Science 6.03.2020

SCIENCE sciencemag.org

PHOTO: JENNIFER Y. LAMB AND MATTHEW P. DAVIS

the Food and Drug Administration, and the

Department of Health and Human Services

for years misinterpreted a law requiring

them to make clinical trial sponsors post

the data to ClinicalTrials.gov. If the ruling

is upheld, it will likely discourage drug

companies from keeping unfavorable

results from the public, and it could offer

vital information for patients and doctors.

Still unclear is how quickly the agencies

might move to fill in the 10-year gap in

compliance—and what the consequences

would be for clinical trial sponsors that

don’t comply.

Canada steps up whale safeguards

CONSERVATION | With only about 400

North Atlantic right whales (Eubalaena

glacialis) remaining, Canada is stepping

up its efforts to keep them safe from ships

and dangerous fishing gear, even as it

tries to keep its lucrative snow crab and

lobster fisheries thriving. New regula-

tions announced last week expand the

area in which whales will be protected by

“dynamic” restrictions—which trigger only

after the animals have been spotted—to the

entire Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Bay of

Fundy. The new restrictions should give

fishers more harvesting opportunities than

seasonlong shutdowns. But it also means

fishing gear could already be in the water

when the whales arrive. “That creates a

huge risk,” says Kristen Monsell, an attor-

ney for the Center for Biological Diversity.

Wind power tops water in U.S.

ENERGY | Last year, wind energy for the

first time surpassed hydropower as the top

source of renewable electricity genera-

tion in the United States, according to a

report out last month from the U.S. Energy

Information Administration. In 2019, wind

turbines produced 300 million megawatt

hours (MWh), compared with 274 million

MWh from dams and 146 million MWh

from all other renewables. The United

States is second only to China in wind

energy production; that country generated

more than 366 million MWh in 2018, the

last year for which statistics are available.

Globally, hydropower continues to be the

largest source of renewable energy.

A satellite that foils space junk

SPACE SCIENCE | One satellite docked

autonomously last week with another, der-

elict one and rescued it, a milestone for a

spaceflight industry increasingly concerned

with space junk. Some 36,000 kilome-

ters above Earth, Northrop Grumman’s

Mission Extension Vehicle (MEV-1) latched

onto Intelsat 901 (IS-901), a 19-year-old

BIODIVERSITY

Glow-in-the-light amphibians

M

ost salamanders don’t stand out: Their

mottled, earth-toned skin helps them

blend into the background of forests and

streams around the world. But shine the

right type of light on them, and they light

up like glow sticks. That’s the finding of a new

study, which reveals for the first time that most

amphibians—from salamanders to frogs—have

fluorescent compounds in their skin, bones,

and even urine that absorb the surrounding light

and re-emit it at specific wavelengths. When

researchers put 32 species of amphibians under

a blue or ultraviolet light, all were biofluores-

cent, emitting a greenish to yellow light from

their skin, they reported last week in Scientific

Reports. This widespread occurrence suggests

biofluorescence appeared early in the evolution-

ary history of amphibians.

An eastern tiger salamander exposed to regular light

(top) and blue light (bottom).

6 MARCH 2020 • VOL 367 ISSUE 6482 1059

Published by AAAS