This artist's concept shows Voyager 1 entering the interstellar medium. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)
1. High-Gain AntennaSHUTDOWN DATE: Still activePURPOSE: CommunicationsKEY FINDING: This is the craft’s main contact point with Earth. It once sent back the robust data from the craft; today, it sends out basic information from the low-power instruments still online.2. Magnetometers and Low-Field MagnetometerSHUTDOWN DATE: Still activePURPOSE: Measure the magnetic fields of the Sun and the ...read more
(Credit: Kraulis/Shutterstock)
From baby blue to black-speckled beige, bird eggs are as varied as the species that lay them. Why bird eggs come in so many colors is still something of a mystery, but new research identifies a reason for a common trend among birds, especially those up north: their dark-colored eggs.
Previous research on tropical birds has shown that darker hues help guard against predation — they are harder for hungry neighbors to see. Deep pigments in eggshells also c ...read more
Satisfying everyday curiosity. That’s what we’re about. And it’s why Discover is bringing you an entirely new website.
In the coming weeks, we will be refreshing the look and experience on Discovermagazine.com. We’ll still have all the great science stories you love, with smart writing and relevant, engaging information. But it will be framed with a sleek, more modern design that we hope you’ll like as much as we do. We will have a faster and easier-to-navigate site ...read more
A recurring theme in evolutionary psychology is that humans did not evolve to live in the modern world. Homo sapiens emerged in the harsh conditions of small hunter-gatherer societies of the Pleistocene era. Then, in just a few thousand years, we found ourselves in a very different world of big cities, fast food and all the rest. This change happened so suddenly that evolution had no time to adapt us to the new world.
As one early evolutionary psychology text put it, “Few fear motor car ...read more
Each bot in the swarm weighs in at just over an ounce. Credit: TU Delft / MAVLab
In 2008, a fire ripped through the architectural building at Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) in the Netherlands. Firefighters got the burn under control, but afterward, the school wanted to know if any furniture was salvageable.
So Guido de Croon, an associate professor of aerospace engineering, flew a drone around the building to survey the damage. But he didn’t want to get too close; de Croon ...read more
A scream evokes a response that few other sounds can. (Credit: GlebSStock/Shutterstock)
Of all the sounds humans produce, nothing captures our attention quite like a good scream.
They’re a regular feature of horror films, whether it’s Marion Crane’s infamous shower scream in “Psycho” or Chrissie Watkins’ blood-curdling scream at the beginning of “Jaws.”
Screams might seem simple, but they can actually convey a complex set of emotions. The ...read more
(Credit: GaudiLab/Shutterstock)
While sitting in traffic on the way to work, Mark Hanna, an emergency pediatrician at Maimonides Medical Center in New York, watched as cars blocked the path of an ambulance on a choked-up Brooklyn street.
Hanna, a self-proclaimed drone nerd, thought to himself: is there any way an airborne, medicine-carrying device could reach a patient faster than an ambulance on wheels? So, he looked into the response times of ambulances in the crowded NYC borough. Then, ...read more
A baobab tree amid the Makgadikgadi Pan, a region researchers say is the ancestral homeland of all living humans. (Credit: Diego Delso/Wikimedia Commons)
A provocative study claims every living human has an ancestral
homeland in what’s now Botswana, and that our early ancestors dispersed from that
area due to climate change. Dig into the details, however, and there are a few
hefty caveats about the researchers’ methods.
There’s a reason Ancestry.com and other genealog ...read more
Hurricane Pablo, as seen in the eastern Atlantic by NASA's Terra satellite on Oct. 27, 2019
A late October tropical storm spinning in the North Atlantic entered the record books today when it strengthened into a strange little hurricane.
Say hello to Hurricane Pablo, seen in the image above acquired by NASA's Terra satellite.
As of about 5 p.m. EST in the U.S., the tiny storm had attained maximum sustained winds of 80 miles per hour, qualifying it for Category 1 status. That makes ma ...read more
California's Kincade Fire, as seen by the GOES-17 weather satellite on Oct. 27, 2019. Also visible is a blaze more than 50 miles away in Vallejo, CA — believed to have started from embers from the Kincade Fire. (Note: The animation may take a little while to load. Source: RAMMB/CIRA/SLIDER)
Early this morning, winds gusted to 93 miles per hour near California's Kincade Fire.
A Category 1 hurricane is characterized by sustained winds of 74 to 95 miles per hour.
The animation of s ...read more
