Environment

Animals

In noisy environs, pied tamarins are using smell more often to communicate

Groups of the primate, native to Brazil, complement vocalizations with scent-marking behavior to alert other tamarins to dangers in their urban home.

Climate

‘Our Fragile Moment’ finds modern lessons in Earth’s history of climate

Michael Mann’s latest book, Our Fragile Moment, looks through Earth’s history to understand the current climate crisis.

Earth

When discussing flora and fauna, don’t forget ‘funga’

Conservation efforts often overlook fungi. That can change by using “mycologically inclusive language,” researchers say.

Earth

How thunderstorms can spawn damaging ‘downbursts’

Powerful winds called downbursts are not the same as a tornado, but the damage they cause can be similar — and can hit with little warning.

Chemistry

Chemists turned plastic waste into tiny bars of soap

Researchers developed a process to turn plastic waste into surfactants, the key ingredients in dozens of products, including soap.

Climate

Emperor penguins lost thousands of chicks to melting ice last year

In 2022, groups of emperor penguins in western Antarctica lost almost all their chicks to receding sea ice, signaling the threat of climate change.

Climate

Some leaves in tropical forests may be getting too hot for photosynthesis

Climate change may be forcing some tropical leaves to stop photosynthesis and die. It’s still unclear what effect this will have on entire forests.

Chemistry

Magnetic ‘rusty’ nanoparticles pull estrogen out of water

Iron oxide particles adorned with “sticky” molecules trap estrogen in water, possibly limiting the hormone’s harmful effects on aquatic life.

Environment

The most intense sunlight on Earth can be found in the Atacama Desert

On the Chilean Altiplano plateau, every square meter of the ground receives, on average, more solar power than Mount Everest and occasionally almost as much as Venus.

Animals

In a ‘perfect comeback,’ some birds use antibird spikes to build their nests

The spikes were meant to keep birds away. But five corvid nests in Europe use the bird-deterrents as structural support and to ward off predators.

Climate

Canada’s Crawford Lake could mark the beginning of the Anthropocene

The mud of a Canadian lake holds an extremely precise record of humans’ influence on Earth. But the Anthropocene isn’t an official geologic epoch yet.

Ecosystems

This seagrass is taking over the Chesapeake Bay. That’s good and bad news

Higher water temperatures are wiping out eelgrass in the Chesapeake Bay and weedy widgeongrass is expanding. Here’s why that seagrass change matters.