Science
Discover facts about science. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
Science
The squid that turns Toyama Bay into a blue light show
Each spring, firefly squid gather in Toyama Bay and flash blue using tiny light-producing organs called photophores. Blue light travels relatively well…
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Honeybees can headbutt scouts over bad hive choices
A scout bee advertises a possible nest by dancing, and another bee can answer with a quick vibration called a stop signal. The signal interrupts the dance but…
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How soybeans recruit bacteria to make their fertilizer
Soybeans can’t use the nitrogen gas filling the air directly, so they house Rhizobia bacteria in little root nodules. The microbes turn nitrogen into ammonia…
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A virus from ancient frozen ground could still infect amoebas
Researchers recovered Pithovirus from Siberian permafrost dated to about 30,000 years old and found it remained infectious to its amoeba hosts. Its large…
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The strange ecosystem living on ocean plastic
A drifting piece of microplastic can become a tiny floating neighborhood for microbes, called the Plastisphere. Some residents may be Vibrio bacteria, a group…
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Moon dust could cut through spacesuits
On Earth, wind and water round off sand grains; on the Moon, those smoothing forces are missing, so dust keeps its sharp edges. Static electricity makes the…
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You can listen to a reef’s health
A healthy reef has a busy soundtrack: animals click, pop, and call. Hydrophones record that underwater mix, and AI can help spot when it changes. A drop in…
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A neuron and a liver cell read different pages of the same DNA
A neuron and a liver cell carry the same DNA, but they use different instructions. Each cell controls which genes are accessible: a neuron keeps the pages it…
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The cylinders that make microwaves bend around objects
The cylinders steer microwaves around an object rather than making it vanish. Arranged carefully, they guide the waves around the sides and bring them back…
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Why mangroves can outdo rainforests at storing carbon
The key is what happens after mangrove leaves fall: roots and plant debris get buried in flooded mud. Because little oxygen gets into that soil, decomposers…
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The material that sends light around sharp corners
A carefully patterned crystal can steer light along its edges, where the material’s structure helps it keep going past certain flaws instead of scattering…
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How scientists see SARS-CoV-2 proteins in 3D
Rapid freezing locks the virus sample in glasslike ice before ice crystals can distort it. Researchers tilt the frozen sample inside a microscope to capture…
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DNA can fold itself into microscopic machines
DNA’s matching letters give engineers a way to make it fold on cue: A pairs with T, while C pairs with G. Arrange the strands carefully and they can assemble…
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How ocean microbes help make clouds
Cloud droplets need a place to get started, and tiny airborne particles can provide one. Some ocean microbes release gases that react in the air to make those…
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Scientists shaped frog-cell robots like Pac-Man to help them replicate
Researchers sculpted tiny clusters of frog cells into a shape that could gather loose cells as it moved. Those collected cells developed into new, smaller…
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A solid whose magnetism refuses to settle down
In herbertsmithite, magnetic atoms sit in a geometry that makes it difficult for all their spins to satisfy their neighbors at once. It is a leading candidate…
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The snail that wears armor made of iron
This snail’s iron armor starts with the minerals around the deep-sea vents where it lives. The scaly-foot snail incorporates iron sulfides into its shell and…
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Researchers detected oxygen where no sunlight reaches
Experiments on the deep seafloor reported oxygen increasing around metal-rich nodules. One proposed explanation is that electrical differences across the…
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The plague bacteria existed thousands of years before the Black Death
The plague bacterium Yersinia pestis was infecting people thousands of years before the Black Death. Ancient DNA shows that the medieval pandemic was one…
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Saturn’s rings can reveal its hidden quakes
A vibration inside Saturn can subtly alter its gravity. Ring particles feel that changing pull as they circle the planet, and their motion gathers into spiral…
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Scientists installed a synthetic genome in a living cell
In 2010, researchers built a bacterial genome from a designed DNA sequence and transplanted it into a recipient cell. The resulting cells reproduced under the…
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The tiny cellular motors that walk while carrying cargo
Kinesin walks by alternating its two legs along a tiny track inside the cell. ATP gives one leg the energy to let go, swing forward, and grab on again while…
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A cave can preserve DNA without a visible fossil
Traces of biological material can become trapped in sediment long after a body has disappeared. Researchers extract and identify those fragments to…
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The squid that uses glowing bacteria as a cloak
A predator looking up sees the squid against the water’s glow—and would normally spot its dark silhouette. Bacteria in the squid’s light organ produce a…
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