News
- Physics
Colliding photons were spotted making matter. But are the photons ‘real’?
Smashups of particles of light creating electrons and positrons could demonstrate the physics of Einstein’s equation E=mc2.
- Health & Medicine
Schools are reopening. COVID-19 is still here. What does that mean for kids?
Children do get COVID-19, and some become very sick and even die. But the disease’s long-term effects on kids remain uncertain.
- Animals
Squirrels use parkour tricks when leaping from branch to branch
Squirrels navigate through trees by making rapid calculations to balance trade-offs between branch flexibility and the distance between tree limbs.
- Space
A lunar magnetic field may have lasted for only a short time
New analyses of Apollo-era lunar rocks suggest that any magnetosphere that the moon ever had endured for no more than 500 million years.
- Physics
A bounty of potential gravitational wave events hints at exciting possibilities
Of about 1,200 possible events, most are probably false alarms, but some could be ripples in spacetime that are especially hard to spot.
- Animals
Snake-eating spiders are surprisingly common
Spiders from at least 11 families feed on serpents many times their size, employing a host of tactics to turn even venomous snakes into soup.
- Physics
Black holes born with magnetic fields quickly shed them
New computer simulations show one way that black holes might discard their magnetic fields.
- Earth
Greece’s Santorini volcano erupts more often when sea level drops
During past periods of lower sea levels, when more of Earth’s water was locked up in glaciers during ice ages, the Santorini volcano erupted more.
- Astronomy
A super-short gamma-ray burst defies astronomers’ expectations
A faraway eruption of gamma rays that lasted for only a second had a surprising origin: the implosion of a massive star.
- Health & Medicine
New delta variant studies show the pandemic is far from over
The coronavirus’s delta variant is different from earlier strains of the virus in worrying ways, health officials are discovering.
- Anthropology
A skeleton from Peru vies for the title of oldest known shark attack victim
The 6,000-year-old remains of a teen with a missing leg and tell-tale bite marks came to light after news of a 3,000-year-old victim in Japan surfaced.
- Animals
Viruses can kill wasp larvae that grow inside infected caterpillars
Proteins found in viruses and some moths can protect caterpillars from parasitoid wasps seeking a living nursery for their eggs.
