Life
- Fossils
Spiked tail to the rescue!
A stegosaur’s bony ‘armor’ didn’t just fend off a predator’s teeth. The tail spikes could gore attackers, ultimately killing them, fossils now show.
- Environment
Will water woes leave Americans thirsty?
In the United States, people often assume that clean water will always be available. But factors ranging from global warming to pollution have begun threatening drinking-water supplies.
- Animals
Teen studies living flashlights of the deep
A teen studies a cryptic fish to better understand when and why it flashes its bacterial glow.
- Health & Medicine
Pills of frozen poop fight killer disease
Popping poop pills? Of course it sounds yucky. But researchers find it might just be one of the most effective ways to knock out a very serious — and tough-to-kill — intestinal disease.
- Microbes
Explainer: What is C. difficile?
Over the past two decades, these severe bacterial infections have evolved from a no-big-deal occurrence to a common, life-threatening problem.
- Animals
News Brief: No hopping for these ancient ‘roos
By hopping, today’s kangaroos can scoot swiftly through the countryside. That was not true for some of their ancient cousins. True giants, those now-extinct kangaroos would have walked on two feet — and relied on their tippy-toes.
- Earth
Coming: The sixth mass extinction?
Species are dying off at such a rapid rate — faster than at any other time in human existence — that many resources on which we depend may disappear.
- Health & Medicine
Strong body helps the mind
Study finds new link between the body and brain in mice and may help explain how exercise heals.
- Health & Medicine
Exercise builds brawn — and brains
One 20-minute session of leg exercises improved memory recall by about 10 percent.
- Brain
The distracted teenage brain
Teens often show poor judgment in decision-making. Scientists have long blamed this on the fact that their brains are still developing. A new study offers another explanation: distractions form rewarding behaviors — ones that persist even after the reward itself has disappeared.
- Health & Medicine
Artificial sweeteners may evict good gut microbes
People use saccharin and other artificial sweeteners to try to stay healthy. A study now suggests such sweeteners might actually cause harm by encouraging the wrong bacteria to grow in our guts.
- Brain
Nobel goes for finding brain’s ‘GPS’
The 2014 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been awarded to scientists who discovered how the brain maps our place within our environment.
