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An artist’s conception of an “awkward family photo” featuring multicellular animals and their unicellular cousins.
Living World

We are family: Tracing the evolution of animals

By Amber Dance

To understand the origins of muticelled life, researchers are studying a motley assortment of simpler animal relatives. The commonalities they’re unearthing offer a trove of clues about our mutual past.

A colorful hummingbird hovers at a flower, feeding with a long beak.
Living World

Hummingbirds thrive on an extreme lifestyle. Here’s how.

By Bob Holmes

Soldiering through nightly suspended animation, a (nearly) all-sugar diet, backwards flight and long migrations, the birds’ tiny physiques prove mighty

A computer drawing in which a white blood cell spits its stringy DNA at a virus.
Living World

Your cells are dying. All the time.

By Amber Dance

Some go gently into the night. Others die less prettily in freak accidents or deadly invasions, or after a showy display.

Illustration of two kidneys, ureters and some major blood vessels, with some yellow blobs depicting a drug.
Health & Disease

Targeting the racial disparity in kidney disease

By Liam Drew

Some people of West African descent face a higher risk of renal failure. New drugs based on gene research may help right the ship — if they can reach everyone who needs them.

Hands type at a computer with bar graphs on screen, other hands hold questionnaires.
Society

Can you believe the polls? It depends

By Ula Chrobak

A veteran of survey research explains why high-quality polling matters — and warns of the proliferation of shoddy gimmicks

Collage with images of hospital, bacteria, viruses. Patient and healthcare worker.
Health & Disease

What if a virus could reverse antibiotic resistance?

In promising experiments, phage therapy forces bacteria into a no-win dilemma that lowers their defenses against drugs they’d evolved to withstand

By Patience Asanga
Cartoon illustration shows four people sniffing strong-smelling items: an old sock, flowers, a banana and a cake.
The Mind

What’s that smell — and how’d you know?

It’s clear that genes, receptors and neurons all play a role in detecting odors. But much of how we make sense of what we sniff remains mysterious. A neuroscientist explains.

By Daniela Hirschfeld
Photograph of a warning label on the side of a cigarette pack. It says SURGEON GENERAL'S WARNING: Smoking Causes Lung Cancer, Heart Disease, Emphysema, And May Complicate Pregnancy.
Health & Disease

The tussle over cigarette warning labels, and the hazy future of vaping

By Clare Watson

Regulatory hurdles, industry objections and legal fights have gone on for decades over traditional tobacco. What’s in store for the next generation of smoking?

A conceptual illustration shows a city street with people standing on each side, some holding placards. One side is colored red, the other blue. There are political posters on the walls and a huge chasm in the middle of the street.
Society

Divided we stand: The rise of political animosity

By Carl-Johan Karlsson

Scientists peered into the partisan abyss. Here’s what they found.

Conceptual illustration. Polygonal bacteriophages inject their nucleic acid into one bacterium; elsewhere, new phages pop out of another bacterium.
Living World

The phageome: A hidden kingdom within your gut

By Amber Dance

Human innards are teeming with viruses that infect bacteria. What are they up to?

Multimedia

People walking through a dark greenhouse filled with trays of softly glowing plants
Society

What a bioluminescent petunia had to teach me

By Rachel Ehrenberg

I bought a glowing plant. It led me down a rabbit hole of radiant mushrooms, 19th century experiments and a modern rivalry between scientists in Russia and the Americas.

Grayscale image of small orb in the upper left with gray planetary rings taking up much of the rest of the image.
Physical World

Saturn’s moon Mimas may hide a surprisingly young ocean

By Shannon Hall

The existence of another watery world in the outer solar system may offer clues to how such seas form — and hope for another spot to search for life

Illustration shows a hand holding a 1960s-era car.
Technology

New forms of steel for stronger, lighter cars

By John Johnson Jr.

Automakers are tweaking production processes to create a slew of new steels with just the right properties, allowing them to build cars that are both safer and more fuel-efficient

Collage showing children, some of them obese, plus fast food and other diabetes risk factors.
Health & Disease

Understanding the sudden rise of type 2 diabetes in children

By Charlotte Huff

The metabolic disorder was long known as a disease of adulthood. Now, it’s spiking in kids and teens, with worrisome consequences.

Photograph of a flying bee heading toward a mustard plant with yellow blossoms. In the background are grey clouds and blue sky.
Food & Environment

Air pollution makes it harder for bees to smell flowers

By Katarina Zimmer

Contaminants can alter plant odors and warp insects’ senses, disrupting the process of pollination

Drawing of tiny people holding, carrying and trying to push the metal balls of an outsized Newton’s cradle.
Society

Are you a workaholic? Here’s how to spot the signs

In a major shift, psychologists now view an out-of-control compulsion to work as an addiction with its own set of risk factors and consequences

By Chris Woolston
Collage shows Jenny Graves reading a book, a koala, kangaroos, a concert hall.
Society

Of genes, chromosomes and oratorios

Jenny Graves has spent her life mapping genes and comparing genomes. Now she’s created a musical opus about evolution of life on this planet — bringing the same drive and experimentalism she brought to the study of marsupial chromosomes.

By Marla Broadfoot
Photo of an old rhesus macaque putting something on her mouth. She sits on what looks like a beach or bare ground. Vegetation is behind her.
The Mind

It’s not just us: Other animals change their social habits in old age

By Tim Vernimmen

In patterns that may sound familiar, long-term studies reveal what elderly deer, sheep and macaques are up to in their twilight years

Stop motion photo shows how a cat twists and turns during a fall so that it can safely land on its feet.
Physical World

Animals use physics? Let us count the ways

By Tom Siegfried

Cats twist and snakes slide, exploiting and negotiating physical laws. Scientists are figuring out how.

An illustration shows a net wrapping around emissions from a smokestack with more smokestacks in the background.
Society

To help with climate change, carbon capture will have to evolve

By Natasha Gilbert

The technologies are a useful tool to reduce CO2 levels but have yet to move us away from fossil fuels

Conceptual illustration shows various modes of transport, colored green: ships, trucks, trains, cars, planes. A couple of fuel molecules — hydrogen gas and kerosene — are also incorporated into the illo.
Technology

The greening of planes, trains and automobiles

By Nicola Jones

We need new fuels to transport people and goods around the globe as society moves away from coal, natural gas and oil. Here’s how things are shaping up.

A collage of photographs of cichlid fishes of different colors and patterns, including blue and yellow, stripy and splotchy.
Living World

One fish, two fish, 3,000 fish ...

By Curtis Abraham

Groups of cichlid fishes in East Africa radiated into thousands of species within dazzlingly short periods of time. How did they do it?

Aerial image showing an arid terrain, with green bushes and, in the middle, a body of water known as the Quitobaquito spring. The terrain is traversed from side to side by a wall, preventing access to the spring from the southern side.
Food & Environment

Nature interrupted: Impact of the US-Mexico border wall on wildlife

Scientists on both sides of the border are working to understand how the barrier is affecting the area’s biodiversity. Meanwhile, communities try to save animals left without access to water.

By Iván Carrillo
Gray wombat amid foliage and grass.
Living World

The most common wombat is also the least understood

Australia’s iconic marsupial has been viewed as a food source, pest, mascot and, now, a conservation concern. Scientists are breaking down myths — using genetics, robots and citizen science — and finding new ways to protect the animals.

By Amber Dance

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