News

  1. Neuroscience

    ‘Silent’ cells play a surprising role in how brains work

    New studies show that astrocytes, long thought to be support cells in the brain, are crucial intermediaries for relaying messages to neurons.

    By Laura Sanders
  2. Animals

    Bedbugs may have been one of the first urban pests

    Common bedbugs experienced a dramatic jump in population size about 13,000 years ago, around the time humans congregated in the first cities.

    By Jake Buehler
  3. Anthropology

    Humans used whale bones to make tools 20,000 years ago

    Ancient scavengers of the beached beasts turned their bones into implements that spread across a large area, researchers say.

    By Bruce Bower
  4. Life

    The first cicada concert was 47 million years ago

    A 47-million-year-old cicada fossil from Germany’s Messel Pit could teach us about the evolution of insect communication.