Technology

The rare and mysterious comet 3I/ATLAS is preparing for its closest approach to Earth this month. On December 19, the interstellar visitor will pass by our planet at a distance of 167 million miles (270 million kilometers). Although it will…

Interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS only the third known visitor from outside our solar system continues to fascinate astronomers worldwide. First detected on July 1, 2025, by the ATLAS survey telescope in Chile, the comet instantly became a global…

Four hundred thousand years ago, near a water hole on grasslands bordering a forest in what is now southern England, a group of Neandertals struck chunks of iron pyrite against flint to create sparks, lighting campfires on…

Lima, Peru — Bats have become the latest mammals susceptible to H5N1, the highly pathogenic avian influenza virus responsible for bird flu. In Peru, over a dozen vampire bats have been found carrying H5N1 antibodies, indicating…

Mosaics can enchant humans with gestalt beauty, but for many other creatures, their worth transcends aesthetics. Repeating patterns of tilelike motifs adorn insect eyes, shark mouths, sunflower heads and many other organisms,…

Even in the face of vast fields of flowers, local bumblebees may face the sting of competition when people bring their honeybees to the floral feast. When beekeepers truck their hives to a mass-blossoming event in upland…

World’s Largest Cockroach: Megaloblatta longipennis, a true marvel of the tropical rainforests of South and Central America, holds the record as the world’s largest winged cockroach. Scientists have been captivated by this unique genus for…

It’s been almost a year since DeepSeek made a major AI splash. In January, the Chinese company reported that one of its large language models rivaled an OpenAI counterpart on math and coding benchmarks designed to evaluate…

Many of us know the feeling: a sudden rush of anger over a seemingly minor thing like a colleague’s irksome email, getting a customer service bot, seeing dishes in the sink or bumper-to-bumper traffic when you’re running late.…

Some 115 million years ago, a veritable fleet of giant predators prowled the waters near Australia. There were long-necked plesiosaurs, snaggletoothed pliosaurs with massive heads, dolphinlike ichthyosaurs, and now — suggests new…

Tantalizing results from small trials and anecdotes raised hopes that drugs like Ozempic could help. Despite setbacks, researchers aren’t giving up yet.

A new climate record suggests that Homo floresiensis — pint-size human relatives nicknamed “hobbits” — endured thousands of years of intensifying drought before disappearing from their Indonesian island home of Flores. The…

The interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS has captivated astronomers and the public alike. Just the third confirmed object to enter our solar system from another star, 3I/ATLAS has offered scientists a rare opportunity to study material formed around…

The altered Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, without new data to justify a reassessment, will no longer recommend universal hepatitis B vaccination at birth. The committee voted 8–3 to limit vaccination of newborns…

Proof that Neandertals hadn’t adapted to cold was right under their noses. Unique video from the naval cavity of a bizarrely well-preserved Neandertal skull confirms the hominid’s enormous noses were not an adaptation to cold…

If there were to be a “best dad” award in the animal kingdom, seahorses would be a shoe-in. That’s because males, not females, of these peculiar fish carry their young to term. They fertilize and nourish eggs deposited on their…

New observations of the interstellar object 3I/ATLAS are raising intriguing questions among astronomers. Recent images suggest changes in the object’s coma, the cloud of gas and dust surrounding its nucleus, providing scientists with fresh…

Laundry-listing facts rarely changes hearts and minds – unless a bot is doing the persuading. Briefly chatting with an AI moved potential voters in three countries toward their less preferred candidate, researchers report…

The microbial toxin colibactin has just the right shape to snuggle up to DNA — but its embrace is unfortunately more cancerous than cozy. Colibactin is produced by bacteria in the gut and causes mutations implicated in colon…

Let the record show: In 2025, one of paleontology’s oldest debates was settled. A second study in as many months confirms — using an independent and novel analysis — that the the tiny tyrannosaur Nanotyrannus is indeed its own…

An erupting volcano may have kicked off a chain of events that led to the swift dance of the Black Plague across Europe in the 14th century, in a pandemic that killed tens of millions of people. New analyses of tree ring data,…

The highly anticipated moment for skywatchers is finally approaching as interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS prepares for its closest pass by Earth this December. The mysterious object famous for both scientific intrigue and viral conspiracy…

The interstellar exocomet 3I/ATLAS has become a global fascination as astronomers and space enthusiasts race to capture its rare passage through our cosmic neighborhood. Recent images shared online especially the remarkably clear shots by…

On August 16, 2012, residents of the tiny Dutch village of Huizinge were rattled by an inexplicably large 3.6 magnitude earthquake. Gas extraction in the nearby Groningen gas field, one of the largest onshore gas fields in the…

The house cat (Felis catus) slunk into China in the eighth century. But long before that, the ancient Chinese were by no means catless. Leopard cats (Prionailurus bengalensis) might have been the first to wander into human…

Important, previously unrecognized genetic changes common to all ancient and modern Homo sapiens spread in Africa more than 300,000 years ago, a new study finds. After that, the same investigation concludes, human evolution…

Meghan Rosen is a senior writer who reports on the life sciences for Science News. She earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry and molecular biology with an emphasis in biotechnology from the University of California, Davis, and later…

“Magic-angle” graphene may provide new clues into poorly understood unconventional superconductors, which operate at higher-than-normal temperatures.

An HPV vaccine delivered into the nose can treat cervical tumors in mice. The vaccine targets a cancer protein produced by the virus.

Major surgery takes a major toll on the body — not unlike running a marathon. You wouldn’t attempt a marathon without training, so why would you undergo major surgery without preparing your body for the trauma it will experience?…