All Stories
- Earth
Green-ish pesticides bee-devil honey makers
Pesticides are agents designed to rid targeted portions of the human environment of undesirable critters – such as boll weevils, roaches or carpenter ants. They’re not supposed to harm beneficials. Like bees. Yet a new study from China finds that two widely used pyrethroid pesticides – chemicals that are rather “green” as bug killers go – can significantly impair the pollinators’ reproduction.
- Math
The mutual inspiration of art and mathematics
Economics, origami and other fields trigger new and original creations.
- Earth
Country ants make it big in the city
Odorous house ants act like invading aliens when they discover urban living.
- Life
Mature females key to beluga sturgeon survival
Hatchery fish are unlikely to restore caviar-producing fish populations, a new assessment finds.
- Earth
Fowl surprise! Methylmercury improves hatching rate
A pinch of methylmercury is just ducky for mallard reproduction, according to a new federal study. The findings are counterintuitive, since methylmercury is ordinarily a potent neurotoxic pollutant.
- Psychology
Alcohol distills aggression in large men
A new study suggests that the ‘big, mean drunk guy’ stereotype contains some truth.
- Space
Geophysicists push age of Earth’s magnetic field back 250 million years
South African rocks suggest that the earliest stages of life on Earth were protected from harmful solar radiation.
- Earth
Arctic seafloor a big source of methane
Measurements show that Arctic undersea methane deposits, previously thought to be sealed by permafrost, are leaking into the atmosphere.
- Life
Researchers distinguish two different types of blood stem cells
Working in mice, scientists find that red and white blood cells arise from different progenitors.
- Physics
Aluminum superatoms may split water
Metal clusters could create hydrogen for fuel, simulations suggest.
- Space
Spirit: ‘The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated’
The Mars rover makes a small, but promising, move.
- Health & Medicine
Old drug may be first choice for childhood petit mal epilepsy
Three-way trial shows ethosuximide edging out two newer choices.
