Life
‘We Are Electric’ delivers the shocking story of bioelectricity
Sally Adee’s new book spotlights the underexplored science of the body’s electricity and investigates how bioelectricity could advance medicine.
Featured Articles in this Issue
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Cover Story
What has Perseverance found in two years on Mars?
NASA's Perseverance rover has turned up volcanic rocks, signs of flowing water and some of the materials necessary for life.
Reviews & Previews
Science Visualized
Paleontology
This dinosaur might have used its feet to snag prey in midair like modern hawks
Fossilized toe pads suggest a hawklike hunting style in Microraptor, a dinosaur that some scientists think could hunt while flying.
Notebook
Space
50 years ago, Earth’s chances of contacting E.T. looked slim
In 1973, a researcher calculated that it could take millions of years to contact aliens. But that hasn’t stopped scientists from trying.
Features
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Trauma distorts our sense of time and self. A new therapy might help
The therapy has helped veterans struggling with mental illness imagine their future selves.
More Stories from the February 25, 2023 issue
- Life
A new metric of extinction risk considers how cultures care for species
Conservation efforts should consider relationships between cultural groups and the species important to them, researchers argue.
- Health & Medicine
The deadly VEXAS syndrome is more common than doctors thought
The recently discovered inflammatory disease, VEXAS syndrome, typically occurs in men over 50, affecting nearly 1 in 4,000 in the United States.
- Animals
Are your cats having fun or fighting? Here are some ways to tell
Certain behaviors indicate if your cats’ interaction is friendly, aggressive or something in between, a new study finds.
- Archaeology
Chemical residue reveals ancient Egyptians’ mummy-making mixtures
Chemical clues in embalming vessels reveal previously unknown ingredients used to prepare bodies for mummification and their far-flung origins.
- Earth
Earth’s inner core may be reversing its rotation
In the past 13 years, the rotation of the planet’s solid inner core may have temporarily stopped and then started to reverse direction.
- Materials Science
These shape-shifting devices melt and re-form thanks to magnetic fields
Miniature machines made of gallium embedded with magnetic particles can switch between solid and liquid states.
- Planetary Science
Enceladus is blanketed in a thick layer of snow
Pits on the Saturnian moon reveal the surprising depth of the satellite’s snow, suggesting its plume was more active in the past.
- Physics
Water is weird. A new type of ice could help us understand why
A newfound type of amorphous ice with a density close to liquid water could help scientists make sense of water’s quirks.
- Life
Fossils suggest early primates lived in a once-swampy Arctic
Teeth and jawbones found on Ellesmere Island, Canada, suggest that two early primate species migrated there 52 million years ago.
- Life
How plant ‘muscles’ fold up a mimosa leaf fast
A mimosa plant revs up tiny clumps of specially shaped cells that collapse its leaflets, though why isn’t clear.
- Health & Medicine
Procrastination may harm your health. Here’s what you can do
Scientists have tied procrastination to mental and physical health problems. But don't panic if you haven't started your New Year's resolutions yet.
- Animals
Prairie voles can find partners just fine without the ‘love hormone’ oxytocin
Researchers knocked out prairie voles’ oxytocin detection system. They weren’t expecting what happened next.
