Technology

An exceptionally preserved specimen of the ancient bird Archaeopteryx offers the most detailed window yet into the evolution of flight, researchers report online May 14 in Nature. The remarkable preservation of the specimen —…

Placebo testing has been part of the process since the 1940s. It’s unclear what additional measures would achieve — but it may slow development.

For wounded chimpanzees, help sometimes comes in the form of first aid — care rendered not by humans but by other chimps. New research reveals the nature and prevalence of these rarely witnessed events. Thirty years of…

Fighting fungi isn’t easy. Season two of the streaming series The Last of Us has arrived on Max (light spoilers ahead), bringing viewers back to a world where people combat zombies puppeteered by a mind-controlling fungus. Guns…

An apple may not fall far from the tree, but for a leaf, it depends on its shape. Elm or apple leaves — oval and symmetrical, with few protruding lobes — fall quickly, making them likely to end up close to the tree’s base.…

In a groundbreaking advancement for clean energy and climate action, Professor Indrajit Shown of the Hindustan Institute of Technology and Science (HITS), Chennai, has developed an innovative method to convert carbon dioxide (CO₂) into…

In a breathtaking new discovery, NASA has unveiled spectacular footage of enormous auroras raging across Jupiter—so massive that they could easily engulf Earth. Captured by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), these intense light displays…

Add a little-known species of assassin bugs to the list of animals that can fashion and wield tools. And true to their name, the insects use that tool to draw their prey into an ambush, researchers report May 12 in Proceedings of…

Sprinklings of life appear key to the recipe for rain. Lofted flecks of organic material like bacteria, pollen and fungal spores play a profound role in regulating rainfall patterns, a new study suggests. These bioparticles can…

A common chemical in household plastics has been linked with heart disease deaths. In 2018, about 13.5 percent of the more than 2.6 million deaths from cardiovascular disease among people ages 55 to 64 globally could have been…

Grunts, barks, screams and pants ring through Taï National Park in Cȏte d’Ivoire. Chimpanzees there combine these different calls like linguistic Legos to relay complex meanings when communicating, researchers report May 9 in…

Neandertals formed sophisticated hunting parties that drove wild horses into fatal traps around 200,000 years ago. At Germany’s Schöningen site, wooden spears, double-pointed sticks, stone artifacts and butchered remains of…

Not all cell walls are created equal. Take the peculiar makeup of the Borrelia burgdorferi bacterium’s cell wall. It might play a role in lingering symptoms of Lyme disease — the most common tick-borne infection in the United…

Some plants stink of rotting meat or dung, which helps them attract flies for pollination. How plants make the carrion stench, which is usually produced by bacteria feasting on decaying corpses, has been a mystery until now.…

The headlines keep coming: Another federal grant funding medical research terminated. Another lab devoted to mental health losing its funding. Another clinical trial stopped. It’s all part of actions the Trump administration…

Many teens who vape want to quit. A recent clinical trial suggests that a drug used to stop smoking can help. In the last four weeks of a 12-week trial, 51 percent of the 88 teens and young adults taking the drug varenicline,…

An extremely rare moment was caught on camera of a snail laying an egg from its neck. The moment was recorded by an employee of New Zealand’s Department of Conservation. The organisation shared a Facebook video showing the fascinating…

Ancient oxygen-making microbes may have oxygenated large swaths of Earth’s seafloor hundreds of millions of years before the element filled the atmosphere. Geochemical analysis of sediments deposited roughly 2.6 billion years…

Post-workout cold plunges may be having a moment, but a new study dunks on the practice. After a tough workout, muscle recovery was no better in women who immersed themselves in chilly water than in women who didn’t. No…

Neandertals may have been forging projectile weapons out of animal bones 50,000 years earlier than previously thought. A bone fragment unearthed from roughly 80,000-year-old rock in Europe shows signs of sharpening and bitumen…

Where Bronze Age civilizations got large amounts of tin, a scarce metal, to mix with copper into the era’s namesake gold-colored metal has long puzzled archaeologists. A big part of the answer lies in Cornwall and Devon, two…

Implanted tubes that transport bodily fluids can get gross. A lab prototype suggests a new vibration-based way to keep them clean and prevent infection.

Rosettes made by scraping Tête de Moine, or “monk’s head,” cheese result from variations in the friction between the blade and the cheese.

Here’s a great case of real life turning out to be stranger than fiction. From baby’s first storybook to sly adult graphic novels, the story we’re told is the same: Male frogs croak with the bottom of their mouths ballooning…

A Soviet space probe stuck in orbit since a failed 1972 launch is expected to crash to Earth this month. The spacecraft, dubbed Kosmos 482, is predicted to reenter Earth’s atmosphere on May 12, according to a spokesperson for…

The porpoise is critically endangered. Ancient Chinese poems reveal the animal’s range has dropped about 65 percent over the past 1,400 years.

In the quiet village of St Thomas am Blasenstein in Austria, an eerie discovery inside a church crypt has stunned scientists and historians alike. A 279-year-old mummy, preserved with astonishing detail, has revealed a rare and…

A new antivenom relies on antibodies from the blood of Tim Friede, who immunized himself against snakebites by injecting increasing doses of venom into his body.

This year may already be on track to be the second hottest on record, after 2024. Floods and tornadoes are wracking wide swathes of the United States. And more wild weather is expected to be on the horizon. But the federal…

Astronomers have found a giant interstellar cloud surprisingly close to Earth. Lurking about 300 light-years from our solar system, this immense cloud of gas and dust is the closest of its kind ever found to Earth, beating the…