HS-PS4-1
Use mathematical representations to support a claim regarding relationships among the frequency, wavelength, and speed of waves traveling in various media.
- Environment
Legos could last a disturbingly long time in the ocean
By looking at toys washed up on beaches, scientists have estimated how long it takes hard plastics to break down in the oceans. And it’s a long time.
- Health & Medicine
New ultrasound treatment kills off cancer cells
Low-frequency ultrasound destroys cancer cells while leaving most healthy cells intact.
- Physics
Soap bubbles’ ‘pop’ reveals the physics of the bursts
A bubble’s pop is a quiet, high-pitched noise. This can reveal the forces that occur during the bubble’s demise.
- Earth
Newfound ‘dunes’ is among weirdest of northern lights
There’s a new aurora dubbed the 'dunes.' It’s weird and joins the ranks of black auroras, STEVE and other odd natural light shows.
- Animals
Here’s how butterfly wings keep cool in the sun
Butterfly wings sport structures that let living tissues release more heat than the rest of the wing.
- Physics
Explainer: Understanding waves and wavelengths
A wave is a disturbance that moves energy from one place to another. Only energy — not matter — is transferred as a wave moves.
- Health & Medicine
Experts rethink need for X-ray shielding of patients
For close to 70 years, workers who perform X-ray scans of the body have been advised to shield sensitive tissues with lead 'aprons.' That may soon stop.
- Materials Science
New twist can hush — even cloak — some sounds
Swiss engineers developed clear, spiral structures to make a new sound-dampening system. Those twists block some vibrations and lets others through.
- Physics
Giving Notre Dame back her unique voice
A 2019 fire robbed Paris’ Notre Dame cathedral of more than her roof. She also lost her voice. Now scientists are using acoustics to return her unique soundscape.
- Physics
Here’s how quantum mechanics lets heat cross a vacuum
Heat can move across a vacuum if the span is small enough. As in really, really small. In a new experiment, the gap was only a few hundred nanometers.
- Animals
Whales echolocate with big clicks and tiny amounts of air
Toothed whales may echolocate using bits of air that they recycle inside their heads to conserve both air and energy.
- Earth
Explainer: Earth — layer by layer
Explore the sizzling heat, unimaginable pressures — and some surprise diamonds — that sit beneath our feet. This is the side of Earth that you can’t see.
