Science

Warming ocean waters are priming beaches and raw shellfish for Vibrio even as scientists are trying to stay one step aheadBailey Magers and Sunil Kumar cut strange figures on Pensacola Beach. Bags of disinfectant solution surrounded them on the white sand; their gloved hands juggled test tubes while layers of rubber and plastic shielded their skin from the elements. As the two organized their seawater samples on the popular Florida shoreline last August, an older woman wearing a swimsuit walked

Every year, hundreds of thousands of men with low-grade prostate cancer face a recurring dilemma: submit to another biopsy, with its attendant discomfort and small but real infection risk, or hope that the cancer growing quietly inside them hasn’t quietly changed. The dilemma exists because the tools available to guide that decision have, until now, been frustratingly imprecise. MRI scans help. PSA blood tests help. But neither helps enough to let doctors say, with real confidence, that a

An elephant’s trunk contains roughly 40,000 individual muscle segments, each capable of contracting independently, which is how the animal can crack open a watermelon and then, thirty seconds later, pick up a single peanut from the ground. Plant tendrils do something structurally similar: when a cucumber vine touches a support, specialised cells on one side of the tendril lignify and stiffen while cells on the other side stay soft, and the resulting asymmetry causes the whole structure to

Fifty-six million years is a long time to be frozen. It is longer than the entire Cenozoic, longer than the reign of the dinosaurs, longer, frankly, than most scientists thought physically possible for a global glaciation. And yet the geological record is unambiguous: roughly 717 million years ago, ice swallowed the Earth, and it did not fully let go for nearly 60 million years. The event is called the Sturtian glaciation, and for decades it has been quietly embarrassing climate science. The pro

View larger. | A UAP – Unidentified Anomalous Phenomenon – from the 1969 Apollo 12 mission to the moon. The triangle of faint bluish “lights” is on the far right, highlighted in the larger square. It’s interesting. But other random colorful dots in images, even at the edges of the film, suggest it might just be an anomaly or blemish in the film used for the photos. This is just one of the 162 Pentagon UFO files released on May 8, 2026. Image via NASA/ US government.

A new study suggests that certain genetic diseases may be treatable with carefully matched vitamins, including a deadly childhood disorder that responded strikingly to vitamin B3. Scientists at Gladstone Institutes have taken an unusual route in the search for treatments for deadly genetic diseases. Rather than choosing a disease first and then looking for a [...]

Eight thousand five hundred. Not the round ten thousand that’s been drummed into public consciousness for the better part of three decades, not the vague “move more” advice that fills GP waiting rooms, but a specific, oddly precise figure that emerges from one of the largest analyses yet of how walking affects long-term weight management. The research, a meta-analysis drawing on data from nearly 4,000 people across 14 randomised controlled trials, suggests that hitting this tar

New research suggests muscles remember past inactivity at the molecular level. Muscle loss, or atrophy, caused by inactivity can begin surprisingly fast — even after just days of bed rest, injury, or reduced movement. For older adults especially, these periods of inactivity can trigger a downward spiral of weakness, slower recovery, loss of independence, and [...]

View at EarthSky Community Photos. | See the semicircle of stars here? It’s the famous constellation Corona Borealis, the Northern Crown. EarthSky friend Paul Henkiel of Flagstaff, Arizona, captured this image on April 30, 2024. Paul also marked the location of the star T Corona Borealis (T CrB), a famous nova, with green indicator marks. Thank you, Paul! This time of the year is perfect for seeing Corona Borealis in the evening sky. And, if you start watching it now, you might see the upc

Here’s the winning entry for the annual Milky Way Photographer of the Year contest, curated by the travel blog Capture the Atlas. Alvin Wu, the winning photographer, wrote: “This image captures the Milky Way rising above a blooming field of lupines in New Zealand during November. That’s when spring wildflowers transform the landscape beneath our night sky. Using a fisheye perspective, the flowers encircle the scene … ” See more of the best Milky Way photos of 2026 b

Scientists are uncovering surprising links between aging and the trillions of microbes living in the human gut. Scientists are investigating whether the key to aging well may lie in the gut microbiome. Early findings suggest microbes could affect everything from inflammation to lifespan, opening new possibilities for future treatments. People once searched for the Fountain [...]

Want to see the Blaze Star go nova in 2026? We do, too! And X marks the spot. Astronomers said an impending nova will give the constellation of the Northern Crown – Corona Borealis – a “new star” that rivals the constellation’s brightest star. But when? When?? Image via Chris Harvey/ Stellarium. Used with permission. Don’t miss the next unmissable night sky event. Sign up for EarthSky’s free newsletter and get daily night sky updates! Come on, Blaze Star! Go n

Sarah Eberle hopes to inspire people to nurture where town and countryside meet and nature is need of protectionStinging nettles, buttercups, broken crockery, fly-tipped flowers and a discarded gnome are not the usual hallmarks of an RHS Chelsea flower show garden.But this year’s On the Edge garden by Sarah Eberle – the most decorated designer at Chelsea – is designed not to look like a garden at all, rather to transport its visitors to the liminal spaces on the outskirts of towns where the coun

National Geographic photographer and WWF ambassador Jasper Doest joined conservation teams during the latest mountain gorilla census in Bwindi Impenetrable national park, taking pictures of the apes and the people essential to their survival Continue reading...

The “world’s oldest octopus” was actually a 300-million-year-old fossil impostor hiding its secret in tiny teeth. A fossil long celebrated as the world’s oldest octopus has now been revealed to be an entirely different marine animal. The 300-million-year-old specimen, which even appeared in the Guinness Book of Records, was misidentified because of changes that happened [...]

When wolves bring down prey in Yellowstone National Park, ravens often appear almost immediately. Long before the predators finish feeding, the birds gather nearby to grab scraps of meat. Their ability to locate fresh kills so quickly has puzzled observers for years, leading many people to assume that ravens simply follow wolves across the landscape. [...]

A 10-year follow-up of the FIDELITY trial, which was controlled with placebo surgery, found that partial meniscectomy does not improve patients’ symptoms or function. Partial meniscectomy, a procedure that trims a degenerated meniscus, is among the most frequently performed orthopedic surgeries worldwide. Although its use has dropped sharply in Finland in recent years, the operation [...]

The discovery could help make electronics faster and more energy efficient. Researchers at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities have found a new way to change how a metal behaves electronically by controlling atomic-level interactions at the boundary where two materials meet. The study, published in Nature Communications, shows that interfacial polarization can shift the [...]

The technology could support advances in high-speed communication systems, sensing tools, biological materials, and medical technologies. Researchers at McGill University have created a new device that produces phonons, which are particles associated with sound, under extremely cold conditions. The work could help pave the way for phonon lasers, a technology with potential uses in communication [...]

A team led by Professor Garrick Allen has recovered hidden text from 42 lost pages of Codex H, offering a rare glimpse into one of the most important early New Testament manuscripts. An academic team led by Professor Garrick Allen at the University of Glasgow has recovered 42 missing pages from Codex H, one of [...]