Heavy rains and flooding through the winter and spring have left fields across the Midwest too wet to plant. (Credit: Matauw/Shutterstock)
Every spring, farmers across the
Midwest take to the fields to plant their crops. Here, corn and soybeans will reign
supreme over tens of millions of acres, as soon as conditions are right to
plant. Not too wet, not too dry – just right.
But the U.S. had an exceptionally wet winter this year. And it kept raining in the spring. April turned to May, ...read more
New research into the genetic backstory of ancient French grapevines reveals that some varieties cultivated today haven't changed for centuries. (Credit: Victor Grigas/Wikimedia Commons)
Consider this the next time you toast a friend and wish them long life: The wine swishing around your glass may have come from grapevines with very long-lived lineages indeed. Researchers analyzing genetic material from ancient grape seeds turned up evidence of varieties almost unchanged for nearly 2,000 yea ...read more
Coming Soon! “The Field Guide to Citizen Science,” from the experts at SciStarter , published by Timber Press.
Citizen science is the public involvement in the discovery of new scientific knowledge. A citizen science project can involve one person or millions of people collaborating towards a common goal. The citizen science movement is approachable and inclusive, making it an excellent option for people looking for ways to get involved and make a differenc ...read more
Scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography are working with Antarctic tour operators like Hurtigruten to enable vacationers to serve as citizen scientists with the FjordPhyto citizen science project. Travelers collect samples of phytoplankton from Antarctic fjords in an effort to understand the base of the food web, helping scientists learn how one of the most fertile ocean regions in the world may be changing.
Human Impact in Remote Areas
You would think that the most remote c ...read more
This iconic shot from the 1902 film A Trip to the Moon shows the fabled Man in the Moon embedded with a massive, bullet-like spacecraft that was launched from Earth by a giant cannon. (Credit: drmvm1/Flickr)
It’s been 50 years since humans first landed on the Moon. But for how long have we rehearsed those first steps in our imaginations? This we do know: We’ve been telling each other tales about our Moon-landing dreams for nearly 2,000 years.
The earliest known written story ab ...read more
(Credit: Manekina Serafima/Shutterstock)
Worldwide, people drink over 65 billion gallons of alcohol each year. The United States’ share, if divided equally across the adult population, would amount to about two and a half gallons of pure alcohol per person, annually. And this thirst seems to be universal: Fermented beverages have been found in nearly every society, as far back as archaeologists can detect their existence.
That’s the idea behind the “drunken monkey&rdquo ...read more
Two galaxy clusters, Abell 0399 and Abell 0401, are merging about 1 billion light-years from Earth. This image shows the clusters' cores (red) in X-ray-light. The two are linked by a thin filament (yellow and blue), which glows faintly in microwaves and radio waves. (Credit: DSS and Pan-STARRS1 (optical), XMM-Newton (X-rays), PLANCK satellite (yparameter), F. Govoni, M. Murgia, INAF)
Galaxy clusters are a great place to peer in on the physics that govern our universe. Not only are these cosm ...read more
A runner on the 3,080-mile Race Across the USA (RAUSA) in 2015. Some of the RAUSA runners were included in a study to determine the metabolic limit for how much energy the body can absorb from food for endurance events. (Credit: Bryce Carlson)
Many marathon runners know the boost that can come from popping a mid-race energy gel. (Mmmm, calorie-rich goop.) But according to new research published in Science Advances, when it comes to endurance events, there’s a limit to how much energy th ...read more
(Credit: Bumble Dee/Shutterstock)
Since 2004, the rate of death by suicide has exceeded that of death by combat injury for American soldiers. A review of more than 100 cases involving the suicide of an active-duty soldier found a significant association between firearm ownership, access and usage patterns and increased risk of suicide.
The study, published today in the open-access, online-only journal JAMA Network Open, conducted psychological autopsies of 135 U.S. soldiers who committed ...read more
Particle accelerators provide a way for scientists to test cosmic ray strength particles in labs on Earth. (Credit: GSI GmbH/Jan Michael Hosan 2018)
NASA astronaut Scott Kelly spent a year in space while scientists monitored changes in his body, as well as that of his twin, Mark Kelly, who remained on the ground. Kelly came back to Earth in good shape, the experiment showed. And, some Russian cosmonauts have also spent even longer than Kelly in space without obvious long term ill effect from ...read more
