All Stories
- Math
How the way we’re taught to round numbers in school falls short
A rounding technique taught in school doesn’t work well for machine learning or quantum computing, but an alternative approach does, researchers say.
- Astronomy
The universe’s background starlight is twice as bright as expected
Images from the New Horizons spacecraft suggest that light from all known galaxies accounts for only half of the cosmos’ visible background glow.
- Earth
How climbers help scientists vibe with Utah’s famous red rock formations
Researchers teamed up with rock climbers to collect rare data that help them assess the seismic stability of red rock formations in Utah.
- Planetary Science
Diamonds may stud Mercury’s crust
Billions of years of meteorite impacts may have flash-baked much of a primitive graphite crust into precious gemstones.
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An extraordinary era in 80,000-plus articles
Editor in chief Nancy Shute looks back at 100 years of Science News coverage and ahead to the future.
- Health & Medicine
What do we mean by ‘COVID-19 changes your brain’?
The events of our lives are reflected in the size, shape and behavior of our constantly changing brains. The effects of COVID-19 changes aren’t clear.
- Science & Society
What made the last century’s great innovations possible?
Science paved the way for antibiotics, lasers, computers and COVID-19 vaccines, but science alone was not enough.
- Climate
Smoke from Australia’s intense fires in 2019 and 2020 damaged the ozone layer
Massive fires like those that raged in Australia in 2019–2020 can eat away at Earth’s protective ozone layer, researchers find.
- Particle Physics
How light from black holes is narrowing the search for axions
The orientation of light waves from the region around galaxy M87’s central black hole rules out the existence of axions of a certain mass.
- Neuroscience
How a scientist-artist transformed our view of the brain
The book ‘The Brain in Search of Itself’ chronicles the life of Santiago Ramón y Cajal, who discovered that the brain is made up of discrete cells.
- Oceans
Even the sea has light pollution. These new maps show its extent
Coastal cities and offshore development create enough light to potentially alter behavior of tiny organisms dozens of meters below the surface.
