Frontiers | Science News

Science News post list

98 news posts in Young Minds

Young Minds

11 Oct 2016

Frontiers for Young Minds is delighted to announce our newest section – Understanding Biodiversity

Frontiers for Young Minds is proud and excited to announce the launch of its newest specialty section, Understanding Biodiversity. This new specialty will be led by the Specialty Chief Editor Chelsea Specht of UC Berkeley and will provide articles that help our curious young readers to better understand the biological diversity that exists on our planet! The Understanding Biodiversity specialty is now open for submissions and will publish articles with the following scope: Biology is the study of life, and what could be more important than that? When scientists study the variety of life – called biodiversity – they can use tools from ecology, evolution, conservation, genetics, and even the management of our natural resources. They find and describe new species, explore uncharted ecosystems, study how and why species change, investigate patterns in where and when species live, and study processes that make it possible for an ecosystem to survive or thrive. This section of Frontiers for Young Minds will include articles that describe, explore, and explain biological diversity on Earth – past, present, and future. From paleontology to botany to zoology (all animals big and small, from elephants to microbes), articles will address how living things adapt, change, and use […]

Young Minds

23 Aug 2016

Frontiers for Young Minds celebrates its first papers in Understanding Health

Frontiers for Young Minds is growing and we are celebrating the first two papers in our youngest Specialty Section Understanding Health. This new specialty is led by our Specialty Chief Editors, Fulvio D’Acquisto and Jay Giedd. Read the Articles Learn about how Nanotechnology could be the next way to treat cancer by providing an alternative delivery system that is so tiny, yet could be the next solution in targeting cancer cells (Author: Dr. Courtney Thomas). Read full article.   Come and explore what a Biofilm is including how they are formed and how we can try to beat them to treat infections (Authors: Drs. Mira Okshevsky and Rikke Louise Meyer). Read the full article. You can look forward to more articles in this exciting new specialty coming soon. Find Out More More information about participating in Frontiers for Young Minds can be found here. Frontiers for Young Minds is currently accepting submissions in four specialties: Understanding Health Understanding Neuroscience Understanding the Earth and its Resources Understanding Astronomy and Space Science Researchers interested in submitting Frontiers for Young Minds versions of their work can find more information here. Please contact kids@frontiersin.org for any additional questions.

Young Minds

16 Aug 2016

Reject or publish? Kids discuss peer-review

Is the paper fact or fiction? Is the paper boring? These are all things this panel of children look for when reviewing a paper for our journal for kids, Frontiers for Young Minds. Watch the panel of kids explain  what criteria should be used when deciding whether a paper should be accepted or not. Learn how to submit your paper to Frontiers for Young Minds.  The open-access journal for kids is free to access and free to publish, which means that there are no publishing fees.

Young Minds

02 Aug 2016

Measuring the Methane Leaks to the Air from Three Large Natural Gas Production Regions

In the coming years, humans will have choices to make about where we get the fuel that powers our lights for us to see at night, our stoves for our hot meals, our water heaters for our warm baths, and even our cars. These choices will affect the air we breathe: burning fuel often causes pollution, like the smog found in cities, and almost always leads to more greenhouse gases in the air. Smog and greenhouse gases affect the way the Earth cools itself. One choice we have today is: which fuel should we use for our power plants, coal or natural gas? In a recent study, my colleagues and I measured the greenhouse gas emissions from three of the largest natural gas fields in the United States. We found that using natural gas instead of coal to fuel power plants could lead to fewer greenhouse gases in the air. Click here for the full article.

Young Minds

01 Aug 2016

Autoimmunity: Why the Body Attacks Itself 2

The human body is made up of 37 trillion cells and billions of these die every single day. The body has special cells, called macrophages, which consume dying cells to prevent them from building up in your body. Macrophages are also able to eat any cell that is infected by a bacterium or virus. This helps your body to remain as healthy as possible. Sometimes, the macrophages are given the wrong signals and they attack healthy cells. When this happens, your body develops an allergic reaction or inflammation that can lead to something called autoimmunity. Click here for the full article.

Young Minds

01 Jun 2016

What do “yellowballs” have to do with the birth of new stars?

Where do stars come from? Human beings have thought about this question for thousands of years and have proposed many different explanations, but scientists have only had the technology to observe the places where stars are forming for a few decades. This is because stars form inside cold “dusty” clouds in space that are invisible to our eyes and invisible to telescopes that study visible light. Fortunately, we have many instruments today that can record light that our eyes cannot see, and we can use familiar colors to represent this light. Even very cold objects give off infrared light, so we can use this type of light to explore how the dusty clouds produce stars. People from around the world have helped scientists identify an early stage in the development of stars, called “yellowballs,” by searching infrared images in an important science project called the Milky Way Project. Click here for the full article.

Young Minds

10 May 2016

American Indian students first to review Frontiers for Young Minds article

by Amee Hennig, associate Editor for Frontiers for Young Minds When asked where the science in your text book comes from, students often don’t have an answer. It was no different for the students of Lapwai High School, located near the Nez Perce Reservation in Lapwai, ID. So when the nine Nez Perce students of Tami Church’s mathematics class were asked to be the first-ever American Indian student reviewers for a Frontiers for Young Minds article they enthusiastically jumped at the opportunity to make a real impact on a scientific discovery they would not read about in their textbooks. Frontiers for Young Minds is read by kids, teachers and parents around the world.  It’s free for all to read and there are no publishing fees for the distinguished scientists who write   about their cutting-edge discoveries in a language that is accessible for young readers. It is then up to the kids – with the help of a science mentor – to provide feedback and explain to the scientists how to best improve the articles before it is published in the journal. Dr. Ben Zuckerman’s article, “Are there other Earths out there? Astronomers’ first clues to an answer date back 100 years” […]

Young Minds

23 Mar 2016

What is Peer Review? It Depends Who is Asking!

Frontiers for Young Minds and Knowing Neurons are excited to share the results of their collaboration on the question, “What is Peer Review?” In creating an infographic to address this question, we ended up with two versions targeted at two unique audiences. The first version – which you can find here – will be useful to undergraduates and other very early career researchers starting to navigate the research world. The second version, found below, is meant for K-12 teachers and students who want to learn about how and why scientists share their findings with each other. Both infographics are published under a Creative Commons 4.0 NC license, so they are free for educators to use and distribute! We will be sharing the second version with our Frontiers for Young Minds team soon! Thank you again to Knowing Neurons for their work on this!

Young Minds

16 Mar 2016

USA Science and Engineering Festival

Frontiers for Young Minds is proud to be an Official Partner of the 4th USA Science & Engineering Festival, to be held April 16-17, 2016 in Washington, D.C. What is the universe made of? Why did dinosaurs go extinct? What do magic tricks and hip-hop have to with math? What will be the next medical breakthrough? What does baseball have to do with physics? Find out at the 4th USA Science & Engineering Festival Expo where more than 350,000 K-12 students and parents, over 5,000 teachers and over 3,000 STEM professionals will experience the largest celebration of STEM! Participants include more than 1,000 of the world’s leading professional scientific and engineering societies, universities, government agencies, high tech corporations and STEM outreach and community organizations. The two-day Expo is perfect for teens, children and their families, and anyone with a curious mind who is looking for a weekend of fun and discovery. Meet science celebrities like Grammy Award-winning alternative music band “They Might Be Giants!” and  Bill Nye the Science Guy! On Thursday April 14, 2016 middle and high school students will have a chance to view presentations from the most inspiring STEM professionals at the 3rd X-STEM Extreme Symposium! And Sneak Peek […]

Young Minds

23 Feb 2016

Frontiers for Young Minds – Expanding on the Map

Frontiers for Young Minds is excited to be expanding its reach once again. Already it has expanded into four disciplines, and now it has expanded its footprint on the map. The main headquarters for Frontiers and the Frontiers Research Foundation remains in Lausanne, but its Project Manager has moved daily operations for the journal to the Capital Region of New York. This has already increased the opportunity for participation and collaboration with US organizations and universities – like last years’ event at the Bay Area Science Festival and its upcoming appearance at the US Science and Engineering Festival. With staff both in the US and Europe there will be greater ability to take advantage of the widespread outreach opportunities for interested young science minds. With Chief Editors in the US and Europe, authors and editors in numerous countries, and the Young Minds editorial team collaborating from opposite sides of the ocean, Frontiers for Young Minds has taken another step towards becoming the international science outreach and educational resource it seeks to be. And we are continuing to grow. If you are researcher and would like to rewrite one of your published articles for kids, let us know. We are accepting submissions. […]

Young Minds

15 Oct 2015

Frontiers for Young Minds live at the Bay Area Science Festival

Frontiers for Young Minds is excited to bring its team together for a live event as part of the Bay Area Science Festival. Three scientists will not only be writing about their research for younger audiences, but will also face the challenge of presenting their work directly to a live public audience. Those scientists will then face a panel of some of our most experienced Young Reviewers, ages 9-17. Our Young Reviewers will push these researchers to better explain how and why their research is important to the public, and provide feedback on how to make their work more interesting and understandable for their young peers. This event will not only provide a live glimpse into the mechanisms behind every Young Minds article – involving young people directly in the scientific process – but will also provide a chance to get to know some of our Chief Editors, learn about cutting-edge science, and share in a final highlight about music and the brain. We look forward to seeing you there. Event Details: At Chabot Space & Science Center November 6th, 6:30-8:30 pm Due to a generous donation in the names of Judah Carillo and Golden Freedman, all tickets to this […]

Young Minds

10 Aug 2015

VIDEO: The motivation behind Frontiers for Young Minds

Frontiers for Young Minds from Frontiers on Vimeo. Frontiers for Young Minds is a non-profit scientific journal written by scientists for young people, but with an innovative twist: the kids themselves assume the role of “peer reviewer.” Distinguished scientists are invited to write about their cutting-edge discoveries in a language that is accessible for a young audience, and it is then up to the kids themselves – with the help of a science mentor – to critique the article and to explain to the authors how to improve the contribution before publication. As a result, Frontiers for Young Minds provides a collection of freely available scientific articles that are not only rigorous, but also shaped for younger audiences by the input of their own peers. Even before the publication of our first 50 articles, the quality of Frontiers for Young Minds was recognized as one of the American Library Association’s 2014 Great Websites for Kids. In this video, Project Manager Amanda Baker explains some of the motivation behind the project and what it hopes to accomplish going forward. The presentation was given in early 2015 as part of an internal seminar series at Frontiers, since which more articles have been […]