Neuroscience
Strange brains offer a glimpse into the mind
A close look at unusual brains offers a way to understand how the human mind is constructed, two new books argue.
Featured Articles in this Issue
-
Cover Story
More than 2 billion people lack safe drinking water. That number will only grow.
By 2050, half the world’s population may no longer have safe water to drink or grow food. What then?
Reviews & Previews
Science Visualized
Neuroscience
This colorful web is the most complete look yet at a fruit fly’s brain cells
Scientists compiled 21 million images to craft the highest-resolution view yet of the fruit fly brain.
Notebook
Animals
Malaysia’s pig-tail macaques eat rats, head first
Pig-tail macaques are seen as a menace on Malaysian palm oil plantations, but may be helping to reduce rodent populations.
Features
-
As waters rise, coastal megacities like Mumbai face catastrophe
For coastal megacities like Mumbai, rising seas and weather chaos linked with climate change threaten economic and social disaster.
-
A freshwater, saltwater tug-of-war is eating away at the Everglades
Saltwater is winning in the Everglades as sea levels rise and years of redirecting freshwater flow to support agriculture and population growth
More Stories from the August 18, 2018 issue
- Life
The right mix of gut microbes relieves autism symptoms in the long run
Replacing missing gut microbes improves autism symptoms in children even two years later.
- Environment
Wildfires are making extreme air pollution even worse in the northwest U.S.
America’s air is getting cleaner — except in places that are prone to wildfires.
- Planetary Science
Jupiter has 12 more moons than we knew about — and one is bizarre
Astronomers found a dozen previously unknown moons of Jupiter, and one may be a remnant of a larger moon that was all but ground to dust.
- Astronomy
Move over, Hubble. This sharp pic of Neptune was taken from Earth
A new strategy at the Very Large Telescope lets astronomers take space telescope–quality pictures from the ground.
- Animals
New ‘Poké Ball’ robot catches deep-sea critters without harming them
A machine that gently catches and releases animals underwater could help researchers take a more detailed census of the deep sea.
- Particle Physics
One particle’s trek suggests that ‘spacetime foam’ doesn’t slow neutrinos
Neutrinos and light travel at essentially the same speed, as predicted.
- Earth
You’re living in a new geologic age. It’s called the Meghalayan
The newly defined Meghalayan Age began at the same time as a global, climate-driven event that led to human upheavals.
- Tech
A new kind of spray is loaded with microscopic electronic sensors
For the first time, researchers have built circuits on microscopic chips that can be mixed into an aerosol spray.
- Earth
The giant iceberg that broke from Antarctica’s Larsen C ice shelf is stuck
A year ago, an iceberg calved off of the Larsen C ice shelf. The hunk of ice hasn’t moved much since, and that has scientists keeping an eye on it.
- Health & Medicine
What leech gut bacteria can tell us about drug resistance
A bacteria found in leeches becomes drug resistant after only a small exposure to common antibiotics.
- Health & Medicine
Lowering blood pressure may help the brain
Aggressively treating high blood pressure had a modest positive effect on the development of an early form of memory loss.
- Genetics
Here’s why wounds heal faster in the mouth than in other skin
Wounds in the mouth heal speedily thanks to some master regulators of immune reactions.
- Particle Physics
A new quasiparticle lurks in semiconductors
Strange entities called collexons hint at undiscovered physics among interacting subatomic particles in a semiconductor.
- Physics
A star orbiting a black hole shows Einstein got gravity right — again
For the first time, general relativity has been confirmed in the region near a supermassive black hole.
- Microbes
How a slime mold near death packs bacteria to feed the next generation
Social amoebas that farm bacteria for food use proteins to preserve the crop for their offspring.
- Health & Medicine
This tick may play a part in gumming up your arteries
Having antibodies to a sugar tied to red-meat allergy is associated with more plaque in the artery walls, a small study shows.
- Earth
In 1968, scientists tried taming hurricanes
For over 20 years, the U.S. government tried to subdue hurricanes through cloud seeding, with mixed results.
- Science & Society
Scientists-turned-students guide viewers through ‘The Most Unknown’
In The Most Unknown, a film on Netflix, a research round robin leads to fascinating discussions about scientific questions.
