Sid Perkins

Sid Perkins is a freelance science writer based in Crossville, Tenn.

All Stories by Sid Perkins

  1. Earth

    Stalagmite is scribe for monsoons, society

    Cave formation has recorded monsoon strength in China since the third century.

  2. Climate

    Climate change stifling lemmings

    Warmer winter temperatures are altering the snowpack, squelching the rodents’ population booms.

  3. Chemistry

    Oldest evidence for complex life in doubt

    Chemical biomarkers in ancient Australian rocks, once thought to be the oldest known evidence of complex life on Earth, may have infiltrated long after the sediments were laid down, new analyses suggest.

  4. Chemistry

    Long Live Plastics

    With plastics in museums decomposing, a new effort seeks to halt the demise of materials commonly thought to be unalterable.

  5. Life

    A more fearsome saber-toothed cat

    Analyses of fossils reveal that a third, newly recognized type of saber-toothed cat — one that killed by biting large chunks of flesh from its victim instead of biting its neck and slashing the major blood vessels there —roamed the Americas about a million years ago.

  6. Paleontology

    How pterosaurs took flight

    Extinct flying reptiles known as pterosaurs may have taken to the air with a technique akin to leapfrogging, new research suggests.

  7. Life

    Fossil find may document largest snake

    Rocks beneath a coal mine in Colombia have yielded fossils of what could be the world's largest snake, a 12.8-meter–long behemoth that's a relative of today's boa constrictors.

  8. Climate

    Cooling climate ‘consensus’ of 1970s never was

    Myth often cited by global warming skeptics debunked.

  9. Earth

    Salinity sensors

    Trace elements in the carbonate shells of freshwater mussels could serve as an archive of road salt pollution.

  10. Earth

    Lake Superior’s ups and downs

    Analyses of trees and other organic material buried in a riverbank near Lake Superior’s northwestern shore shed new light on how much and when the lake level varied soon after the last ice age.

  11. Earth

    Pterodactyls may soar once more

    Paleontologists and aeronautical engineers are designing a reconnaissance drone that will mimic the flight of an ancient flying reptile.

  12. Humans

    Origins of Maya pottery material remain mysterious

    Scientists haven’t yet identified the source of volcanic ash used in Maya pottery, but they now have geochemical clues about the ash’s composition.