News
- Quantum Physics
Two real-world tests of quantum memories bring a quantum internet closer to reality
Scientists successfully entangled quantum memories linked by telecommunications fibers across two different urban environments.
- Neuroscience
Two distinct neural pathways may make opioids like fentanyl so addictive
A study in mice looked at how feelings of reward and withdrawal that opioids trigger play out in two separate circuits in the brain.
- Physics
Here’s how ice may get so slippery
Ice’s weirdly slick exterior might originate from the boundaries between two different types of ice that form on the surface of frozen water.
- Health & Medicine
Young people’s use of diabetes and weight loss drugs is up 600 percent
Young people’s use of diabetes and weight loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy is surging, especially among females ages 18 to 25.
By Meghan Rosen - Health & Medicine
Human body lice could harbor the plague and spread it through biting
Rats and fleas previously got all the blame, but humans’ own parasites could be involved.
- Particle Physics
The neutrino’s quantum fuzziness is beginning to come into focus
An experiment studying the neutrino’s “wave packet” sets a limit on the uncertainty of the subatomic particle’s position.
- Archaeology
One of the world’s earliest farming villages housed surprisingly few people
Hundreds, not thousands, occupied the Turkish site of Çatalhöyük nearly 9,000 years ago, undermining arguments for a Neolithic social revolution.
By Bruce Bower - Health & Medicine
Burning the stomach lining reduces the ‘hunger hormone’ and cuts weight
An experimental weight loss procedure blasts the stomach lining with heat to curb hunger and cut pounds.
By Meghan Rosen - Animals
Sumatran orangutans start crafting their engineering skills as infants
By 6 months old, young orangutans are experimenting with construction materials, and by 6 years old, they are building platforms 20 meters in the air.
- Health & Medicine
Genetic analyses of the bird flu virus unveil its evolution and potential
The H5N1 outbreak in cattle is giving flashbacks to the COVID pandemic. But this time is different.
- Neuroscience
How smart was T. rex?
A debate over how to count neurons in dinosaurs is raising questions about how to understand extinct animals’ behavior.
By Freda Kreier - Paleontology
How did an ancient shark parasite end up fossilized in tree resin?
A worm preserved in 99-million-year-old amber resembles modern flatworms in shark intestines. The rare finding has scientists stumped.