Honey bee health has been on the decline for two decades, with U.S. and Canadian beekeepers now losing about 25 to 40% of their colonies annually. And queen bees are failing faster than they have in the past in their ability to reproduce. The reason has been a mystery, but researchers at North Carolina State University and the University of British Columbia are finding answers.

A group of scientists led by the American Museum of Natural History and Bat Conservation International have discovered a new species of a striking orange and black bat in a mountain range in West Africa. The species, which the researchers expect is likely critically endangered, underscores the importance of sub-Saharan "sky islands" to bat diversity. The species is described today in the journal...

Working with theorists in the University of Chicago's Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering, researchers in the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory have achieved a scientific control that is a first of its kind. They demonstrated a novel approach that allows real-time control of the interactions between microwave photons and magnons, potentially leading to advances in...

There are things in life that can be predicted reasonably well. The tides rise and fall. The moon waxes and wanes. A billiard ball bounces around a table according to orderly geometry.

With the impact of climate change increasing by the day, scientists are studying the ways in which human behavior contributes to the damage. A recent study at Walla Walla University, by a collaboration of researchers from Walla Walla University and La Sierra University, examined the effects of acidic water on octopuses, potentially bringing new insight into both how our activities impact the world...

Skoltech researchers have found a way to use chemical sensors and computer vision to determine when grilled chicken is cooked just right. These tools can help restaurants monitor and automate cooking processes in their kitchens, and perhaps one day even end up in your 'smart' oven. The paper detailing this research results, supported by a Russian Science Foundation grant, was published in the...

Research led by the University of Wyoming shows that physical weathering is far more important than previously recognized in the breakdown of rock in mountain landscapes. Because it is difficult to measure, physical weathering has commonly been assumed to be negligible in previous studies.

As crunch UN talks to reverse the accelerating destruction of nature loom, indigenous peoples are sounding an alarm over proposed conservation plans they say could clash with their rights.

Archaeologists have discovered the world's oldest known cave painting: a life-sized picture of a wild pig that was made at least 45,500 years ago in Indonesia.

The vaunted Mediterranean diet and the French "bon gout" are getting some competition: The European Union's food safety agency says worms are safe to eat.

Researchers at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and the School of Engineering and Applied Science at the University of Pennsylvania have identified ionizable lipid nanoparticles that could be used to deliver mRNA as part of fetal therapy. The proof-of-concept study, published today in Science Advances, engineered and screened a number of lipid nanoparticle formulations for targeting mouse fetal...

Scientists from the Pacific Quantum Center of Far Eastern Federal University (FEFU) report that the slipknot-structure AFV3-109 protein folds and unfolds depending on temperature. The protein is typical for the archaea, viruses of the oldest single-celled organisms that can survive in the extreme conditions of underwater volcanic sources. The research appears in PLOS ONE.

Earth's ability to absorb nearly a third of human-caused carbon emissions through plants could be halved within the next two decades at the current rate of warming, according to a new study in Science Advances by researchers at Northern Arizona University, the Woodwell Climate Research Center and the University of Waikato, New Zealand. Using more than two decades of data from measurement towers in...

The first COVID-19 lockdowns led to significant changes in urban air pollution levels around the world, but the changes were smaller than expected—a new study reveals.

Most of the revenues extracted from use of the world's oceans is concentrated among 100 transnational corporations, which have been identified for the first time by researchers at Duke University and the Stockholm Resilience Centre at Stockholm University.

Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity profoundly changed our thinking about fundamental concepts in physics, such as space and time. But it also left us with some deep mysteries. One was black holes, which were only unequivocally detected over the past few years. Another was "wormholes"—bridges connecting different points in spacetime, in theory providing shortcuts for space travelers.

Editor's note: Nathan Ahlgren is a professor of biology at Clark University. In this interview, he explains exactly what proteins are, how they are made, and the wide variety of functions they perform in the human body.

Novel calculations have enabled the study of nearly 700 isotopes between helium and iron, showing which nuclei can exist and which cannot. In an article published in Physical Review Letters, scientists from TU Darmstadt, the University of Washington, the Canadian laboratory TRIUMF, and the University of Mainz report how they simulated for the first time using innovative theoretical methods a large...

Primary amoebic meningoencephalitis (PAM), a deadly disease caused by the "brain-eating amoeba" Naegleria fowleri, is becoming more common in some areas of the world, and it has no effective treatment. Now, researchers reporting in ACS Chemical Neuroscience have found that a compound isolated from the leaves of a traditional medicinal plant, Inula viscosa or "false yellowhead," kills the amoebae...

Apart from black holes, magnetars may be the most extreme stars in the universe. With a diameter less than the length of Manhattan, they pack more mass than that of our sun, wield the largest magnetic field of any known object—more than 10 trillion times stronger than a refrigerator magnet—and spin on their axes every few seconds.

In 2007, an increase in world food prices led to a global rush for land in the form of land grabs or large-scale land acquisitions. Over the last two decades, such acquisitions have resulted in millions of hectares of land changing hands in developing nations. Although such changeover can increase the cultivation of crops needed to feed the world's growing population and spark new agricultural...

Many students, especially non-science majors, dread chemistry. The first lesson in an introductory chemistry course typically deals with how to interpret the periodic table of elements, but its complexity can be overwhelming to students with little or no previous exposure. Now, researchers reporting in ACS' Journal of Chemical Education introduce an innovative way to make learning about the...

Financial responsibility means managing money in a relatively sensible way by minimizing superfluous or unnecessary spending. But according to new research from the University of Notre Dame, people think they are more financially responsible than they actually are.

Egg cells are among the largest cells in the animal kingdom. If moved only by the random jostlings of water molecules, a protein could take hours or even days to drift from one side of a forming egg cell to the other. Luckily, nature has developed a faster way: cell-spanning whirlpools in the immature egg cells of animals such as mice, zebrafish and fruit flies. These vortices enable cross-cell...