All Stories
- Neuroscience
For neurons, birthday matters
How brain cells make their connections during development still isn’t well understood. A new study shows that in the eye, a neuron’s birthday makes a difference in how it finds its targets.
- Psychology
Bilingual homes may give babies a learning lift
Hearing two languages during the first six months of life linked to an early mental advantage.
By Bruce Bower - Computing
Brain-inspired computer chip mimics 1 million neurons
By processing data in parallel, computer chips modeled after the human brain could perform certain tasks, such as pattern recognition, faster and more energy-efficiently than traditional computers.
By Andrew Grant - Animals
Here’s your chance to see the last passenger pigeon
On display for the 100th anniversary of her species’ extinction, the final passenger pigeon specimen looks pretty good.
By Susan Milius - Earth
Cloud seeding fueled fire about weather modification
Experiments in 1964 resulted in “exploding” clouds.
- Health & Medicine
New tests screen for lethal prion disease
Urine and nasal swabs can detect small amounts of the abnormal prions that cause Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.
By Nsikan Akpan - Tech
Robots start flat, then pop into shape and crawl
The machines use heated hinges to transform into shape and crawl around.
By Meghan Rosen - Animals
Octomom and six other extreme animal parents
The octopus that brooded her young for 4.5 years is just the start when it comes to tales of extreme parenting.
- Planetary Science
Rosetta spacecraft confabs with a comet
After a 10-year chase, ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft has met up with comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko.
- Astronomy
Single black hole may be masquerading as a pair
New observations of a recently discovered binary black hole reveal that astronomers may have been seeing double.
- Computing
Barrel jellyfish may hunt with new kind of math
Barrel jellyfish use a new type of mathematical movement pattern to forage for food, a new study suggests.
- Life
Airborne transmission of Ebola unlikely, monkey study shows
No evidence found of macaque monkeys passing deadly virus to each other.