPA.