All Stories
- Climate
Here’s why Irma caused some coastal water to temporarily go missing
The first sign of an impending storm surge — and serious danger — may be the sudden, wholesale retreat of water from coastal beaches.
- Planets
Cassini spacecraft takes its final bow
Twenty years after it left Earth, NASA’s Cassini mission is about to end — with a crash into Saturn.
- Climate
Five portraits of Hurricane Irma’s record-breaking fury
A series of remarkable images capture Hurricane Irma’s power and might — and the lessons they can teach scientists.
- Physics
The quantum world is mind-bogglingly weird
At the smallest scales, particles are ghostly and ill-behaved. No one understands them, but that doesn’t keep scientists from trying.
- Physics
Explainer: Quantum is the world of the super small
The word quantum often gets misused. What does it mean? Think small. Really, really small.
- Health & Medicine
The five-second rule: Designing an experiment
Is it true that food is still clean if it’s picked up off the floor before five seconds have passed? To find out, we designed an experiment to give us data.
- Health & Medicine
The five-second rule: Growing germs for science
Is it true that food dropped on the floor and picked up after five seconds is clean? To find out, we’re building an incubator and allowing any hitchhiking germs to grow.
- Health & Medicine
The five-second rule: Myth busted?
We’ve done an experiment to test the five-second rule. Now it’s time to analyze the data. Be forewarned: They’re not appetizing.
- Health & Medicine
The five-second rule: Microbes can’t count
A good scientific study compares results to what other scientists have done. These scientists have all debunked the five-second rule.
- Animals
Poop-eating gulls can be pain in the butt for seal pups
The birds can harm baby fur seals as they try to dine on fresh parasites in the pups’ feces.
- Brain
Brains may need flexible networks to learn well
New data suggest that brain cells may learn best when they are able to easily make and break off communications with neighbors — or distant brain regions.
- Animals
Three simple rules guide fire ants in building towers
Fire ants build towers of ants to protect themselves during a flood. New research reveals the simple rules that guide how they do this, no foreman needed.
