Humans
- Health & Medicine
Strict gun laws ended mass shootings in Australia
Australia enacted tough gun laws in 1996, which cut gun exposure — especially to semiautomatic weapons. Since then, new data show, that nation has experienced zero mass shootings.
- Health & Medicine
Zika vaccines look promising
As a Zika epidemic surges through Brazil and northward, scientists are looking for drugs to keep more people from becoming infected. Several vaccines show promise in early tests — but none has yet been tried in people.
- Animals
This mammal has the world’s slowest metabolism
A sloth species manages to exist with a super-slow metabolism by moving little and using its environment for heating and cooling its body.
- Humans
Cave holds earliest signs of fire-making in Europe
Ancient burned bone and heated stones in a Spanish cave are the oldest evidence of ancient fire-making in Europe.
- Animals
Catching ‘Dory’ fish can poison entire coral reef ecosystems
More than half of saltwater-aquarium fish sold in the United States may have been caught in the wild using cyanide, new data show.
- Health & Medicine
Adult diseases may be linked to childhood weight
Danish scientists find that very overweight kids grow up with a heightened risk of colon cancer and stroke.
- Brain
Teen drinking may damage ability to cope with stress
Teens are often tempted to drink alcohol. Drinking too much — and repeatedly — can hurt their ability to manage stress, a study in rats indicates.
- Archaeology
Neandertals: Ancient Stone Age builders had tech skills
Neandertals built stalagmite circles in a French cave 176,500 years ago. These structures show that these ancient human cousins had social and technical skills.
- Health & Medicine
Helping MS patients get a grip on things
An Irish teen has invented a device that helps people with multiple sclerosis address the “clenched fist” symptom that afflicts most such patients.
- Animals
Uh oh! Baby fish prefer plastic to real food
Given a choice, baby fish will eat plastic microbeads instead of real food. That plastic stunts their growth and makes them easier prey for predators.
- Health & Medicine
Heat sickness
Scientists worry that increasing temperatures could combine with air pollution to up rates of illness and premature death — perhaps dramatically.
- Animals
Eating toxic algae makes plankton speedy swimmers
After slurping up harmful algae, copepods swim fast and straight — making them easy prey for hungry predators.
