Photograph of cornfield with a stunning sunset in the background.
Food & Environment

How green are biofuels? Scientists are at loggerheads

By Dan Charles

Replacing gasoline with ethanol has changed landscapes across the globe as grasslands and forests give way to cornfields. Researchers are deeply divided over what this means for the planet. Here's the science behind the conflict.

A tinted aerial photo shows a bunch of people sitting at tables in a cafeteria with lamps emitting violet light.
Health & Disease

How to fight Covid with light

By Chris Baraniuk

Some wavelengths of light in a range called far-UVC kill microbes in experiments and appear to be harmless to people. Could they be used to make indoor spaces safer against the coronavirus?

Hunter-gatherer women and children walk through a grassy African savanna.
Food & Environment

Our ancestors ate a Paleo diet. It had carbs.

By Diana Kwon

There is no one prehistoric meal plan. A modern hunter-gatherer group known as the Hadza has taught researchers surprising things about the highly variable menu consumed by humans past.

Aerial view of a parking lot crammed with electric cars colored white, tan, yellow and red.
Technology

What will it take to recycle millions of worn-out EV batteries?

By Ula Chrobak

In Nevada and other US states, entrepreneurs are anticipating the coming boom in retired lithium-ion batteries from electric cars and hoping to create a market for recycled minerals

A small boat leaves a wake among houses surrounded by floodwaters.
Society

Rethinking insurance for floods, wildfires and other catastrophes

By Emily Underwood

The industry is in crisis just when disaster coverage is most needed

Living World

The evolution of whales from land to sea

The genomes of cetaceans help tell the story of mammals who returned to the life aquatic

By Amber Dance
Technology

Handing the surgeon’s scalpel to a robot

After decades of merely assisting doctors, are sophisticated machines ready to take charge?

By James Gaines
Photo shows orange lava spewing from atop a volcanic crater.
Opinion | Physical World

There are more active volcanoes than you think

By Luca Caricchi and By Guido Giordano

OPINION: Volcanologists warn that magma-filled vents evolve over time, leading to an underestimation of the number that might erupt — especially those capable of the biggest explosions

Collage juxtaposes silhouettes of overweight people with unlabeled graphs, a BMI (height-weight ratio) chart, scale and measuring tape.
Society

She saw the obesity epidemic coming. Then an unexpected finding mired her in controversy.

By Alice Callahan

Katherine Flegal was a scientist who found herself crunching numbers for the government, until one day her analyses set off a firestorm. What does she make of her decades as a woman in public health research?

Photo of a young man staring off into space, in a kind of reverie. In the background, colored lines with arrows at the end of them swirl around, representing wandering thoughts.
The Mind

The science of a wandering mind

By Tim Vernimmen

More than just a distraction, mind-wandering (and its cousin, daydreaming) may help us prepare for the future

Insuring our uncertain future
Event | Society

Insuring our uncertain future

EVENT: Is the disaster insurance industry hurtling toward a climate crisis? Learn how we can shore up programs that buffer the financial devastation that follows floods, fires and hurricanes — and help individuals and communities strengthen their climate resilience.

People holding placards march behind a large white banner with “National March for Life” written on it in red. There are buildings in the background.
Health & Disease

The US abortion decision is already having global impacts

By TK Sundari Ravindran and By Pascale Allotey and By Sofia Gruskin

OPINION: The reversal of Roe v. Wade is a tragedy not just for the United States, but for women everywhere

Artistic drawing of a large eagle swooping in on two large ostrich-like birds
Living World

How a giant eagle came to dominate ancient New Zealand

By Boyce Upholt

Before the formidable bird went extinct, scientists say, it likely hunted the islands’ flightless moa. Now evidence suggests the eagle was part of a wave of feathered invaders, and its story holds lessons for today and the future.

Multimedia

A massive brownish sand dune, steep orange-brown rocks behind it and purplish mountains in the distance
Living World

A treasure hunt for microbes in Chile’s Atacama desert

By Lindzi Wessel

The famously dry region has long been dismissed as a mostly lifeless wasteland, good for little more than mining of minerals and precious metals. To these researchers, however, it’s a microbial gold mine worthy of protection.

Stylized drawings of a real nerve cell and an electronic version that can also process and store information.
Technology

Making computer chips act more like brain cells

By Kurt Kleiner

Flexible organic circuits that mimic biological neurons could increase processing speed and might someday hook right into your head

Conceptual illustration shows sunrise on an agricultural landscape with crops and grazing cattle. In the center of the image is a dinner plate with large servings of greens, corn, beans and a small serving of meat.
Food & Environment

How much meat can we eat — sustainably?

By Bob Holmes

Scientists find that a small amount of animal products could have a place in our diets without wreaking environmental havoc. But it’s far less than what we consume today, and only if farmed in just the right way.

A photograph shows huge clouds of black smoke darkening the sky above the containers and other structures of an oil storage facility. Flames are also visible.
Opinion | Society

Russia is guilty of ecocide

By Michael Long and By Michael Lynch

OPINION: All perpetrators of environmental destruction should be held accountable

Photo of a neon sign advertising a bail-bond service
Society

Doing away with cash bail

By M. Mitchell Waldrop

In the US, people charged with a crime usually need to post a large cash bond to be released before trial — a system used barely anywhere else in the world. This doesn’t enhance public safety and causes great hardship to defendants and families. There’s a better way, researchers say.

Health & Disease

How long will it take to understand long Covid?

Covid long-haulers experience a litany of symptoms, and researchers have proposed a variety of theories to explain them. It’s a morass to figure out, but the answers are important for the multitudes still suffering from an infection that happened to them months or even years ago.

By Marla Broadfoot
Video | Health & Disease

Long Covid: A parallel pandemic

VIDEO: Tens of millions of people are living with long Covid. Yale immunologist Akiko Iwasaki explains the current state of play in the search for causes of, and treatments for, this potentially debilitating illness.

By Hunni Media para Knowable Magazine
Photograph of an adult female Sumatran rhino resting on the ground. An adorable rhino calf is standing to her left.
Opinion | Living World

The importance of understanding wildlife sex

By Pierre Comizzoli

OPINION: If we’re truly serious about protecting animal species from extinction, we should learn more about how they reproduce

Photograph of a group of vervet monkeys. They are clustered around and feeding from a box of pink-colored corn kernels. They are ignoring an equally full box of blue-colored kernels.
Living World

Cultural transmission makes animals flexible, but vulnerable

By Tim Vernimmen

From monkeys washing potatoes to cockatoos raiding trash cans, socially spread behaviors allow creatures to adapt more rapidly to changing environments than conventional evolution would allow. But the traits are also more easily lost.

A dark-haired dog with white around its muzzle is standing with its mouth open. A small treat is in the air; the dog is preparing to catch it in its mouth.
Health & Disease

Inside the brains of aging dogs

By Lesley Evans Ogden

In a citizen science project, thousands of pet dogs are helping scientists to understand what happens to memory and cognition in old age

An idealized factory churns out plant-based meat patties in an idyllic nature setting, while closed feedlots and poultry farms stand empty nearby.
Food & Environment

How sustainable are fake meats?

By Bob Holmes

Marketed to meat lovers, plant-based burgers like Impossible and Beyond claim to taste like the real thing and to have far lighter environmental footprints. Here’s what the numbers have to say.

Conceptual illustration shows a woman, head in hands, sitting on a chair. Images surrounding her depict a death she may have caused through negligence: an ambulance, bicycle on its side, damaged car, grave site and a cell phone opened to a texting app.
Health & Disease

The lasting anguish of moral injury

By Constance Sommer

Psychologists are finding that moral code violations can leave an enduring mark — and may require new types of therapy

Physical World

A dying star’s last hurrah

At the end of their lives, sunlike stars metamorphose into glowing shells of gas — perhaps shaped by unseen companions

By Dana Mackenzie
Society

Rethinking prison as a deterrent to future crime

Time behind bars can increase the likelihood that someone will re-offend, research finds. In many cases, programs that rehabilitate, rather than punish, may be a better solution.

By Jamie Santa Cruz

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