Elephants engage in name-calling, according to a new report in Nature Ecology and Evolution. Unlike a few other animals — like dolphins and parrots — that respond to others imitating their signature call, an elephant’s name is its own separate word.This finding was born in the field, but confirmed with experiments. It’s been well established that one elephant can signal an entire group with what Joyce Poole, cofounder of Elephant Voices, a nonprofit organization that researches elephant ...read more

The Sun warms the Earth, making it habitable for people and animals. But that’s not all it does, and it affects a much larger area of space. The heliosphere, the area of space influenced by the Sun, is over a hundred times larger than the distance from the Sun to the Earth.The Sun is a star that constantly emits a steady stream of plasma – highly energized ionized gas – called the solar wind. In addition to the constant solar wind, the Sun also occasionally releases eruptions of plasma cal ...read more

The 2020s have already seen many lunar landing attempts, although several of them have crashed or toppled over. With all the excitement surrounding the prospect of humans returning to the Moon, both commercial interests and scientists stand to gain.The Moon is uniquely suitable for researchers to build telescopes they can’t put on Earth because it doesn’t have as much satellite interference as Earth, nor a magnetic field blocking out radio waves. But only recently have astronomers like me st ...read more

Nestled in the heart of the west-central Balkans, Montenegro is a land of breathtaking landscapes and rich cultural and religious heritage. This small yet diverse country, bordered by the Adriatic Sea, is renowned for its architectural marvels and medieval murals that adorn its many sacred sites.So, if you're planning a trip and wondering what to do in Montenegro, exploring its spiritual and historical landmarks should be at the top of your list. From ancient monasteries perched in rugged cliffs ...read more

You’ve probably heard people say, “It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity.” There’s a lot of truth to that phrase, and it’s important to understand it as summer temperatures rise.Humidity doesn’t just make you feel sticky and uncomfortable – it also creates extra dangerous conditions on hot days. Together, too much heat and humidity can make you sick. And in severe cases, it can cause your body to shut down.Meteorologists talk about the risk of heat and humidity using the heat in ...read more

The first of several global heating analyses for May is in, and while expected, the news, from the Copernicus Climate Change Service, is still disturbing: It was the warmest May on record, continuing a record-setting heat streak that has now lasted for each of the past 12 months, going back to June 2023.This means global temperatures have been at 1.63 degrees C above preindustrial levels over the past 12 months, according to the Copernicus analysis. Under the Paris Agreement, countries agreed to ...read more

Buronius manfredschmidi nov. gen. et sp. photographs. Upper panel: holotype left upper M2 (GPIT/MA/13005), A–occlusal, B–buccal, C–lingual, D–mesial, E–distal. Lower panel: paratype left lower P4 (GPIT/MA/13004), F–occlusal, G–buccal, H–lingual, I–mesial, J–distal. Scale bars equal 10 mm. (Credit: Böhme et al., 2024, PLOS ONE, CC-BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/))A team of researchers reported a new species, Buronius manfredschmidi, that they estimated w ...read more

We know that humans evolved in Africa from our ape-like ancestors, starting around 6 million years ago. We came down from the trees, began to walk upright, found fire, hunted and gathered, constructed weapons and tools, and then some of us migrated out of Africa.In time, Homo sapiens spread all over the world and became the only remaining hominins after Neanderthals died out around 40,000 years ago.But while we know that H. sapiens started in Africa before populating the rest of the planet, for ...read more

Have you ever played hide-and-seek in a new place? It’s much harder than playing at home. You only know the obvious hiding spots: under the bed, in the closet, behind the couch. The trick is trying to think of hiding spots you can’t even imagine. How do you search in places you never thought could be hiding spots?That is kind of what scientists like me do when we look for alien life; we’re trying to think of new ways to look for life. In the meantime, we’re looking for life by looking fo ...read more

Saying “hi” can be complicated. That greeting’s meaning can be altered by the tone of your voice, the tilt of your head, your eye contact, and whether and how you raise and wave your hand. And the nature of a hand wave could differ if it’s directed toward one person, a group, someone new, or someone familiar.It turns out that greetings — and communication in general — by elephants is equally nuanced. Over the past few decades, researchers have explored three “C’s” of elephant c ...read more