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  1. Animals

    Parrots can move along thin branches using ‘beakiation’

    The movement involves swinging along the underside of branches with their beaks and feet, similar to how primates swing between trees.

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  2. Earth

    These tiny, crackly bubbles are a new type of volcanic ash

    Scientists have identified a new type of volcanic ash made up of millimeter-long spheres with a crackled surface.

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  3. Earth

    You’re living in a new geologic age. It’s called the Meghalayan

    The newly defined Meghalayan Age began at the same time as a global, climate-driven event that led to human upheavals.

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  4. Health & Medicine

    Delusions of skin infestation may not be so rare

    Delusional infestation, an unwavering belief that one’s skin is overrun with creatures or objects, may not be as rare as previously thought, researchers say.

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  5. Physics

    A single atom can gauge teensy electromagnetic forces

    The force of scattering particles of light was measured in zeptonewtons, a billionth of a trillionth of a newton.

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  6. Animals

    This sea slug makes its prey do half the food catching

    Nudibranchs’ stolen meals blur classic predator-prey levels.

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  7. Planetary Science

    Earth might once have resembled a hot, steamy doughnut

    Newly proposed space objects called synestias are large, spinning hunks of mostly vaporized rock. They look like a jelly-filled doughnut.

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  8. Earth

    Ice particles shaped like lollipops fall from clouds

    Small ice particles called ice-lollies, because of their lollipop-like appearance, can form in clouds.

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  9. Earth

    ‘River piracy’ on a high glacier lets one waterway rob another

    The melting of one of Canada’s largest glaciers has rerouted meltwater from one stream into another in an instance of river piracy.

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  10. Earth

    Whirlwinds of crystals called gravel devils spotted in Andes Mountains

    Large whirlwinds in northern Chile can carry gravel-sized gypsum crystals several kilometers before dumping them in mounds.

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  11. Life

    Tiny toxic proteins help gut bacteria defeat rivals

    A strain of E. coli makes competition-killing tiny proteins and soothes inflamed intestines.

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  12. Materials Science

    Superflexible, 3-D printed “bones” trigger new growth

    New ultraflexible material could be the future of bone repair, but awaits human testing.

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