All Stories
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Health & Medicine
Taking a weight-loss drug reduced a craving for opioids
Early results from 20 people with opioid use disorder raise hopes that popular weight-loss drugs like Wegovy can tackle opioid addiction, too.
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Come along with us on a mathematical mystery tour
Editor in chief Nancy Shute discusses an unexpected breakthrough on a puzzle that has intrigued mathematicians for almost a century.
By Nancy Shute -
Physics
Here’s how scientists reached nuclear fusion ‘ignition’ for the first time
The first fusion experiment to produce an energy excess required meticulous planning and also revealed a long-predicted heating phenomenon.
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Neuroscience
Ancient viruses helped speedy nerves evolve
A retrovirus embedded in the DNA of some vertebrates helps turn on production of a protein needed to insulate nerve cells, aiding speedy thoughts.
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Planetary Science
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx nabbed over 120 grams of space rocks from asteroid Bennu
After being stymied by two stuck screws, NASA finally accessed a trove of Bennu asteroid bits. Mission scientist Harold Connolly tells what’s next.
By Adam Mann -
Agriculture
Mixing up root microbes can boost tea’s flavor
Inoculating tea plant roots with nitrogen-metabolizing bacteria enhances synthesis of theanine, an amino acid that gives tea its savoriness.
By Nikk Ogasa -
Health & Medicine
Newfound immune cells are responsible for long-lasting allergies
A specialized type of immune cell appears primed to make the type of antibodies that lead to allergies, two research groups report.
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Archaeology
These South American cave paintings reveal a surprisingly old tradition
Radiocarbon dates point to an artistic design practice that began in Patagonia almost 8,200 years ago, several millennia earlier than previously recorded.
By Bruce Bower -
Agriculture
Could a rice-meat hybrid be what’s for dinner?
A hybrid food that combines rice, animal cells and fish gelatin could one day be a more sustainable way to produce meat.
By Meghan Rosen -
Health & Medicine
U.S. opioid deaths are out of control. Can safe injection sites help?
A new NIH study will evalute the only two officially sanctioned sites, in New York City, and a future site in Providence, R.I.
By Tara Haelle -
Animals
Does this drone image show a newborn white shark? Experts aren’t sure
If a claim of the first-ever sighting of a newborn white shark holds, it could help solve a mystery of where adult white sharks give birth.