Editor's picks: Bumpy black holes, pitcher plants' tricky traps, e-cigarette harms, New World monkeys, and Newton's early insights into plant biology

Science News Editor's Picks 02/08/15

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NEWS IN BRIEF When entering a black hole, fasten your seat belt BY ANDREW GRANT Rapidly spinning black holes can generate turbulence, a new analysis shows. Read More Read More»

IT'S ALIVE Fairly bad pitcher traps triumph in the end BY SUSAN MILIUS Carnivorous pitcher plant traps rarely catch much, but their lackadaisical hunting turns out not to be so lame after all. Read More Read More»

NEWS Ancient Maya bookmakers get paged in Guatemala BY BRUCE BOWER New discoveries peg ritual specialists as force behind bark-paper tomes and wall murals. Read More Read More»

WILD THINGS Warming Arctic will let Atlantic and Pacific fish mix BY SARAH ZIELINSKI The ultra-cold, ice-covered Arctic Ocean has kept fish species from the Atlantic and Pacific separate for more than a million years -- but global warming is changing that. Read More Read More»

NEWS Asteroids or planets might trigger a supernova BY CHRISTOPHER CROCKETT Rocky debris falling onto a white dwarf might trigger some supernovas. Read More Read More»

NEWS IN BRIEF E-cigarettes lower immunity to flu and other germs BY JANET RALOFF Electronic cigarettes produce substantial amounts of lung inflammation, a new mouse study finds. They may also reduce the ability to fight off infections from strep and flu germs. Read More Read More»

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More Headlines from Science News NEWS Temperatures taken in the realm of the tiny Aluminum and other materials can serve as their own thermometers at nanometer scales, opening up the possibility of taking the temperature of tiny computer transistors. Read More BY ANDREW GRANT NEWS Monkeys reached Americas about 36 million years ago Peruvian fossils suggest ancient African primates somehow crossed the Atlantic Ocean and gave rise to South American monkeys. Read More BY BRUCE BOWER NEWS Geologists discover tectonic plate’s slippery underbelly Slippery layer of partially melted rock underneath tectonic plate revealed using reflected dynamite blast vibrations. Read More BY THOMAS SUMNER SCIENCE TICKER Isaac Newton’s theory of how water defies gravity in plants A passage in one of Isaac Newton’s journals reveals that he may have theorized basic plant hydrodynamics long before botanists. Read More BY HELEN THOMPSON Facebook | Twitter | YouTube | Google+ Society for Science & the Public • 1719 N Street, N.W. Washington, DC 20036 • Copyright © 2015