Odd new particles may be tunneling through the planet, and how the flu operates differently in big and small towns
Hoping to spot subatomic particles called neutrinos smashing into Earth, the balloon-borne Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA) detector has circled the South Pole four times. ANITA has yet t...
4 Okt 201820min
The future of PCB-laden orca whales, and doing genomics work with Indigenous people
Science has often treated Indigenous people as resources for research—especially when it comes to genomics. Now, Indigenous people are exploring how this type of study can be conducted in a way that r...
27 Sep 201833min
Metaresearchers take on meta-analyses, and hoary old myths about science
Meta-analyses—structured analyses of many studies on the same topic—were once seen as objective and definitive projects that helped sort out conflicts amongst smaller studies. These days, thousands of...
20 Sep 201825min
The youngest sex chromosomes on the block, and how to test a Zika vaccine without Zika cases
Strawberries had both male and female parts, like most plants, until several million years ago. This may seem like a long time ago, but it actually means strawberries have some of the youngest sex chr...
13 Sep 201822min
Should we prioritize which endangered species to save, and why were chemists baffled by soot for so long?
We are in the middle of what some scientists are calling the sixth mass extinction and not all at-risk species can be saved. That’s causing some conservationists to say we need to start thinking about...
6 Sep 201821min
<i>Science</i> and <i>Nature</i> get their social science studies replicated—or not, the mechanisms behind human-induced earthquakes, and the taboo of claiming causality in science
A new project out of the Center for Open Science in Charlottesville, Virginia, found that of all the experimental social science papers published in Science and Nature from 2010–15, 62% successfully r...
30 Aug 201829min
Sending flocks of tiny satellites out past Earth orbit and solving the irrigation efficiency paradox
Small satellites—about the size of a briefcase—have been hitching rides on rockets to lower Earth orbit for decades. Now, because of their low cost and ease of launching, governments and private compa...
23 Aug 201821min
Ancient volcanic eruptions, and peer pressure—from robots
Several thousand years ago the volcano under Santorini in Greece—known as Thera—erupted in a tremendous explosion, dusting the nearby Mediterranean civilizations of Crete and Egypt in a layer of white...
16 Aug 201821min
