Earth
- Environment
50 years ago, chemical pollutants were linked to odd animal behavior
Fifty years after studies hinted that pollution interferes with how aquatic creatures communicate, scientists are still unraveling its myriad effects.
- Earth
Clouds affected by wildfire smoke may produce less rain
As wildfires become more frequent in the western United States, these low-rain clouds could exacerbate drought, fueling more fires.
- Agriculture
Cold plasma could transform the sustainable farms of the future
Physicists have been working on ways to use the power of plasma to boost plant growth and kill pathogens.
- Earth
This pictogram is one of the oldest known accounts of earthquakes in the Americas
The Telleriano-Remensis, a famous codex written by a pre-Hispanic civilization, describes 12 quakes that rocked the Americas from 1460 to 1542.
- Climate
Climate change made Europe’s flash floods in July more likely
The deadly July floods in Belgium and Germany bear the fingerprints of human-caused climate change, scientists say.
- Earth
Haiti’s citizen seismologists helped track its devastating quake in real time
Two scientists explain how citizen scientists and their work could help provide a better understanding of Haiti’s seismic hazards.
- Science & Society
How extreme heat from climate change distorts human behavior
As temperatures rise, violence and aggression go up while focus and productivity decline. The well off can escape to cool spaces; the poor cannot.
- Physics
Windbreaks, surprisingly, could help wind farms boost power output
Wind farm performance could be improved by 10 percent by using low barriers to increase the wind speed directed at the turbines, simulations suggest.
- Climate
The new UN climate change report shows there’s no time for denial or delay
Human-caused climate change is unequivocally behind extreme weather events from heat waves to floods to droughts, a massive new assessment concludes.
- Chemistry
50 years ago, scientists developed self-destructing plastic
In the 1970s, scientists developed plastic that could quickly break down when exposed to light. But that didn’t solve the world’s pollution problems.
- Earth
A new book reveals stories of ancient life written in North America’s rocks
In ‘How the Mountains Grew,’ John Dvorak probes the interlinked geology and biology buried within the rocks of North America.
- Earth
Greece’s Santorini volcano erupts more often when sea level drops
During past periods of lower sea levels, when more of Earth’s water was locked up in glaciers during ice ages, the Santorini volcano erupted more.
