A conservation organization has petitioned for protection of the western Joshua tree under the California Endangered Species Act due to the effects of climate change and habitat destruction.

The geode of Pulpí is an 11-meter hollow ovoid with crystal-paneled walls. It is like those familiar couplets of stone interiors covered with bright crystallites, but so large that several people can fit inside. The crystals, of up to two meters in size, are so transparent that they look like ice crystals. In this paper for Geology, Juan Manuel García-Ruiz and colleagues reveal the geological...

Tropical Storm Ema had a very short life, but NASA's Terra satellite caught a glimpse of the storm before it dissipated in the Central Pacific Ocean.

Many of today's scientific processes are simulated using computer-driven mathematical models. But for a model to accurately predict how air flow behaves at high speeds, for example, scientists need supplemental real life data. Providing validation data, using up-to-date methods, was a key motivating factor for a recent experimental study conducted by researchers at the University of Illinois at...

Two new porcelain crab species have been described in the ZooKeys journal by scientists from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) and the Institut fur Tierokologie und Spezielle Zoologie der Justus-Liebig-Universitat Giessen. One of the new species, Polyonyx socialis, was discovered in the South China Sea of Vietnam. The other, Petrolisthes virgilius, has a new identity, after...

A fast knee-jerk "ballistic" escape response and a more considered "delayed" escape response are mediated by distinct and parallel neuronal pathways in zebrafish, according to a study published October 15 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Harold Burgess of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, and colleagues.

Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet will sign off draft laws on new green taxes and subsidies this week, including much harsher charges on short-haul flights, German government sources said Tuesday.

The mystery continues.

NASA is moving up the first all-female spacewalk to this week because of a power system failure at the International Space Station.

Piranha fish have a powerful bite. Their teeth help them shred through the flesh of their prey or even scrape plants off rocks to supplement their diet.

A new study has found that children who had strong early reading skills in their native Spanish language when they entered kindergarten experienced greater growth in their ability to read English from kindergarten through fourth grade.

Given the alarming pace of climate change, it is increasingly important to understand what factors motivate people to take action—or not—on environmental issues. A recent study in Sustainability Science shows that deeply held values, which align closely with political leanings, can predict whether someone takes action to protect the environment. And it suggests people on opposite ends of the...

Northwestern Engineering materials science researchers have uncovered new insights into how electrostatic interactions can be regulated to attain and control scroll-like cochleate structures, which could inform how to capture and release macromolecules in a size-selective manner as part of future drug-delivery strategies.

The irreproducibility of preclinical data is impeding scientific progress and the development of effective new medical therapies. The Animal Study Registry was launched in January 2019 as a response to the reproducibility crisis and the scientific community's quest for greater transparency in animal research in order to enhance both the knowledge gained from animal studies and the reproducibility...

In 2018, vast amounts of snow were spread across most of the Arctic region and did not melt fully until late summer, if at all. Publishing on October 15 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology, researchers documented the consequences of this extreme weather event at Zackenberg, Northeast Greenland by extensively monitoring all components of the local ecosystem for more than 20 years, allowing them...

GPS tracking data reveals that the foraging activity of the European nightjar more than doubles during moon-lit nights, and the birds then migrate simultaneously about 10 days after the full moon, according to a study published October 15 in the open-access journal PLOS Biology by Gabriel Norevik and Anders Hedenström of Lund University in Sweden, and colleagues.

New insight on how the natural loss of foot muscles occurred in rodents and other species during their evolution has been published today in the open-access journal eLife.

Recent attacks on "grievance" studies have occasioned renewed attention to the politics of knowledge in the academy. In a wide-ranging survey, Mark Horowitz, William Yaworsky and Kenneth Kickham revisit some of anthropology's most sensitive controversies. Taking the field's temperature since the sweltry "science wars" of the nineties, Horowitz and colleagues probe whether anthropology is still a...

Canadians who consider religion to be important in their lives were still more likely to vote for the Conservative Party in 2015, finds new research from the University of Waterloo. This religion effect on voting behaviour is one of the strongest sociodemographic effects on vote choice in Canada.

Those at the bottom of the social ladder are known to live shorter and sicker lives than those at the top. And the stress of life at the bottom may have long-term health effects that even upward mobility can't undo, according to new research in monkeys.

A newly discovered protein turns on plants' cellular defence to excessive light and other stress factors caused by a changing climate, according to a new study published in eLife.

Microscopic droplets on the surface of leaves give refuge to bacteria that otherwise may not survive during the dry daytime, according to a new study published today in eLife.

NASA's Suomi NPP satellite passed over North Atlantic Ocean on Oct. 14 and provided forecasters with an infrared view of Tropical Storm Melissa that revealed wind shear was tearing the storm apart as it was becoming extra-tropical.

Native to the Southeastern United States, muscadine grapes are a superfruit. With high levels of resveratrol, phenols and antioxidants, they are known to help fight cardiovascular disease and cancer-causing agents. Muscadines are also favored by small industries making juices, pies, jams, and wine. With combined sales of $5.2 million, these grapes are economically important in Georgia and North...