GOING THE DISTANCE Painted ladies travel 12,000 km each year, farther than any known butterfly migration.
Gerard Talavera
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Magazine
In the June 23 SN: Emmy Noether gets her due, the 411 on ancestry testing, bonobo birthing buddies, a mysterious neutrino surplus, the oldest known lizard fossil, genetic genealogy in police work, Pluto’s dunes and more.
Earth & Environment
Topic Image Rail
MOTION OF THE OCEAN FLOOR The network of submarine fiber-optic cables that deliver work e-mails and cat videos to computers around the world could double as undersea earthquake detectors. Existing cables are shown in purple; planned cables are in blue.
G. Marra et al/Science 2018
TURN IT UP Researchers put an acoustic tagging device on a male narwhal to record its underwater clicks, buzzes and calls.
S. Blackwell
Earth & Environment
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Climate
News
Antarctica has lost about 3 trillion metric tons of ice since 1992
Antarctica’s rate of ice loss has sped up since 1992 — mostly in the last five years, raising global sea level by almost 8 millimeters on average.News
Tropical cyclones have slowed over the last 70 years
Tropical cyclones are moving 10 percent slower, on average, than they did in the mid-20th century, potentially making them more dangerous. -
Earth
News
Underwater fiber-optic cables could moonlight as earthquake sensors
The seafloor cables that ferry internet traffic across oceans may soon find another use: detecting underwater earthquakes.Science Visualized
Here’s a look at the world’s deadliest volcanoes — and the ways they kill
Scientists gathered data on nearly 280,000 global volcano deaths from 1500 to 2017 and sorted fatalities by cause of death, such as lava flows or gas. -
Agriculture
News
Nanoparticles could help rescue malnourished crops
Nanoparticles normally used to fight cancer could also be used to treat malnourished crops.News in Brief
Grapevines are more drought-tolerant than thought
Grapevines handle drought better than previously thought. This could inform irrigation management. -
Ecosystems
Feature
When bogs burn, the environment takes a hit
Bogs and other peatlands around the world store outsized amounts of carbon. Climate change and agriculture are putting them at risk.News
Pollution regulations help Chesapeake Bay seagrass rebound
Regulations that have reduced nitrogen runoff into the Chesapeake Bay are driving the recovery of underwater vegetation. -
Toxicology
News
How bees defend against some controversial insecticides
Some bees have enzymes that allow them to resist toxic compounds in some neonicotinoid pesticides.News
The way poison frogs keep from poisoning themselves is complicated
Gaining resistance to one of their own toxins forced some poison dart frogs to make other genetic tweaks, too. -
Pollution
News
Sunshine is making Deepwater Horizon oil stick around
Sunlight created oxygen-rich oil by-products that are still hanging around eight years after the Deepwater Horizon spill.Science TickerTreating roads with oil and gas wastewater may spread harmful pollution
When spread on roads, wastewater from oil and gas production can leach radium and other contaminants into the environment, a new study finds. -
Sustainability
News
A big analysis of environmental data strengthens the case for plant-based diets
A new study calculates the bonus for the planet of choosing more foods from plants.News
‘Fossil’ groundwater is not immune to modern-day pollution
Ancient groundwater that is thousands of years old is still susceptible to modern pollution, new research suggests. -
Oceans
News
Masses of shrimp and krill may play a huge role in mixing oceans
Hoards of migrating shrimp and krill can cause large-scale turbulence in the ocean, a new study suggests.Science Stats
Ocean heat waves are becoming more common and lasting longer
Over the last 100 years, the world’s oceans have sweltered through a rising number of heat waves.
