Category Science

These bubble-wrap cartilage cells have been dyed green to make them easily visible Plikus lab/University of California/Irvine A long-overlooked skeletal tissue found in the nose and ears turns out to resemble bubble wrap – and harnessing it could make facial…

So how could this new cell elude scientists and doctors for so long? In a way, it didn’t. Plikus and his graduate student scoured centuries of scientific papers for any lost trace of fatty cartilage. They found a clue in…

The Horse Hill oil site was discovered in 2015 Invicta Kent Media/Shutterstock Over 100 earthquakes that shook the south of England are likely to have been triggered by oil extraction, say experts. Previous research had ruled out a link, but…

January 8, 2025 5 min read NASA’s Mars Sample Return Program Faces Stark Choices NASA sees two paths for saving its beleaguered plan to retrieve materials from the Red Planet but won’t choose between them until 2026 By Lee Billings…

“With those winds being very calm this morning, I believe we can actually make some progress, turn a corner, and start to build some containment on these fires,” Brent Pascua, a Cal Fire battalion chief, told The Today Show on…

La Niña increases the risk of drought in certain regions, as occurred in California in 2022 David McNew / Getty Images A weak La Niña climate pattern has emerged in the Pacific Ocean, months later than was initially forecast. This…

January 9, 2025 4 min read Los Angeles Fires Could Push California’s Insurance System to the Brink Damages from the recent fires in the Los Angeles area could overwhelm California’s already stressed insurer of last resort By Blanca Begert, Camille…

On the morning of January 7, the first of Los Angeles’ vast wildfires broke out in a forested area near Topanga State Park on the northwest edge of the city. Conditions allowed the blaze to spread very quickly: 100 mph…

The skull of a saber-toothed tiger (Smilodon) Steve Morton Predators have evolved sabre teeth many times during the history of life – and we now have a better idea why these teeth develop as they do. Sabre teeth have very…

Katalin Karikó, a Hungarian-born biochemist, dedicated her life’s work to messenger RNA (mRNA), which she always believed had the potential to change the world. After decades of being ignored, she persisted with the research that eventually revolutionized the field of…