All Stories
- Animals
A South American mouse is the world’s highest-dwelling mammal
At 6,739 meters above sea level, the yellow-rumped leaf-eared mouse survives low oxygen and freezing conditions atop a dormant volcano.
- Space
To rehearse Perseverance’s mission, scientists pretended to be a Mars rover
Seven Mars scientists pretended to be the Mars Perseverance rover on a training exercise in the Nevada desert.
- Health & Medicine
Close relatives of the coronavirus may have been in bats for decades
The coronavirus lineage that gave rise to SARS-CoV-2 has been circulating in bats for around 40 to 70 years, a study suggests.
- Oceans
These ancient seafloor microbes woke up after over 100 million years
Scientists discover that microbes that had lain dormant in the seafloor for millions of years can revive and multiply.
- Planetary Science
NASA’s Perseverance rover will seek signs of past life on Mars
NASA’s Perseverance rover will collect rocks and search for past life on Mars using lasers and zoomable cameras among other instruments.
- Physics
A black hole circling a wormhole would emit weird gravitational waves
A new calculation reveals the strange gravitational waves LIGO and Virgo could see if a black hole were falling into a hypothetical tunnel in spacetime.
- Animals
A wasp was caught on camera attacking and killing a baby bird
Some wasps scavenge carrion or pluck parasites off birds, but reports of attacks on live birds are rare.
- Health & Medicine
A popular heartburn medicine doesn’t work as a COVID-19 antiviral
In lab tests, an antacid didn’t prevent coronavirus infection, but clinical tests are needed to see if it can help people who already have COVID-19.
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What it takes to save species, locally and globally
Editor in chief Nancy Shute writes about the struggle to save species on both the local and global levels.
- Astronomy
The star cluster closest to Earth is in its death throes
Gaia spacecraft observations of stars’ motion within and fleeing the cluster suggest the 680-million-year-old Hyades has only 30 million years left.
- Archaeology
Ancient DNA suggests Vikings may have been plagued by smallpox
Viral genetic material from human remains provides direct evidence that smallpox infected people dating back to the year 603.
