All Stories
- Life
Mega El Niños kicked off the world’s worst mass extinction
Long-lasting, widespread heat and weather extremes may have caused the Great Dying extinction event 252 million years ago.
- Artificial Intelligence
Talking to a chatbot may weaken someone’s belief in conspiracy theories
AI might help lift conspiracy theorists out of the rabbit hole, but some researchers say proceed with caution.
- Environment
How much is climate change to blame for extreme weather?
Scientists can estimate how much more likely or severe some past natural disasters were due to human-caused climate change. Here's how.
- Anthropology
Ancient DNA unveils a previously unknown line of Neandertals
DNA from a partial skeleton found in France indicates that European Neandertals consisted of at least two genetically distinct populations.
- Health & Medicine
California droughts may help valley fever spread
Droughts temporarily dampen the number of valley fever cases across the state, but cases spike in the years after rains return.
- Artificial Intelligence
AI generates harsher punishments for people who use Black dialect
ChatGPT and similar AI sort those who use African American English dialect into less prestigious jobs and dole out harsher criminal punishments.
- Quantum Physics
A quantum computer corrected its own errors, improving its calculations
The corrected calculation had an error rate about a tenth of one done without quantum error correction.
- Health & Medicine
The first face transplant to include an eye shows no rejection a year later
A man who received a partial face transplant that included an eye can’t see out of the eye, but there is blood flow to it.
- Earth
How earthquakes build beefy gold nuggets
The strain imparted by an earthquake can generate voltages in quartz veins that stimulate the mineralization of gold.
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When pain really is in your head
Editor in chief Nancy Shute discusses the complexity of chronic pain, the spread of diseases and training crocs to avoid eating certain toads.
- Animals
Bumblebees lose most of their sense of smell after heat waves
A few hours in high temps reduced the ability of antennae to detect flower scents by 80 percent. That could impact the bees’ ability to find food.
