All Stories
- Animals
Hippo poop cycles silicon through the East African environment
By chowing down on grass and then excreting into rivers and lakes, hippos play a big role in transporting a nutrient crucial to the food web.
- Planetary Science
Water has been found in the dust of an asteroid thought to be bone-dry
Scientists detected water in bits of an asteroid thought to be devoid of the liquid. Such space rocks might have helped create Earth’s oceans.
- Anthropology
A jawbone shows Denisovans lived on the Tibetan Plateau long before humans
A Denisovan jaw is the earliest evidence of hominids on the Tibetan Plateau, and the first fossil outside of Siberia from the mysterious human lineage.
- Physics
How scientists traced a uranium cube to Nazi Germany’s nuclear reactor program
New research suggests that the Nazis had enough uranium to make a working nuclear reactor.
- Earth
Dry sand can bubble and swirl like a fluid
Put two types of sand grains together in a chamber, and they can flow like fluids under the right conditions.
- Astronomy
Skepticism grows over whether the first known exomoon exists
New analyses of the data used to find the first discovered exomoon are reaching conflicting results.
- Health & Medicine
A mysterious dementia that mimics Alzheimer’s gets named LATE
An underappreciated form of dementia that causes memory trouble in older people gets a name: LATE.
- Physics
Here’s what causes the aurora-like glow known as STEVE
Amateur astronomer images and satellite data are revealing what causes the strange atmospheric glow called STEVE.
- Health & Medicine
How holes in herd immunity led to a 25-year high in U.S. measles cases
U.S. measles cases have surged to 704. Outbreaks reveal pockets of vulnerability where too many unvaccinated people are helping the virus spread.
- Science & Society
A science-themed escape room gives the brain a workout
Quantum physicist Paul Kwiat reveals what it takes do well in LabEscape, his science-themed escape room.
- Animals
How aphids sacrifice themselves to fix their homes with fatty goo
Young aphids swollen with fatty substances save their colony by self-sacrifice, using that goo to patch breaches in the wall of their tree home.
- Health & Medicine
Why war’s emotional wounds run deeper for some kids and not others
Researchers examine why war’s emotional wounds run deep in some youngsters, not others.
