All Stories
- Space
Explainer: How auroras light up the sky
The northern and southern lights are considered natural wonders of the world. Here’s how these and related splendid sky glows form.
- Chemistry
Chemists win Nobel Prize for faster, cleaner way of making molecules
Both scientists independently came up with new process — asymmetric organocatalysis. That name may be a mouthful, but it’s not that hard to understand.
- Chemistry
Explainer: In chemistry, what does it mean to be organic?
These are molecules formed by combining carbon with other elements, especially hydrogen.
- Tech
A sense of touch could upgrade virtual reality, prosthetics and more
Scientists and engineers are trying to add touch to online shopping, virtual doctor appointments and artificial limbs.
- Physics
Research on climate and more brings trio the 2021 physics Nobel Prize
Syukuro Manabe and Klaus Hasselmann pioneered work on simulations of Earth’s climate. Giorgio Parisi probed complex materials.
- Plants
Well-known wildflower turns out to be a secret meat-eater
Look closely at Triantha occidentalis, and you’ll see gluey hairs — and a trail of insect corpses on its stem.
- Animals
Analyze This: Some female hummingbirds go undercover
Some female white-necked jacobin hummingbirds boast bright blue colors similar to males. That may help females blend in to avoid attacks.
- Health & Medicine
Starting schools later leads to less tardiness, fewer ‘zombies’
Students attending schools with later start times feel more awake during the day and are less likely to oversleep and be late for class.
- Health & Medicine
A 2021 Nobel goes for discovering how our body reads touch sensations
David Julius and Ardem Patapoutian found nerve-cell sensors for temperature, pain and pressure.
- Animals
There’s a new word for birds stealing animal hair: kleptotrichy
Dozens of YouTube videos show birds grabbing hair from dogs, cats, people, raccoons and even a porcupine — a behavior rarely described by scientists.
- Health & Medicine
Seven strategies to keep COVID-safe at school
Some schools safely brought students back for in-person learning last year. Their experiences suggest how to avoid classroom spread of COVID-19 this year.
- Earth
Scientists Say: Anthropocene
Humans are changing the world in profound ways. Some scientists think those changes have launched a new epoch in Earth’s history: the Anthropocene.
