Life

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We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.

More Stories in Life

  1. Health & Medicine

    Some GLP-1 drugs are more effective for those with specific gene variants

    In a study, people with gene variants in two genes lost slightly more weight on GLP-1 drugs, but threw up more on Zepbound.

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  2. Health & Medicine

    New mutations help the H5N1 bird flu virus infect cows but not people

    The findings show how the H5N1 bird flu virus is evolving in livestock and what that may mean for human health.

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  3. Life

    Smithsonian secrets most likely to blow your mind

    Millions of objects stashed at a site open only to select visitors tell the history of Earth's inhabitants.

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  4. Life

    Talking dogs and chatty cats could one day ‘speak’ in our language

    Advances in decoding animal sounds might someday make animal translators a possibility.

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  5. Animals

    For gray whales, San Francisco Bay is becoming a deadly pit stop

    Climate change could be forcing gray whales to seek food in San Francisco Bay, where vessel strikes may be driving rising deaths.

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  6. Neuroscience

    Seeing and imagining activate some of the same brain cells

    By recording brain activity directly, scientists showed that imagining an object can revive parts of the neural pattern used to see it.

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  7. Paleontology

    Mummified reptile hints at the origins of how we breathe

    A cave preserved two animals’ rib cages, cartilage and even traces of protein, revealing a flexible breathing apparatus like that of today’s land dwellers.

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  8. Paleontology

    The ‘oldest fossil octopus’ is probably another animal

    In 2000, researchers thought they found the oldest fossil octopus, which lived over 300 million years ago. But it may just be a half-rotten nautilus.

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  9. Animals

    A new book finds parenting inspiration in the animal kingdom

    In The Creatures’ Guide to Caring, science journalist Elizabeth Preston looks to the animal kingdom to explore what it means to be a good parent.

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