Flying fish belong to the family Exocoetidae, which means in Latin, “fish that sleeps on the shore.” The family contains about 60 flying fish species that live about 5 years and use special ray-shaped fins underwater. They eat a humble diet of plankton and other small crustaceans.You can see this species in pop culture: In the seventh level of the original Super Mario Bros., Mario must run through a gauntlet of little red flying pufferfish called Cheep Cheeps. But in reality, they soar throu ...read more

A huge "smokestorm" from blazing Canadian wildfires made headlines around the world recently. Now, NASA imagery shows the smoke was so thick and widespread it was visible to a spacecraft nearly a million miles from Earth.The image was acquired by NASA’s Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC) on NOAA’s DSCOVR satellite on May 20, 2023. A gigantic swirl of smoke, described as a "smoke cyclone/smokestorm" by climate scientist Daniel Swain, is clearly visible. Not quite as visible is the fu ...read more

After pummeling Guam on Wednesday, Super Typhoon Mawar has strengthened into one of the most powerful tropical cyclones ever recorded in the month of May. For a time on Friday, May 26, Mawar howled with maximum sustained winds of 185 miles per hour. That has made it 2023's strongest storm so far. It's also stronger than any of 2022's tropical cyclones. With gusts approaching 210 miles per hour, Mawar has pushed up waves nearly 65 feet tall, according to the Joint Typhoon Warning Center.A stunnin ...read more

As the old saying — often attributed to Bette Davis — has it, “Getting old ain’t for sissies.” For most people, growing old is a lot better if they can stay in their own homes as they age, something called “aging in place.” But for many older people, especially those with some degree of cognitive impairment, staying at home has not been a realistic option. The good news is modern technology might be changing that. Data-Driven Home Care DevicesFor more than a decade, researchers at ...read more

Much of what your average person knows about ancient cultures comes down to a handful of artifacts.We know the ancient Egyptians partly through the Bust of Nefertiti and the Rosetta Stone. We know the Anglo-Saxons partly through the helmet and treasure left at Sutton Hoo.But what are some of the most significant treasures from the ancient Maya civilization?For those who aren’t as familiar with this culture, we’ve enlisted the help of Elizabeth Paris, an archaeologist at the University of Cal ...read more

We tend to think of our minds as, for better or worse, impenetrable fortresses. Other people see our internal thoughts only when we transform them into language and send them out into the world.Earlier this month, however, researchers at the University of Austin chipped away at this barrier between internal and external.By feeding brain imaging data into an artificial intelligence model, they captured the gist of what their subjects were hearing, seeing and thinking. As the technology’s accura ...read more

In the memoir, Group, a young law student ranked at the top of her class but struggled in her personal life with an eating disorder, suicidal ideation and intimacy issues. An acquaintance connected her with a therapist who recommended she join group therapy sessions.The author had to open up to other group members in the sessions and share parts of herself she’d rather keep hidden. In turn, she listened as other group members told their own stories and questioned the parts of their lives tha ...read more

Humans have evolved to survive and thrive as social creatures. Meaning, dynamic cooperation and connection to others are fundamental to our existence as a species.And yet, or perhaps because of this, some individuals insist on pushing the limits of human isolation. They voluntarily subject themselves to extreme environments and conditions to test what the human body and mind can endure.Living in Social IsolationOver the past century, scientists have monitored human subjects while they voluntaril ...read more

For almost 60 years, the world’s most iconic radio telescope consisted of a 305-metre dish built into a natural sinkhole in Puerto Rico with a 900-tonne receiver suspended above. But on 1 December 2020, the receiver plummeted to the ground after its supporting cables snapped, destroying the dish. The US National Science Foundation, which runs the facility, had long been aware of the ageing observatory’s shortcomings. Indeed, it had closed the observatory and announced plans to demolish it. B ...read more