All Stories by Jessica Shugart
- Humans
Mother lode
Certain sugar molecules in human breast milk do more to foster beneficial microbes, and banish harmful ones, than they do to nourish newborns.
- Environment
Mercury contamination in California to last 10,000 years
Toxic remnants of gold rush will seep into San Francisco area waterways for millennia.
- Anthropology
Hunting boosts lizard numbers in Australian desert
Reptiles prefer to live in places aboriginal people have burned.
- Neuroscience
3-D effects may require one eye only
Peering through a peephole can bring flat images to life.
- Life
Broccoli compound protects rats from lethal radiation
Treatment shields healthy cells from gamma ray attack but lets tumors die.
- Climate
Tropics to launch into uncharted climate territory by 2038
Global temperatures will take a permanent leap above historical bounds by 2047 if greenhouse gas emissions continue unabated, a simulation suggests.
- Animals
Alpine swifts fly nonstop for more than six months
During a journey of 200 days, the birds eat, rest and migrate without touching the ground.
- Earth
Deep network
The NEPTUNE observatory — a ring of six underwater research stations connected to the Internet with fiber optic cables — is the first online observatory to brave the depths of the abyss.
- Life
Blocking a hormone helps mice beat lengthy jet lag
A timekeeping brain molecule steadies the beat of the circadian clock, while stopping it allows for a quick reset.
- Life
Engineered salivary glands keep juices flowing
Organs grown in a lab dish do their job when transplanted into mice.
- Earth
Oxygen wafted into Earth’s atmosphere earlier than thought
Date pushed back to 3 billion years ago, suggesting photosynthesis had evolved by then.
- Earth
Biggest volcano hulks deep
Tamu Massif forms a broad, rounded dome rising about 4 kilometers from the seafloor and stretching 450 by 650 kilometers across.
