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Animals

Counting the breaths of wild porpoises reveals their revved-up metabolism

A new method tracks harbor porpoises’ breathing to collect rare information on the energy needs of the marine mammals.

Neuroscience

Big data reveals hints of how, when and where mental disorders start

The first wave of data from the PsychENCODE project holds new clues to how and when psychiatric diseases such as schizophrenia emerge.

Archaeology

Corn domestication took some unexpected twists and turns

A DNA study challenges the idea people fully tamed maize in Mexico before the plant spread.

Neuroscience

Here’s a rare way that an Alzheimer’s protein can spread

Amyloid-beta found in vials of growth hormone can move from brain to brain, a mouse study shows.

Animals

50 years ago, armadillos hinted that DNA wasn’t destiny

Nine-banded armadillos have identical quadruplets. But the youngsters aren’t identical enough, and scientists 50 years ago could not figure out why.

Astronomy

The Parker Solar Probe takes its first up-close look at the sun

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe survived its first encounter with the sun and is sending data back to Earth.

Plants

Hybrid rice engineered with CRISPR can clone its seeds

New research has created self-cloning hybrid rice, raising hopes of higher food production.

Health & Medicine

Babies born in opioid withdrawal have unusually small heads

Infants born dependent on opioids had heads that were smaller than babies whose moms didn’t use the drugs during pregnancy.

Humans

‘Little Foot’ skeleton analysis reignites debate over the hominid’s species

Long-awaited analyses of the Little Foot skeleton have researchers disagreeing over resurrecting a defunct species name.

Animals

Nearly 200 Great Barrier Reef coral species also live in the deep sea

There are more coral species lurking in the deep ocean that previously thought. That could be good news for their shallow water counterparts.

Earth

Here’s what was surprising about Kilauea’s 3-month-long eruption

Researchers revealed new insight into the Hawaiian volcano’s most recent eruption.

Life

Biologists are one step closer to creating snake venom in the lab

Milking snakes for venom may soon no longer be needed to make antidotes for bites.