News
- Life
Fossil pushes back land-animal debut
Creatures first squished mud through their five toes millions of years earlier than previously believed.
- Physics
Plants’ reproductive weaponry unfurled
Botanical tricks include adhesion and bubbles to spread their spores into the environment.
-
- Humans
Technique may reveal where it all began
A new strategy overcomes a distance quandary as it tracks the origins of widespread phenomena — from an E. coli outbreak to a fad.
- Humans
Modern era brings death to words
An analysis of books published over two centuries shows how words are born or succumb to shifting social and technological influences.
- Life
After a breakup, coral embryos live on as clones
Even modest waves can break apart embryonic corals, but the bits that survive can grow into separate clones.
- Psychology
Kids flex cultural muscles
Young children, but not chimps or monkeys, generate collective leaps of knowledge.
-
- Earth
Fault’s twists may shake up earthquake forecasts
Deep angles along the southern San Andreas mean future temblors may be stronger than predicted.
-
- Space
Aura of life captured in Earthshine
Light from Earth reflected off the moon contains the kind of information that could prove useful in the characterization of faraway exoplanets.
- Life
Pollutants long gone, but disease carries on
Even without new exposures, various chemicals can impact DNA and cause illness across at least three subsequent generations, rat study finds.
