TAG · Tech & Science
A powerful El Niño now building in the Pacific Ocean is already influencing extreme weather worldwide, and federal forecasters say it could become the strongest in recorded history, according to NPR. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric…
2026-10-01 · 5 MIN READKENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — SpaceX launched four people on NASA's Crew-13 mission to the International Space Station from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on Thursday, despite concerns about thunderstorms and gusty winds. The Falcon…
2026-10-01 · 3 MIN READA geomorphologist working at a Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District preserve in San Mateo County, California, discovered a fossilized tooth that paleontologists confirmed as an adult Pacific mastodon molar estimated at 10,000 years…
2026-09-12 · 3 MIN READA Lafayette College psychology professor published a commentary in The Conversation, republished by United Press International on September 11, examining how Americans form "flashbulb memories" of the September 11 attacks on the events'…
2026-09-11 · 4 MIN READScientists from the Denver Museum of Nature and Science and Liverpool John Moores University have identified the first known series of footprints left by an adult Tyrannosaurus rex, a 23-foot trackway in southwestern North Dakota dating to…
2026-09-11 · 3 MIN READBILLINGS, Mont. — The U.S. Forest Service is closing 23 research and development stations in more than a dozen states as part of a reorganization under President Donald Trump intended to cut costs and concentrate the agency's resources in…
2026-09-03 · 3 MIN READThe Trump administration has terminated more than 100 federal science advisory committees since returning to office, according to a news analysis in the journal Nature, leaving researchers and practitioners without formal channels they…
2026-08-29 · 5 MIN READResearchers at Alaska's Toolik Field Station are studying how warming is reshaping tundra on the North Slope, where plant life rarely exceeds 10 inches (25 centimeters). Florida Atlantic University researchers Adam Bloom and Jake Francis…
2026-08-25 · 4 MIN READJackson State University joined 13 other historically Black colleges and universities in April to launch the Association of HBCU Research Institutions, a coalition that aims to help member institutions compete for larger federal grants and…
2026-08-18 · 3 MIN READWang Hong, a mathematician from China's Guilin City, became the first Chinese woman to win the Fields Medal on Thursday, when the International Congress of Mathematicians in Philadelphia presented the prize to her and three other…
2026-07-23 · 3 MIN READChinese authorities have charged Youlin Chen, a 54-year-old American seismologist who researched underground nuclear tests, with espionage after detaining him in late 2024, according to his supporters. The State Department earlier this…
2026-07-14 · 3 MIN READA 67-million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton nicknamed Gus sold at Sotheby's in New York on Tuesday for $50.1 million, making it the most valuable dinosaur fossil ever sold at auction, the auction house said. The price far exceeded a…
2026-07-14 · 3 MIN READA new study from University of California, Merced researchers has quantified for the first time the role heat waves play in driving Western U.S. wildfires, finding that while heat waves account for only 12% to 15% of warm-season days, they…
2026-06-18 · 3 MIN READAstronomers detected the sugar erythrulose in a large gas cloud near the center of the Milky Way, according to a study published Monday in the journal Nature Astronomy. The sugar was identified in gas form by comparing telescope signals to…
2026-07-13 · 3 MIN READ
Proposed rules from the Office of Management and Budget would centralize federal grant oversight under political appointees and restrict international research collaborations, according to an analysis published in The Guardian by Columbia…
2026-07-11 · 3 MIN READIsraeli researchers are testing methods to locate and remove unexploded grenades, mortars, and other munitions from the Mediterranean Sea near the central city of Rishon Lezion, part of a yearslong experiment to clear the seabed and return…
2026-07-10 · 3 MIN READThe Royal Canadian Geographical Society has released the first images of the wreck of Quest, the final ship of Antarctic explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton, which lies on the seabed of the Labrador Sea. The expedition, conducted in partnership…
2026-07-08 · 3 MIN READA growing body of evidence shows that weight management is not simply a matter of calories in versus calories out, according to physicians and researchers interviewed by the Associated Press. The quality of calories, including how foods…
2026-07-07 · 3 MIN READScientists have created the most advanced synthetic cell yet, a laboratory-built organism they have named 'Spudcell' that can adapt and learn survival skills.
2026-07-02 · 3 MIN READResearchers are set to launch a 21-day expedition Thursday from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts to survey the wrecks of two ships linked to polar explorers Ernest Shackleton and Robert Falcon Scott. The expedition…
2026-07-02 · 4 MIN READA 33-year-old graduate-school dropout and video blogger has prompted investigations into academic misconduct at Chinese universities, with Shanghai University removing a dean and firing a postdoctoral researcher after he alleged data…
2026-07-02 · 4 MIN READA growing number of prominent U.S. researchers are accepting jobs in the United Kingdom, Europe, and Canada, citing changes in federal funding under President Donald Trump's second term, according to interviews and data from the journal…
2026-06-30 · 3 MIN READPsychiatric researchers have identified a combination of three chatbot behaviors — sycophancy, linguistic alignment and hyperpersonalization — that they say can drive users toward delusional thinking, according to a newly published review…
2026-06-27 · 3 MIN READHumans and great apes have been giggling in similar ways since branching off the evolutionary tree, a new study suggests.
2026-06-25 · 3 MIN READFormer NOAA deputy administrator Terry Garcia warned that the Trump administration has jeopardized the nation's ability to forecast extreme weather just as a "very strong" El Niño develops, citing a "descoping" of a key ocean-observing…
2026-06-23 · 3 MIN READResearcher Kent Kiehl has spent two decades scanning the brains of prisoners to identify psychopathy, and his work has been cited in thousands of U.S. criminal cases. But critics say the science is unreliable, revives discredited eugenic…
2026-06-23 · 3 MIN READNations around the world are experiencing up to two additional months of dangerous heat stress per year compared to several decades ago, according to research published Monday in the journal Nature Climate Change. The study is the first to…
2026-06-22 · 3 MIN READOn June 20, 2026, NPR published a report by journalist Jason Fuller examining scientific research into whether butterflies could offer clues to extending human lifespan.
2026-06-20 · 3 MIN READThe Trump administration has proposed a rule that would place all federal research and other discretionary grants under the control of political appointees rather than scientific experts, a move opponents say would effectively dismantle…
2026-06-19 · 4 MIN READThe National Science Foundation on Thursday reversed a decision to dismantle a sprawling ocean monitoring network, citing concerns raised by Democratic lawmakers and scientists who rely on the system to track ocean circulation, climate…
2026-06-18 · 3 MIN READA new study finds the San Andreas and San Jacinto fault systems in Southern California are at their highest tectonic stress levels in at least 1,000 years, putting the region at increased risk for a major earthquake.
2026-06-16 · 3 MIN READResearchers have developed a method to map the vast, interconnected network of underground fungi that spans quadrillions of miles beneath the Earth's surface, according to NPR.
2026-06-16 · 3 MIN READThe Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Janelia Research Campus has announced a major initiative to use a tiny, transparent fish called Danionella — together with artificial intelligence — to understand how the brain produces complex…
2026-06-16 · 4 MIN READA peer-reviewed study of breast milk samples from mothers in Seattle found that about 92% of 50 samples were contaminated with at least one endocrine-disrupting chemical, including BPA, BPS, melamine, cyanuric acid, and triclosan, the…
2026-06-14 · 3 MIN READA group of European scientists warned Sunday that monitoring of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) — a vast ocean current system that regulates global climate — is at risk of being discontinued, leaving the world…
2026-06-14 · 4 MIN READYale researchers are preparing to publish two papers examining a program that offers one-time cash payments of $500 to victims of community violence and intimate partner violence in New Haven, Conn., finding the payments help recipients…
2026-06-12 · 3 MIN READNPR's daily science podcast Short Wave released a weekly news roundup on June 11, 2026, hosted by Angela Zhang, Emily Kwong, and Mary Louise Kelly.
2026-06-11 · 3 MIN READThe Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory in China has released its first major results, offering some of the most precise measurements to date of how neutrinos change flavor as they travel through space. The findings were published…
2026-06-10 · 3 MIN READHumanoid robots struggling with tasks like grasping a cup have a new teacher — a person wearing an ultrasound wristband that captures the movement of muscles, tendons and ligaments beneath the skin, according to researchers at the…
2026-06-09 · 3 MIN READColumbia University researchers used a DNA-editing technique called base editing to correct disease-causing mutations in early-stage human embryos, publishing results Monday on a preprint server. The work marks a step in embryo gene…
2026-06-05 · 3 MIN READThree scientific papers that questioned vaccine safety and were used by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Trump administration to justify changes to U.S. vaccine policy have been retracted, removed, or formally investigated by their publishing…
2026-06-04 · 3 MIN READNASA has declared the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Environment (MAVEN) satellite unrecoverable and its mission concluded, nearly six months after losing contact with the spacecraft. The agency held a media teleconference Wednesday to…
2026-06-03 · 3 MIN READThe Trump administration plans to dismantle the Ocean Observatories Initiative, a $368 million deep-sea observation network of more than 900 instruments that has collected continuous climate and ocean data since 2016, according to a…
2026-06-02 · 3 MIN READThe National Science Foundation has suspended nearly $21 million in research grants to UC Berkeley, alleging that principal investigators failed to disclose foreign funding from traditional U.S. allies — several of whom said they never…
2026-06-02 · 3 MIN READMicrosoft announced Tuesday that its second-generation Majorana quantum chip, Majorana 2, is 1,000 times more reliable than its predecessor, with qubits that survive for an average of 20 seconds compared to milliseconds on the first chip.…
2026-06-02 · 3 MIN READPigeons may navigate hundreds of miles by using iron-loaded immune cells in their livers to sense Earth’s magnetic field, according to a study published Wednesday that offers a surprising new clue to a century-old biological mystery.
2026-05-28 · 3 MIN READNPR’s “Spacing Out” space nerd club segment on May 25, 2026 highlighted new James Webb Space Telescope results on Neptune’s moon Nereid, a hot Jupiter-like exoplanet’s day-to-night cloud pattern, and what auroras can signal about solar…
2026-05-25 · 3 MIN READJackson Hole’s busiest trails near the town do not appear to create a wildlife “sacrifice zone,” a yearslong study found, using 27 remote cameras in a 36-square-mile area south and east of Jackson. Led by The Nature Conservancy…
2026-05-23 · 4 MIN READA yearslong study using remote cameras around Jackson Hole found that high recreation on nonmotorized trails did not appear to create a “sacrifice zone” for wildlife, researchers said. Led by Courtney Larson of The Nature Conservancy, the…
2026-05-22 · 3 MIN READU.S. researchers say Trump administration funding changes have emptied research labs and slowed or halted parts of biomedical science, even after Congress restored some money earlier this year. In interviews for NPR, Harvard computational…
2026-05-21 · 3 MIN READA multi-year camera study on nonmotorized trails near Jackson, Wyoming, has found that heavy recreational use does not appear to drive away wildlife, challenging the notion that popular trail networks become ecological “sacrifice zones.”…
2026-05-21 · 3 MIN READJackson Hole’s busiest trails have not turned nearby habitat into a wildlife “sacrifice zone,” a yearslong study found. Researchers who set 27 remote cameras on trails in a 36-square-mile area south and east of Jackson said they saw…
2026-05-21 · 3 MIN READScientists are revising global warming projections, saying new scenario work makes the “worst” and “best” extremes less plausible—but also confirms that limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius under the Paris Agreement is unlikely without…
2026-05-20 · 3 MIN READPlants with extra copies of their chromosomes—called polyploids—show evidence of having survived past periods of extreme environmental stress, according to new research. NPR reports that a study led by plant biologist Yves Van de Peer…
2026-05-19 · 3 MIN READScientists say they are discarding both the most catastrophic and most optimistic future climate scenarios because they no longer fit how the world is changing. A new set of seven plausible carbon pollution pathways suggests the Paris 2015…
2026-05-19 · 3 MIN READScientists have revised global warming “worst” and “best” future pathways, saying the most catastrophic scenarios are less likely than before while the most optimistic one now also exceeds the 2015 Paris goal of limiting warming to 1.5…
2026-05-18 · 4 MIN READResearchers led by Steve Prabu of the University of Oxford have measured the instantaneous power of black hole jets for the first time. According to a study published in Nature Astronomy, the jets from Cygnus X-1, a relatively nearby black…
2026-05-17 · 4 MIN READThe Pasteur Institute in Paris has fully sequenced the Andes virus detected in a French passenger aboard the MV Hondius cruise ship and found it matches viruses already known in South America, with no evidence of characteristics that would…
2026-05-16 · 3 MIN READFrance’s Pasteur Institute has fully sequenced the Andes virus found in a French passenger who tested positive after traveling on the MV Hondius cruise ship, French officials said. Health Minister Stéphanie Rist said the virus matched…
2026-05-16 · 3 MIN READResearchers in Ireland have uncovered what they say is the oldest surviving English poem inside a medieval manuscript being held in a Roman library, according to researchers involved in the discovery. The poem, composed in Old English,…
2026-05-16 · 3 MIN READA new analysis of 400,000-year-old tooth enamel proteins suggests that Homo erectus — the first human ancestor to migrate out of Africa — interbred with Denisovans, and a remnant of that encounter survives in the DNA of some people alive…
2026-05-15 · 3 MIN READEn un nuevo estudio, investigadores analizaron proteínas antiguas extraídas del esmalte de dientes de Homo erectus de unos 400.000 años, recuperados en China. Al comparar mutaciones en una proteína del esmalte con variantes presentes en…
2026-05-15 · 3 MIN READCAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — NASA’s Psyche spacecraft will swing past Mars this week to use the planet’s gravity for a boost on its journey to the rare metal asteroid Psyche, snapping thousands of pictures as practice for the main encounter…
2026-05-15 · 4 MIN READAn analysis of 400,000-year-old tooth enamel has uncovered a genetic link suggesting that Homo erectus interbred with Denisovans hundreds of thousands of years ago, and that the genetic legacy may have reached modern humans through later…
2026-05-14 · 3 MIN READAncient teeth are giving researchers genetic clues about Homo erectus and possible interbreeding with Denisovans, according to a new study that analyzed enamel proteins from six people. The work, described by an outside expert as using…
2026-05-14 · 3 MIN READThe Trump administration suspended at least 18 research grants to UC Berkeley in April, according to an attorney representing university scientists in a class action lawsuit. The suspensions occurred despite a federal court injunction…
2026-05-10 · 3 MIN READNASA released a new image from its James Webb Space Telescope showing the spiral galaxy Messier 77 about 45 million light-years away. The picture, released this week, highlights the galaxy’s bright active nucleus and the extreme heat of…
2026-05-10 · 3 MIN READScientists took soil samples Thursday outside a home connected to Paul Flores, convicted in 2022 of killing Kristin Smart, the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office said. The sheriff’s office served a search warrant on the home of Susan…
2026-05-07 · 3 MIN READA male coyote swam 2 miles from Angel Island to Alcatraz Island across the cold, swift currents of San Francisco Bay, stunning National Park Service biologists who had assumed the animal made a shorter crossing from the city.
2026-05-06 · 3 MIN READA new study suggests that a tiny icy body in the outer solar system, roughly 300 miles wide, may possess a thin atmosphere — a discovery that could reshape understanding of small worlds beyond Neptune, according to researchers using…
2026-05-05 · 3 MIN READUn nuevo estudio reporta que un pequeño objeto helado más allá de Plutón, llamado (612533) 2002 XV93, podría albergar una atmósfera tenue y persistente. El hallazgo se basa en observaciones realizadas en 2024 desde Japón mientras el objeto…
2026-05-05 · 3 MIN READJ. Craig Venter, the geneticist who raced the U.S. government to decode the human genetic blueprint and later pioneered synthetic life, died April 29 in San Diego at age 79. His institute attributed his death to complications from cancer…
2026-05-02 · 3 MIN READJ. Craig Venter, who won the race to sequence the human genome and helped scientists understand how genes shape disease, died Wednesday. He was 79. The J. Craig Venter Institute said his death was announced by the institute, which said he…
2026-05-02 · 3 MIN READLos arqueólogos de Pompeya, en Italia, han utilizado por primera vez inteligencia artificial para reconstruir digitalmente el rostro de uno de los hombres que murieron durante la erupción del Vesubio en el año 79 d.C. El proyecto,…
2026-04-30 · 3 MIN READIn an interview with The Associated Press, Apollo moonwalker Harrison “Jack” Schmitt said the next generation should treat the return to the moon as a challenge to leave “footsteps like these” for future explorers. Schmitt, 90, discussed…
2026-04-26 · 3 MIN READResearchers have spent decades breeding potatoes for chip makers—developing varieties that can grow in different climates, resist diseases and pests, and last in storage for months while still producing a crisp chip. In Michigan,…
2026-04-26 · 3 MIN READThe U.S. National Science Foundation’s NOIRLab released a new image of the Sombrero galaxy on Friday, showing the popular, hat-shaped spiral galaxy in enhanced color. The photo was taken by a telescope in Chile about four years ago, with…
2026-04-25 · 3 MIN READA new analysis of fossilized octopus jaws suggests that massive, kraken-like octopuses were among the top predators in dinosaur-era seas about 100 million years ago. Researchers say the ancient animals likely grew to between 23 and 62 feet…
2026-04-24 · 3 MIN READA newly analyzed interstellar visitor, Comet 3I/Atlas, likely formed in a cold, isolated corner of the Milky Way before the star system where it is traveling toward Earth. Using observations from the ALMA observatory, astronomers reported…
2026-04-24 · 3 MIN READ
