All Stories
- Space
Pluto has landslides
New Horizons data reveal Pluto’s first six confirmed landslides along steep crater rims.
- Science & Society
Here’s what happens when you put politicians in charge of science
Proposed federal rules would rely on political appointees to decide how a lot of U.S. science gets done. History shows the consequences of such actions.
- Science & Society
Lost in Curiosity reveals the messy reality of doing science
In her new book, science journalist Roberta Kwok takes readers behind the scenes to understand how researchers get nature to give up its secrets.
- Animals
Summit living isn’t a problem for this tiny mouse
A boost to heat production and drawing in more oxygen may help Andean leaf-eared mice thrive at altitude.
- Health & Medicine
Support goes a long way to boost birth control effectiveness
The HER Salt Lake Contraceptive Initiative’s approach, which centered the user and made refills easy, meant all types of methods worked well.
- Archaeology
Neandertal babies were a lot like ours — but didn’t stay that way
Two studies of Neandertal remains suggest their newborns were about the same size as those of modern humans but developed faster through infancy.
- Climate
Can geoengineering blunt El Niño’s fury?
Marine cloud brightening could cool part of the Pacific and weaken extreme El Niños, simulations suggest. But the approach could have risks.
- Space
A shoebox-sized satellite could expose hidden nuclear weapons in space
There’s never been a good method to check for violations of the Outer Space Treaty’s prohibition of nuclear weapons in space.
- Artificial Intelligence
AI tools meant to vet science are surprisingly easy to fool
The gold standard of scientific review, peer review by researchers’ colleagues, is in crisis. AI might offer a solution but has problems of its own.
- Climate
A robot swarm is on a mission to map Greenland’s perilous ice sheets
The ambitious expedition aims to fill data gaps about the glacier-sea boundary to predict when the world might tip into a catastrophic climate regime.
- Agriculture
Scientists say Beefalo are all beef, no -alo. Breeders disagree
A whole-genome analysis of Beefalo, a hybrid bison-cattle breed, suggests very few individuals have any bison DNA at all, a new study reports.
- Health & Medicine
Many U.S. teens underestimate fentanyl’s deadly risk
A majority of 8th-graders and roughly a third of 10th- and 12th-graders do not see great risk in using fentanyl once or twice, a study reports.
