Science News

All Stories by Science News

  1. Let Them Eat Shrimp: The Tragic Disappearance of the Rainforests of the Sea by Kennedy Warne

    For anyone wondering just what the heck “rainforests of the sea” might be, they’re the world’s largely unsung, highly imperiled, biologically fabulous coastal forests of mangroves. And it’s a telling point that the word mangroves does not appear on the cover of a book devoted to their marvels and troubles. LET THEM EAT SHRIMP: THE […]

  2. One Hundred Names for Love: A Stroke, a Marriage, and the Language of Healing by Diane Ackerman

    Review by Laura Sanders.

  3. The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood by James Gleick

    The story of information itself takes readers on a ride through history, from the first alphabet to the bits and bytes of the modern Information Age. Pantheon, 2011, 526 p., $29.95.

  4. The Cloud Collector’s Handbook by Gavin Pretor-Pinney

    For weather buffs or anyone who has hunted cloud animals, this clearly written guide to the skies makes a game of spotting the many kinds of clouds. Chronicle Books, 2011, 143 p., $14.95.

  5. Quantify!: A Crash Course in Smart Thinking by Göran Grimvall

    A fun survey of the use of numbers to make sound judgments, from gravity’s effects on sports records to statistical analysis of the weather. Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 2011, 218 p., $25.

  6. The Great Sperm Whale: A Natural History of the Ocean’s Most Magnificent and Mysterious Creature by Richard Ellis

    A rich exploration of the evolution and biology of this giant sea creature. Univ. Press of Kansas, 2011, 368 p., $34.95.

  7. Driven to Extinction: The Impact of Climate Change on Biodiversity by Richard Pearson

    A scientist examines how species have reacted to past climate shifts and how organisms may respond in the future. Sterling, 2011, 263 p., $22.95.

  8. Science Future for May 21, 2011

    June 1The 2011 hurricane season begins. For storm updates go to www.nhc.noaa.gov June 1–5The World Science Festival returns to New York City with its annual fun and flair. See worldsciencefestival.com July 5–10Watch a 360-degree under-water film and visit exhibits at the Royal Society’s Summer Science Exhibition in London. Learn more at royalsociety.org

  9. Science Past from the issue of May 20, 1961

    U.S. SPACEMAN A-OKAY — The United States broke the space barrier May 5 when Alan B. Shepard, Jr., 37-year-old astronaut, rode the Mercury capsule 302 miles down-range from Cape Canaveral, Fla. At 9:34 a.m. EST the Redstone rocket carrying the Mercury capsule lifted off the launching pad and took the astronaut for a 15-minute trip […]

  10. Letters

    Ain’t got the beat Obviously, Bruce Bower hasn’t tried to teach tourists how to dance. “A man oblivious to music’s tempo” (SN: 3/26/11, p. 9), though not common, is not rare. In the last 35-plus years I’ve shown more than 10,000 visitors to New Orleans how to do the Cajun two-step or waltz, and perhaps […]

  11. From the Archive

    Read the full article (PDF) February 13, 1937 | Vol. 31 | No. 827 Robot Mathematician Solves Nine Simultaneous Equations A ONE-TON machine that in a single action can solve nine simultaneous equations with nine unknowns so complicated in form they might well require days of laborious computation by trained mathematicians has been developed at […]

  12. Health & Medicine

    Body & Brain

    Sleeping babies are growing babies, plus the body-brain connection and women’s circadian clocks in this week’s news.