The venom of the male blue-lined octopus is made for its predators, its prey, and, apparently, its mating partners. That’s what researchers from the University of Queensland in Australia found after observing the males of the species sedating the females with venom prior to mating. “Injecting the females renders them immobile,” the researchers wrote in a March Current Biology report, “allowing the males to mate successfully.” Read More: The Tiny Blue-Ringed Octopus Is Iridescent and De ...read more

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the sixth leading cause of death in the U.S. Beyond the high economic and healthcare demands, it places a significant physical, emotional, and financial burden on family caregivers.Patients with AD experience memory loss, confusion, mood and personality changes, and difficulty with language, often leading to social withdrawal. The biological cause of AD is linked to the accumulation of amyloid plaques, tau tangles, and synaptic loss in brain regions such as the hipp ...read more

If you’ve been feeling a little down as the “Doomsday Clock” ticks ever closer to midnight, you’re not alone.A new study in The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists (BAS) links the clock’s progress to negative shifts in mortality and mental health. The study, the first of its kind to connect the timepiece metaphor for global catastrophe to mental and physical health, indicates higher rates of death related to Alzheimer’s disease, suicide, unintentional injuries, and alcohol and drug abuse a ...read more

Even during one of Earth’s largest mass extinction events, where heat waves kill of a majority of Earth’s species, at least one oasis of survival existed.The findings suggest that there may have been pockets of protection throughout Earth — challenging the notion that the heat affected life on the planet uniformly, according to a paper in Science Advances.Living Through "The Great Dying"About 250 million years ago, a series of massive volcanic eruptions warmed Earth. This period, sometimes ...read more

Uncertainty is just what it sounds like: not knowing. It’s that state of limbo when you’re waiting to find out if you got the job, if the biopsy is negative, if you’re pregnant or not. It’s not knowing who’s the best candidate or which brand of car is likely to last the longest. It’s also not knowing the answers to those existential questions: Why am I here? How is everything going to turn out?  Most research on uncertainty has focused on its negative aspects, primarily anxiety. Ho ...read more

In an unprecedented procedure, CRISPR gene editing has been used to treat cancer. A research team from Tel Aviv University, led by Razan Masarwy, successfully used CRISPR to cut a gene from head and neck cancers. Following the procedure, 50 percent of the targeted tumors disappeared 84 days after treatment. Their findings were published in Advanced Science.Collapsing the Cancer PyramidDan Peer, Director of the Laboratory of Precision Nanomedicine, and his colleagues are pioneers in mRNA-based ...read more

Many of us have taken first-aid classes in school — a vital skill in any emergency where unconscious individuals require immediate assistance. This training includes assessing the situation, checking vital signs, calling for help, and even performing CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation) if necessary.While technical aspects of first aid need to be taught and practiced, the instinct to help others in distress is deeply ingrained in human nature. And we're not alone: Various animal species have al ...read more

In the ongoing quest to understand dark matter, researchers are now wondering if a strange phenomenon occurring at the heart of the Milky Way galaxy could be from a different form of dark matter. Dark matter is a mysterious substance that could make up 85 percent of the Universe’s mass, and researchers have been working endlessly to find and understand it. Now, a new study published in Physical Review Letters is looking at a new candidate for dark matter that could be causing unexplained chem ...read more

More often than not, private sector attempts to visit the moon so far have resulted in a failure to land. Intuitive Machines experienced its second moon setback in March 2025. Its lander, Athena was off target by about 800 feet, touched down in a crater, then tipped over. It snapped and sent some photographs and activated a few experiments before going silent about 24 hours later.About a week earlier, Texas aerospace company Firefly Aerospace celebrated the first successful lunar landing when it ...read more

Microplastics — defined as plastic particles under 0.2 inches – have been discovered most recently in human lungs and brains, as well as in our livers, kidneys, and testes. They have so far been associated with some cancers, respiratory diseases, and pregnancy and birth complications.Now researchers are adding another ill effect to the persistent particles — boosting antibiotic resistance, according to a study recently published in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.Antibio ...read more