Life

  1. Microbes

    Get to know your microbes at ‘The Secret World Inside You’

    The American Museum of Natural History’s newest exhibit rehabilitates bacteria’s bad reputation and introduces visitors to the microbiome.

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  2. Animals

    Sharks follow their noses home

    Leopard sharks draw on scents to navigate back to shore, study suggests.

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  3. Neuroscience

    Shrub cells are true to form

    New cell types discovered in the brains of mice

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  4. Health & Medicine

    High-intensity interval training has great gains — and pain

    Intense spurts of activity followed by brief rest can improve heart health, blood glucose and muscle endurance. But some question if the pain of HIIT workouts will impede the popularity.

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  5. Animals

    When tarantulas grow blue hair

    Azure coloring is surprisingly common in the spiders, though they themselves are colorblind.

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  6. Physics

    Aircraft industry could take tips from penguins

    Tiny grooves and an oily sheath prevent water droplets from freezing on the feathers of some penguins.

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  7. Science & Society

    Climate, new physics and Jupiter on the horizon for 2016

    The first issue of the new year features stories about what will, editor in chief Eva Emerson predicts, hold on as scientific newsmakers during 2016.

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  8. Climate

    Arctic passageways let species mingle

    People aren’t the only animals likely to use passages that open up as the Arctic melts.

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  9. Particle Physics

    Dark matter helped destroy the dinosaurs, physicist posits

    In ‘Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs,’ Lisa Randall finds connections between particle physics, cosmology, geology and paleontology.

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  10. Animals

    Ants’ size and profession controlled by chemical tags on DNA

    Epigenetic marks determine whether female Florida carpenter ants are soldiers or foragers.

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  11. Paleontology

    12 amazing fossil finds of 2015

    From an ancient sponge ancestor to the Carolina Butcher, scientists learned a lot about life on Earth this year.

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  12. Animals

    Lemurs chat only with their best friends

    Ring-tailed lemurs maintain friendships built with grooming by calling to each other, a new study finds.

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