Humans
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
- Archaeology
The Yamnaya may have been the world’s earliest known horseback riders
5,000-year-old Yamnaya skeletons show physical signs of horseback riding, hinting that they may be the earliest known humans to do so.
- Particle Physics
Muons unveiled new details about a void in Egypt’s Great Pyramid
The subatomic particles revealed the dimensions of the void, discovered in 2016, and helped researchers know where to stick a camera inside.
- 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.
- Archaeology
Ancient DNA unveils disparate fates of Ice Age hunter-gatherers in Europe
Ancient DNA unveils two regional populations that lived in what is now Europe and made similar tools but met different fates.
- Health & Medicine
Here’s how lemon juice may fend off kidney stones
Lemon nanoparticles slowed formation of kidney stones in rats. If the sacs work the same way in people, they could help prevent the painful crystals.
- Health & Medicine
Medicated eye drops may delay nearsightedness in children
Myopia, or nearsightedness, is a growing global health threat. But a Hong Kong study found that medicated eye drops may delay its onset in children.
- Health & Medicine
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.
- Humans
A new biomaterial heals heart attack damage in animals. Humans could be next
If used right after a heart attack, this intravenously delivered biomaterial can preserve cardiac function. It could also treat traumatic brain injury.
- Health & Medicine
A gel cocktail uses the body’s sugars to ‘grow’ electrodes in living fish
A chemical reaction with the body’s own sugars turned a gel cocktail into a conducting material inside zebrafish brains, hearts and tail fins.
- Archaeology
Homo sapiens may have brought archery to Europe about 54,000 years ago
Small stone points found in a French rock-shelter could have felled prey only as tips of arrows shot from bows, scientists say.
- Science & Society
Lots of people feel burned out. But what is burnout exactly?
Researchers disagree on how to define burnout, or if the phenomenon is really another name for depression. Helping people cope at work still matters.
- Life
Fungi don’t turn humans into zombies. But The Last of Us gets some science right
Fungi like those in the post-apocalyptic TV show are real. But humans’ body temperature and brain chemistry may protect us from zombifying fungi.
