Most people would think that it would be hard to hide the evidence of a massive volcanic eruption. It shouldn't be hard to track down the source of tens of cubic kilometers of ash and debris because it should just get thicker and thicker until you reach the volcano that disgorged the mess. Yet, somehow, it isn't that easy. We live on a geologically active planet where all the processes of weather, tectonics, volcanism and more can quickly disassemble the deposits of an eruption -- even a gia ...read more

When navigating through dark environments, rats swish their whiskers against nearby objects to figure out where they are. As the animals explore, they use this sense of touch to build maps of unfamiliar places. Cockroaches and blind crayfish use their antennae in a similar approach. Now, the go-by-feel strategy has inspired the creation of a robotic catheter capable of finding its way through the beating heart of lives pigs during a surgical procedure without the help of a surgeon’s guidi ...read more

Charred earth, shells, bones and human burials found in mounds on a plain in northern Bolivia are offering scientists new clues about the earliest known inhabitants of the southwestern Amazon. The remains, excavated from raised areas known as “forest islands” on the Llanos de Moxos, an extensive savanna, show the area was inhabited between 10,600 and 4,000 years ago, according to new study published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances. “In the late Holocene, about 2,500 ...read more

Since the birth of the satellite age, scientists noticed that some spacecraft tend to slow down when the sun’s activity is highest, causing them to fall closer to Earth. If the spacecraft don’t carry enough fuel to boost them back to their intended orbits, they can eventually fall back down to Earth. Researchers quickly connected the slow-downs to the northern and southern lights, or auroras. These drifting patterns of colorful light are caused by charged solar particles striking Ea ...read more

The “everything in moderation” mantra sounds like great advice for weight management. Enjoy all your favorite junk food, but stick to reasonable portions and don’t indulge too often. For most of us, that’s easier said than done. Now, a new discovery by a team of scientists at the University of North Carolina (UNC) School of Medicine may help explain why so many of us can’t resist polishing off a jumbo bag of chips or a carton of ice cream in one sitting & ...read more

It's one of the most common arguments in basketball: Who hit that ball out of bounds? When two NBA players lunge for a ball end up tipping it out, neither wants to cop to the final touch. Refs are called in to arbitrate while both players deny their culpability, often in heated tones. There's an obvious motive behind wanting to avoid blame, but a new study shows that there might also be a neurological basis behind both players' belief that their opponent touched the ball last. Our brains ...read more

Throat cancer, stroke and paralysis can rob people’s voices and strip away their ability to speak. Now, researchers have developed a decoder that translates brain activity into a synthetic voice. The new technology is a significant step toward restoring lost speech. “We want to create technologies that can reproduce speech directly from human brain activity,” Edward Chang, a neurosurgeon at the University of California San Francisco, who led the new research, said in a press b ...read more

We know surprisingly little about seismicity (on Earth it would be earthquakes) on other planets. Although we have done a little seismology on the Moon, both "listening" for natural temblors or creating our own, beyond that, we haven't had much luck. Sure, the 1970's Viking landers had seismometers as part of their array of instruments, but they were sitting on the deck of the landers, not placed on the ground, so almost no useful data was collected. The newest Mars lander, InSight, is th ...read more

It seems like every few years there’s a virus or bacterium that threatens human health in a new way. But a new fungus that is a threat to humans? That doesn’t happen very often. That’s why we in the medical mycology community – the people who study dangerous fungi – are so intrigued and concerned by news reports about a new, deadly fungus called Candida auris. C. auris is believed to have been first identified in 2009 in the ear canal of a patient in Japan, but has ...read more

Grab a spacesuit and a few months of provisions. We’re taking you on a tour of the Interplanetary Parks Service. Space is harsh. From damaging radiation to deadly gases and drastic temperature changes, pretty much any environment beyond Earth can kill you at a moment’s notice. Yet our cosmic backyard boasts natural wonders that rival the greatest found on terra firma. And, one day, when we have the technology for deep-space rocket launches, suitable protective gear, and enough pr ...read more