All Stories
- Health & Medicine
Science may get sidelined in artificial turf debate
Despite news reports about the potential harms of artificial turf, studies find synthetic fields have few health risks, although lead levels may be elevated in older fields.
By Beth Mole - Animals
When mom serves herself as dinner
For this spider, extreme motherhood ends with a fatal family feast.
By Susan Milius - Quantum Physics
Atomic clock will keep precise time for 15 billion years
The world’s most precise atomic clock will not lose or gain a second in roughly 15 billion years.
By Andrew Grant - Physics
An even more precise atomic clock
An atomic clock described April 21 in Nature Communications is about three times as precise as its record-setting predecessor.
By Andrew Grant - Climate
Monster storm dominates view from space station
A stunning photograph from the International Space Station captures the size and power of Typhoon Maysak, which clamored through the Western Pacific.
- Animals
Whether froglets switch sexes distinguishes ‘sex races’
Rana temporaria froglets start all female in one region of Europe; in another region, new froglets of the same species have gonads of either sex.
By Susan Milius - Chemistry
Shipwrecked bubbly gives chemists a taste of the past
Champagne preserved at the bottom of the Baltic Sea for 170 years has given chemists a glimpse of past winemaking methods.
By Beth Mole - Tech
Smart card taps track clogs on London’s Tube
To make public subway systems more efficient, researchers track smart card taps and flag problem stations.
- Plants
Bits of bacterial DNA naturally lurk inside sweet potatoes
Samples of cultivated sweet potatoes worldwide carry DNA from Agrobacterium cousin of bacterium used for GMOs.
By Susan Milius - Astronomy
Cosmic rays misbehave in space station experiment
A puzzling feature in a new cosmic ray census may force physicists to rethink which cosmic objects send these speedy particles hurtling across the galaxy.
By Andrew Grant - Ecosystems
Before you plant this spring, consider the birds
A study of Chicago neighborhoods finds that the plants in private yards influence the variety of birds that live in the area.
- Astronomy
Color differences could recalibrate cosmic acceleration rate
Color differences in a class of supernovas could lower estimates of how much dark energy is in the universe.