Life

Animals

Wind won’t keep hungry yellow jackets away from your picnic

Hungry yellow jackets are really good at tracking attractive odors. Even in windy and difficult conditions, they can find your barbecue.

Fossils

Fossil vomit shows what one 290-million-year-old predator dined on

Bones in the barfed-up material, which dates to a time before the dinosaurs, offer a rare peek into the diet of a prehistoric hunter.

Physics

Scientists Say: Discharge

In physics, this release of energy can rebalance electrical charges. In biology, such a release might cool you down on a hot day.

Microbes

Analyze This: Which cells are the speediest?

The cellular Olympics would be an amazing spectacle. Some cells move at mind-boggling speeds by jumping, gliding, swimming, expanding or shrinking.

Animals

Intricate silk helps net-casting spiders trap prey in webs

Rufous net-casting spiders can adjust the stiffness and stretchiness of their webs thanks to looping strands of silk.

Health & Medicine

Got brain rot?

Excessive scrolling through social media or viral videos can mess with your mental health — and possibly alter your brain’s development, studies show.

Animals

A bonobo’s imaginary tea party hints that apes can pretend

Kanzi would sometimes play with imaginary juice and grapes, just as humans might. The bonobo's ability challenges old ideas about how animals think.

Oceans

The sea surface covered by seaweed is now as big as South America

The first global mapping of macroalgae blooms in the ocean, last year, reveals rapid growth and a new record for the area seaweed blankets.

Ecosystems

The Okefenokee’s dark waters hold secrets about climate and more

This Georgia peat swamp’s vast stores of carbon and water are under threat from mining and pollution. Scientists and locals are fighting to protect it.

Animals

Let’s learn about animals that can regrow body parts

Animals that regenerate limbs, eyes and other body parts may hold clues to superhuman healing.

Physics

Scientists Say: Equilibrium

This steady state may look like a total standstill, but it’s actually an equal opposition of forces.

Brain

Adolescence appears to last far longer than once thought

The brain undergoes “rewiring” throughout adolescence and doesn’t reach its adult architecture until our early 30s, suggests a new study.