News

  1. Life

    Spider sex play has its pluses

    In the tricky world of arachnid mating, messing around with not-quite-mature females yields later benefits.

    By Susan Milius
  2. Health & Medicine

    Possible relief for irritable bowel

    Those taking an antibiotic whose effects are localized to the intestines fared better than patients getting a placebo pill, two trials find.

    By Nathan Seppa
  3. Chemistry

    Building big molecules bottom-up

    Using templates, chemists make ring structures on the scale of biological machinery.

    By Rachel Ehrenberg
  4. Paleontology

    Oceans may have poisoned early animals

    High sulfur and low oxygen produced a deadly brew nearly 500 million years ago that apparently stalled a burst of evolutionary change.