All Stories
- Animals
Tropical songbirds get their growth spurt late
Tropical songbirds are late bloomers, but that delayed development may give them an advantage after leaving the nest.
- Planetary Science
Mountains, craters revealed in latest images of dwarf planet Ceres
The Dawn spacecraft sent back postcards from Ceres that show off the dwarf planet’s varied terrain.
- Physics
Hawking proposes solution to black hole problem
Light sliding along the boundary of a black hole encodes everything that ever fell inside, suggests Stephen Hawking in a new but incomplete proposal.
By Andrew Grant - Health & Medicine
Earlier is better for HIV treatment
People infected with HIV benefit from starting a drug regimen early, an international study finds.
By Nathan Seppa - Genetics
DNA architecture, novel forensics offer new clues
Going from theory to practice is always rife with problems, be it shifting from the sequence of DNA’s letters to observing its dynamic machinations or from an identity marker in the lab to a piece of courtroom evidence.
By Eva Emerson - Humans
Moon bounces, bad spider leaders and more reader feedback
Readers debate faith's role in evolution, compare politicians to spiders and more.
- Chemistry
Wanted: Crime-solving bacteria and body odor
Forensic investigators are moving past old-school sleuthing to analyze microbes and odors that tell a more complete story, while pursuing ways to enhance traditional tools as well.
By Meghan Rosen - Health & Medicine
Blood test can predict breast cancer relapse
Blood tests for breast cancer DNA can predict relapse.
- Animals
Twin pandas look forward to growth spurts
The surviving panda twin born at the National Zoo last weekend will undergo DNA tests to discover paternity.
By Meghan Rosen - Animals
A world of mammal diversity has been lost because of humans
Humans have eradicated large mammal biodiversity in most regions of the globe, a new study finds.
- Health & Medicine
Virus closely related to hepatitis A discovered in seals
Scientists have discovered a relative of the hepatitis A virus in seals.
- Climate
Hurricane’s tiny earthquakes could help forecasters
Hurricane Sandy set off small earthquakes under its eye as it moved up the U.S. East Coast in 2012. The tiny tremors could help researchers track the behavior of future storms, researchers propose.