Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT

Science

Highlights

  1. A Conversation With

    What Ants and Orcas Can Teach Us About Death

    A philosopher journeys into the world of comparative thanatology, which explores how animals of all kinds respond to death and dying.

     By

    Susana Monsó, a philosopher of animal minds at the National Distance Education University in Madrid. “I’ve always been interested in those capacities that are understood to be uniquely human,” she said. “Death was a natural topic to pick up.”
    CreditGianfranco Tripodo for The New York Times
  2. If You Think You Can Hold a Grudge, Consider the Crow

    The brainy birds carry big chips on their shoulders, scientists say. And some people who become subjects of their ire may be victims of mistaken identity.

     By Thomas Fuller and

    Dr. Marzluff believes a crow can hold a grudge for 17 years.
    CreditAlana Paterson for The New York Times
  1. The Rebellious Scientist Who Made Kamala Harris

    The presidential candidate’s mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris, was a breast cancer researcher whose egalitarian politics often bucked a patriarchal lab culture.

     By

    Kamala Harris with her mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris, in 2007, during a Chinese New Year Parade.
    CreditKamala Harris campaign, via Associated Press
  2. This Toad Is So Tiny That They Call It a Flea

    A “toadlet” in Brazil is the second-smallest vertebrate known to exist on the planet.

     By

    Brachycephalus dacnis, the second-smallest species of vertebrate on the planet, was discovered in southeastern Brazil and measures less than 0.7 centimeters long.
    CreditLucas Botelho
    Trilobites
  3. Fossil Reveals Oldest Known Tadpole That Grew to the Size of a Hot Dog

    A 161 million-year-old fossil, linked to a line of extinct frog-like amphibians, is the oldest tadpole ever found.

     By

    CreditGabriel Lío
    Trilobites
  4. Two Black Holes Are Giving the Cosmos a Fright

    The ghosts of stars are up to their usual mischief.

     By

    CreditAndrew Beardmore (Univ. of Leicester) and NASA/Swift
    Out There
  5. Can John Green Make You Care About Tuberculosis?

    With a forthcoming nonfiction book and an online army of Nerdfighters, the young-adult author aims to eliminate an entirely curable global scourge.

     By

    John Green, the best selling author and YouTuber, wants to bridge an “empathy gap” for tuberculosis, which disproportionately affects people in sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia.
    CreditLee Klafczynski for The New York Times

Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT

Origins

More in Origins ›
  1. How Early Humans Evolved to Eat Starch

    Two new studies found that ancient human ancestors carried a surprising diversity of genes for amylase, an enzyme that breaks down starch.

     By

    Early humans, such as this 430,000-year-old individual from Spain, may have evolved to have extra genes for breaking down starch after they started cooking tubers for food.
    CreditJavier Trueba/MSF/Science Source
  2. When Two Sea Aliens Become One

    Primitive animals called comb jellies can fuse their bodies and nervous systems together.

     By

    CreditMariana Rodriguez-Santiago
  3. Why Do Apes Make Gestures?

    Chimps and other apes have been observed making more than 80 meaningful gestures. Three theories have tried to explain why.

     By

    A chimpanzee in Uganda presents his back to another as a request for grooming.
    CreditCat Hobaiter
  4. Our Bigger Brains Came With a Downside: Faster Aging

    A study comparing chimpanzee and human brains suggests that the regions that grew the most during human evolution are the most susceptible to aging.

     By

    The darker green regions of the brain show the parts that have expanded the most during human evolution. A new study shows that they are the same sections that shrink the most during aging.
    CreditVickery et al., Science Advances, 2024
  5. How Did the First Cells Arise? With a Little Rain, Study Finds.

    Researchers stumbled upon an ingredient that can stabilize droplets of genetic material: water.

     By

    Droplets containing RNA float in water. Each color is produced by a different kind of RNA.
    CreditAman Agrawal

Trilobites

More in Trilobites ›
  1. This Toad Is So Tiny That They Call It a Flea

    A “toadlet” in Brazil is the second-smallest vertebrate known to exist on the planet.

     By

    Brachycephalus dacnis, the second-smallest species of vertebrate on the planet, was discovered in southeastern Brazil and measures less than 0.7 centimeters long.
    CreditLucas Botelho
  2. The Early Bird Got the Cicada, Then an Evolutionary Air War Started

    Fossils reveal that prehistoric cicadas’ wings evolved to help them evade hungry predators with feathers and beaks, scientists say.

     By

    An artist’s concept of an Early Cretaceous cicada chased by Longipteryx chaoyangensis, an early bird.
    CreditXu et al., Sci. Adv. 10, eadr2201 (2024)
  3. A Feathered Murder Mystery at 10,000 Feet

    Scientists say they have observed one of the highest-altitude acts of bird predation ever recorded.

     By

    Scientists tracking migratory grey plovers with GPS received signals suggesting the bird had been nabbed by a peregrine falcon at 10,000 feet.
    CreditJasper Koster
  4. Brazilian Fossil Hints at Older Origin for All Dinosaurs

    The discovery may push back the emergence of the reptiles that once ruled the Earth, and clarify how dinosaurs like the Triceratops and Stegosaurus emerged.

     By

    An artist’s concept of Gondwanax paraisensis in a Triassic landscape of present-day southern Brazil. It lived almost 10 million years before any other known dinosaurs.
    CreditMatheus Fernandes Gadelha
  5. Sperm Can’t Unlock an Egg Without This Ancient Molecular Key

    Using Google’s AlphaFold, researchers identified the bundle of three sperm proteins that seem to make sexual reproduction possible.

     By

    CreditYonggang Lu/Osaka University

Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT

Climate and Environment

More in Climate and Environment ›
  1. Climate Change Is Making Disasters Deadlier. Here’s How Much.

    More than half a million people were killed in 10 disasters that climate change worsened, according to a new report.

     By

    Rescue workers escorted a stranded couple to safety from their damaged home after heavy flooding in Letur, Spain, on Wednesday. In some areas of the country, a month’s worth of rain fell in less than a day.
    CreditSusana Vera/Reuters
  2. Clean Energy Is Booming in the U.S. The Election Could Change That.

    Trump has suggested he would dismantle the Inflation Reduction Act, which has reshaped America’s energy landscape. It won’t be easy.

     By

    A battery manufacturing plant under construction at the site of a former steel mill in Weirton, W.Va.
    CreditKristian Thacker for The New York Times
  3. Three Mile Island, Notorious in Nuclear Power’s Past, May Herald Its Future

    The Pennsylvania plant, site of the worst U.S. nuclear energy accident, is at the forefront of efforts to expand nuclear capacity to meet rising electricity demand.

     By Rebecca F. Elliott and

    Cooling towers at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, where Constellation Energy plans to restart a reactor it shut down in 2019.
    Credit
  4. E.P.A., Just Rebounding From Trump Years, Faces an Uncertain Future

    Perhaps more than any other federal agency, the one responsible for protecting air, water and public health is a target for Donald Trump and his allies.

     By

    Former President Donald J. Trump and his supporters have said a second Trump administration would repeal President Biden’s environmental policies and many E.P.A. regulations.
    CreditStefani Reynolds for The New York Times
  5. Can 70 Moms Save a Species?

    Here’s the story of Squilla, a rare North Atlantic right whale mother, and her firstborn. To help their species continue, they’d have to navigate an increasingly dangerous ocean.

     By

    CreditGeorgia Department of Natural Resources, NOAA permit #20556-01
  1.  
  2.  
  3.  
  4.  
  5.  
  6.  
  7.  
  8.  
  9.  
  10.  
  11.  
  12.  
  13.  
  14.  
  15. Advertisement

    SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
  16.  
  17.  
  18.  
  19.  
  20.  
  21.  
  22.  
  23.  
  24.  
  25.  
  26. Advertisement

    SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
  27.  
  28.  
  29.  
  30.  
  31.  
  32.  
  33.  
  34.  
  35.  
  36.  
  37. Advertisement

    SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
  38.  
  39.  
  40.  
  41.  
  42.  
  43.  
  44.  
  45.  
  46.  
  47.  
  48. Advertisement

    SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
  49.  
  50.  
  51.  
  52.  
  53.  
  54.  
  55.  
  56.  
  57.  
  58.  
  59. Advertisement

    SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
  60.  
  61.  
  62.  
  63.  
  64.  
  65.  
  66.  
  67.  
  68.  
  69.  
  70. Advertisement

    SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
  71.  
  72.  
  73. The Panda Factories

    In the 1990s, China began sending pandas to foreign zoos to be bred, in the hope that future generations could be released into the wild. It hasn’t gone as planned.

    By Mara Hvistendahl and Joy Dong

     
  74.  
  75.  
  76.  
  77.  
  78.  
  79.  
  80.  
  81. Advertisement

    SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
  82.  
  83.  
  84.  
  85.  
  86.  
  87.  
  88.  
  89.  
  90.  
  91.  
  92. Advertisement

    SKIP ADVERTISEMENT
  93.  
  94.  
  95.  
  96.  
  97.  
  98.  
Page 9 of 10

Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT

Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT