Science News for Writers

Immigration is a political hot-button in the upcoming US Presidential election - and while this is primarily illegal immigration that upsets so many, legal immigration is in the news as thousands of Syrians and others flee war zones in search of a safe home. This brings up the question of how do immigrants assimilate into their new society, especially the US society?  There are many myths and assumptions about this process of becoming an American, so a study that breaks down what happens as the first, second, and third generations come to fit in and become citizens. Here's the report with a link to the full report in the attribution: *  *  *  *  *   Immigrants come to resemble native-born Americans  over time, but integration not always link " The U.S. has a long history of accepting people from across the globe,  and successful integration of immigrants and their children  contributes to our economic vitality and a vibrant...

Credit: Busby et al./Current Biology 2015 Gene flow within West Eurasia is shown by lines linking the best-matching  donor group to the sources of admixture with recipient clusters (arrowhead).  Line colors represent the regional identity of the donor group, and line thick- ness represents the proportion of DNA coming from the donor group. Ranges of the dates (point estimates) for events involving sources most similar to  selected donor groups are shown. It's often said that the history we know was written by the winners with the losers lost to history and memory. Until the age of DNA analysis, that is. DNA retains a record of historic events, and the collective DNA of a population can be used to trace historic movements of entire populations or invasions by outside groups. Using DNA allows us to trace historic movements of peoples in pre-history, such as recent research that shows that an unknown somewhat mysterious population invented agricultu...

www.prohamm.de There is a saying, "the more things change, the more they remain the same."   While our society has made tremendous strides since the civil rights movement of the sixties, it's been a bit like squeezing a balloon.  Squeeze here, bulge there.  For those of us alive in the sixties, we've watched as redlining and other blatant discriminations have faded while other racially based practices to control minorities have flourished.  I'm thinking of Nixon's War on Drugs that imprisons primarily black men for essentially petty crimes of simple possession. So have things changed?  Yes and no. This research points out that the balloon has simply bulged in another direction. *  *  *  *  * With racial segregation declining between neighborhoods, segregation now taking new form " Neighborhood segregation still remains high in America ." Recent research has shown that racial segregation in the U.S. is declining between...