Today I Learned:
1) There was a big study in this month's Science on gender bias in technical tests in France. It was a huge, non-randomized study that analyzed data from a national series of standard professional tests in a number of fields. The tests are split into a written portion, which is name- and gender-blind, and an oral portion, which obviously isn't gender blind. The (rather surprising) finding of the study was that minority genders (women in math, physics, and philosophy; men in languages and literature) scored better on the oral portions than on the written portions, in comparison to the other gender. The effect was stronger for women than for men, and the effect was greatest in the fields with the most gender gap. The authors therefore suggested that oral exams might be helpful for closing the gender gap in male-dominated fields.
Not sure if this study can be taken to mean much solidly, in the big picture, but it's an interesting tidbit. Link here, paywalled, of course: http://ift.tt/2awXlIK
2) Lichens are a symbiotic superorganism made up of a fungus (which provides the structural support for the lichen) and a photosynthesizer, usually a basal plant or prokaryote (which provides the food). Until today! Again from this month's Science, researchers performing transcriptomics on a bunch of lichens found unexpected evidence of *yeast* in the mix. It turns out that several lichen species *also* have a yeast symbiote, though exactly what it's doing for the other two (if it's doing anything at all) is unknown.
That's really about all the article has to say, from what I got from a quick read, but here's the (paywalled) article for completeness: http://ift.tt/2aJ6ctV
3) Elon Musk has been married three times... twice to the same woman. If their public statements are to believed, they separated under good, even loving, terms. Sounds likely to me that they really do love each other and get along well... but Musk just doesn't have time for a wife. With, y'know, saving the world and all.
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