Gentle purchase incentives can lead customers to choose groceries with higher animal husbandry standards more often. A recent study at the University of Bonn at least suggests this. The researchers used two different animal welfare label posters as "nudges." Each poster changed
An experiment that involved feeding a dead goat to a Komodo dragon as well as an analysis of thousands of ancient bones suggests that Homo floresiensis was neither a skilled hunter of big game nor a master of fire
Why do people make the choices they do? Researchers from the Center Synergy of Systems (SynoSys) at TUD Dresden University of Technology, the Max Planck Institute for Human Development, and the University of Basel present their new approach to finding answers to that question.
Scientists have grown wheat containing supersized starch granules—a leap forward in biological engineering with potential benefits for our daily diets and a raft of industrial applications.
A new ancient DNA study published in Science Advances provides evidence that political power among Scythian elites may have been inherited through family lineages that extended across multiple burial sites. By combining archaeology, anthropology and genetics, the new study
Picture a mouse taking rapid, staccato sniffs of a crumb it's found while foraging for food. Now compare that with a human leaning in for a single, deep inhale to gauge whether a cantaloupe is ripe. New research from Northwestern University has found that, like humans, mice
Tropical moist forests account for 70% of global living biomass. Deforestation and degradation—that is, the partial damage to tree stands—as well as the subsequent regeneration of forests therefore play a pivotal role in the global carbon cycle. While the effects of large-scale
The hominins may have gone on adventures, but they lacked key skills of modern humans
The Southern Ocean has long stood out as an oddity in the global climate system. While most of the planet's surface oceans have warmed in response to rising greenhouse gases, waters circling Antarctica showed an unexpected tendency to cool during the late 20th and early 21st
Patients in hospitals generally trust the nursing staff. After all, they have undergone training and, in some cases, have several years of professional experience. In the case of carpenter ants, it is not nursing expertise that determines who cares for the patients.
Most of us have attended sex ed classes in school. If we're lucky, we'll learn about consent and how to roll a condom onto a banana. But the classroom rarely goes into the specifics of sexual health and well-being—including what to do when a condom breaks.
Werner Heisenberg's famous uncertainty principle describes one of the most intriguing features of quantum physics: certain pairs of physical quantities describing a particle, such as position and momentum, cannot simultaneously be determined with arbitrary precision—not because
A new study from the University of Eastern Finland shows that the transition toward a circular plastics economy is hindered by systemic interdependencies and internal contradictions within ecosystems.
Whether mussels, crustaceans or fish, marine animals have been responding to environmental crises with a reduction in body size for hundreds of millions of years. A new study by Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), in conjunction with the Universities of
New research has begun to lift the lid on the global online trade in land crabs, leading scientists to call for closer monitoring and regulation to better understand any effects it may be having on native populations and global biodiversity. The study, published in Oryx,
Chinese goldsmiths working during the Ming Dynasty were masters of their craft, capable of creating intricate and elaborate jewelry pieces. The evidence is there in the abundance of finds in royal and noble tombs across Hubei province.
Businesses today face growing dual pressures to deliver strong financial performance while also demonstrating environmental and social responsibility. New research from Murdoch University published in Business Strategy & Development has found that companies that aggressively
Earth was once covered by a global magma ocean, which later cooled and crystallised – now traces of this primordial event have been found in magma from a young volcano in the Indian Ocean
Planets beyond our solar system can have magnetic fields similar to those closer to home, astronomers said Tuesday after observing extreme winds on scorching worlds known as "hot Jupiters."
Short-lived sources of radio radiation in the sky, known as radio transients, can originate in the vicinity of supermassive black holes in the centers of galaxies. They are the result of processes that take place under extreme physical conditions. While most radio transients
A new study published in Movement Ecology describes how migratory fish passed through the Haringvliet Sluices before the introduction of Kierbeheer (the partial opening of the Haringvliet Sluices to allow limited saltwater intrusion and facilitate fish migration). The analysis,
An international team of astronomers reports the discovery of a new massive barred spiral galaxy. The newfound galaxy, designated M1149-BSG-z5, was identified using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). The finding was detailed in a paper published June 23 on the preprint
Researchers at the University of Münster and Ruhr University Bochum have demonstrated for the first time in real time that the body's own defense cells use catecholamines—neurotransmitters such as dopamine and adrenaline—to communicate via the same chemical signals as nerve
Enabling people to reflect critically on societal changes and participate in meeting major challenges is the purpose of teaching transformative competencies. In a Perspective article published in the journal npj Climate Action, Dr. Nicole Aeschbach has examined how this
NASA’s Swift space telescope is reaching the end of its two-decade run in orbit – unless a satellite launched on 3 July can give it a lifesaving boost
A few years ago, Austin Wrenn noticed something unsettling in his strawberry greenhouses at Wrenn's Farm in Zebulon, North Carolina. He was one of the first growers in the state to experience losses from an unexpected, aggressive fungal pathogen known as Neopestalotiopsis, or
There is a constant war going on in your body. Working against you are viruses and cancer cells growing uncontrollably, threatening your tissues and organs. Fighting on your side are immune cells such as lymphocytes, a type of white blood cell that includes T cells and B cells.
Researchers from the University of Bergen have uncovered the remains of a 4,000-year-old child in a cave site on Norway's west coast. "The find offers rare and important insight into the first agricultural population in Norway, and we hope that analysis of the bone material
Researchers have spent decades—and billions of dollars—sequencing animal and crop genomes, but fungi have historically been the forgotten middle child of genomics, only noticed when they're ruining bread or colonizing toes.
More than 500,000 stars blaze red, white, and blue in this image from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, released in celebration of the United States' 250th anniversary. The image showcases Messier 3 (M3), one of the Milky Way galaxy's most massive globular clusters, or spherical
New research from the University of Kansas uses network science to determine why people make mistakes when lip-reading. Michael Vitevitch, professor of speech-language-hearing at KU, and his co-authors created a visual map of about 20,000 words in English, hoping to better
A hardy aquarium fish prized for its golden hue, the ornamental Flowerhorn cichlid (Amphilophus spp.) has become a problem for the residents of San Pablo City, Laguna: It is increasingly taking on an outsized role in both the natural ecosystem and local aquaculture operations
Neutrinos: They have no electric charge, pass through matter like a ghost and are so light they were initially thought to have zero mass. These are just some of the traits that make them so difficult to detect. Research on neutrinos requires massive underground observatories
Every summer, communities across northern Australia brace for the tropical cyclone season. Tropical cyclones draw their power from the warm seas, extracting heat and moisture from ocean water.
During his morning runs, Rod Keogh had no doubt that the whale poo he saw washed up on the beach had value. Science has finally caught up with him. Samples collected by the South Australian man have contributed to a groundbreaking study of the diets and microbiomes of southern
Europe's summer heat wave has exposed tens of millions of people to temperatures above 35°C, broken records and claimed hundreds of lives. Early climate attribution studies suggest Europe's event would have been "virtually impossible" just 50 years ago without human-caused
Female orangutans are generally solitary, but they travel more and eat less in an apparent effort to ensure their offspring have someone to play with
Murder, suicide, spontaneous combustion, sleepwalking, ventriloquism: These are some of the sensational events in the novels of Charles Brockden Brown (1771–1810). As the United States' first professional author, Brown is the Founding Father of the nation's literature. He is,
When trying to attract and recognize potential mates, animals are known to rely on various signals, traits and behaviors. In the case of birds, these signals can typically include a wide range of sounds—such as trills, whistles, chirps or melodious notes defined as "songs"—as
The moon is not the only natural object traveling through space alongside Earth. Several small asteroids travel around the sun in near lockstep with our planet. And just like Earth, these space rocks also take a year to complete a full orbit. Today, we know of eight such
Your cognitive flexibility may go first The post Memory Loss May Not Be the Earliest Sign of Alzheimer’s appeared first on Nautilus .
Residents of Guam and the Northern Marianas boarded up windows and stocked up Friday as a monster weather system forecast to become a "super typhoon" approached the U.S. Pacific territories.
France endured a rise of nearly 30% in the number of deaths recorded during the week starting June 22, the peak of a record-breaking heat wave that battered the country, the public health authority said Friday.
A three-armed spacecraft rocketed into orbit Friday to rescue a NASA telescope that's in danger of crashing back to Earth.
Domestic and family violence (DFV) rates in the Indo-Pacific are among the highest globally, but there is a lack of focus, both in research and policy, on the issue across the region. In the first analysis of its kind centered on the Indo-Pacific, Griffith University
People in the U.S. experience more, and more intense, heat waves than the Founding Fathers would have
A study into the foraging habits of green turtles in the Northern Territory has used an innovative surveying technique that could become a critical tool in monitoring marine habitats in remote and challenging environments.
The Congo River is the second-largest river in the world, releasing an average of 40,000 cubic meters of water per second into the Atlantic Ocean. This huge discharge rate creates a large plume of fresh water that fans out 800 kilometers (500 miles) offshore.
Healthy ecosystems depend on more than just having lots of species—they rely on the complex relationships between plants, prey and predators, according to new international research led by the University of Waikato and the German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research
New archaeology has uncovered everything from musket balls to wig curlers at the site of the Battle of Bunker Hill, the first major clash of the American Revolution