Science

Not long before the end of the school year, my husband and I received an e-mail from our fifth-grader’s principal that may now be all-too-familiar to many parents. The subject line included the words, “MULTIPLE COVID CASES.”  Several students in my daughter’s class had tested positive for COVID-19. Her school acted fast. It reinstated a …

Here’s what we know right now about getting COVID-19 again Read More »

Monkeypox is not yet a global public health emergency, the World Health Organization said June 25. The decision comes as the outbreak of the disease related to smallpox continues to spread, affecting at least 4,100 people in 46 countries as of June 24. That includes at least 201 cases in the United States. Those cases …

Monkeypox is not a global health emergency for now, WHO says Read More »

On June 24, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. By undoing the landmark 1973 decision that protected a person’s right to an abortion, the highest court in the country has shifted decisions about this medical care to individual state and local governments. Some states have already passed laws that curtail abortion access. Now, …

5 misunderstandings of pregnancy biology that cloud the abortion debate Read More »

Does the eel use electric fields to navigate? — Science News, June 24, 1972 Many species of ocean fish [such as American eels] migrate over large distances. Some of them do so with such extreme accuracy that they can come thousands of miles to return to the stream or area where they were born. Naturalists …

50 years ago, eels’ navigation skills electrified scientists Read More »

Bits of charcoal entombed in ancient rocks unearthed in Wales and Poland push back the earliest evidence for wildfires to around 430 million years ago. Besides breaking the previous record by about 10 million years, the finds help pin down how much oxygen was in Earth’s atmosphere at the time. The ancient atmosphere must have …

Earth’s oldest known wildfires raged 430 million years ago Read More »

There’s a new record holder for biggest bacterium — and you don’t need a microscope to see it. The newfound species, Thiomargarita magnifica, is roughly a centimeter long, and its cells are surprisingly complex, researchers report in the June 24 Science. The bacterial behemoth is roughly the size and shape of a human eyelash, marine …

This giant bacterium is the largest one found yet Read More »

Despite the scary name, modern vampire squid are docile denizens of the deep sea — but their Jurassic ancestors may have been a lot fiercer. Analyses of fossilized soft tissue from three 164-million-year-old specimens of Vampyronassa rhodanica suggest that the ancient cephalopods had some powerful weapons, researchers say June 23 in Scientific Reports. Unlike its …

Vampire squid are gentle blobs. But this ancestor was a fierce hunter Read More »

For many cats, a mere whiff of catnip can send them into a licking, rolling, plant-shredding frenzy. That destruction amplifies catnip’s natural defenses against insects and its appeal to cats, a new chemical analysis finds. Compared with intact leaves, crushed-up leaves emit more volatile compounds called iridoids, which act as an insect repellant, researchers report …

Cats chewing on catnip boosts the plant’s insect-repelling powers Read More »

PASADENA, Calif. — A lucky celestial alignment has given astronomers a rare look at a galaxy in the early universe that is seeding its surroundings with the elements needed to forge subsequent generations of stars and galaxies. Seen as it was just 700 million years after the Big Bang, the distant galaxy has gas flowing …

An otherwise quiet galaxy in the early universe is spewing star stuff Read More »

By now, wheat planted late last year waves in fields across Ukraine. Spring crops of sunflowers and barley are turning swaths of dark earth into a fuzz of bright green. But with Russia’s war being waged in some of the most fertile regions of Ukraine, uncertainty looms over summer harvesting. Ukrainian farmers braved a war …

Russia’s invasion could cause long-term harm to Ukraine’s prized soil Read More »