Thirteen years after Vermont lost the ignominious distinction of being the only state in the continental United States without any breeding pairs of bald eagles, the state is moving to remove the iconic national symbol from its list of threatened and endangered species.

Microbiology researchers at Oregon State University have shed new light on the mechanisms of carbon cycling in the ocean, using a novel approach to track which microbes are consuming different types of organic carbon produced by common phytoplankton species.

Polymer science has made possible rubber tires, Teflon and Kevlar, plastic water bottles, nylon jackets among many other ubiquitous features of daily life. Elastic polymers, known as elastomers, can be stretched and released repeatedly and are used in applications such as gloves and heart valves, where they need to last a long time without tearing. But a conundrum has long stumped polymer...

Researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and collaborators have devised and tested a new, highly sensitive method of detecting and counting defects in transistors—a matter of urgent concern to the semiconductor industry as it develops new materials for next-generation devices. These defects limit transistor and circuit performance and can affect product...

New research from the University of Illinois shows sweet corn, when planted at high densities, has steadily increased in yield since the 1930s. The historical view underscores the importance of planting modern density-tolerant hybrids at their optimal densities, and suggests an opportunity to improve density tolerance even more.

Consumers perceive diverse organizations to be moral organizations, new research indicates, and the perception can affect consumer behavior.

A video of the sea floor off the Orange County coast this week shows damage to an oil pipeline that sent an estimated 144,000 gallons of crude into the ocean, fouling beaches and threatening ecologically sensitive wetlands.

A 70-year-old model used to predict the microstructure of materials doesn't work for today's materials, say Carnegie Mellon University researchers in Science. A microscopy technique developed by Carnegie Mellon and Argonne National Laboratory yields evidence that contradicts the conventional model and points the way towards the use of new types of characterizations to predict properties—and...

Sixty-three percent. That's the proportion of mammal species that vanished from Africa and the Arabian Peninsula around 30 million years ago, after Earth's climate shifted from swampy to icy. But we are only finding out about it now.

Addressing the climate crisis will require cooperation on a massive scale, but to accomplish this, people need to know what specific challenges lie ahead and how to best move forward. Across the globe, people are facing the effects of the climate crisis, yet many are still unsure how and even if they can address it.

Settling into a new job is no easy task, but the connections made among other newcomers in the beginning days could be key to early success.

A new report that could make it simpler to send spacecraft to some areas of Mars while still protecting the planet from Earth-based contamination was presented today at a press conference at the 53rd annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society's Division for Planetary Sciences by Planetary Science Institute Senior Scientist Amanda Hendrix.

Gazing into the universe is like looking into a funhouse mirror. That's because gravity warps the fabric of space, creating optical illusions.

In a new paper in the journal Science, researchers uncover the evolution of the hepatitis B virus since the Early Holocene by analyzing the largest dataset of ancient viral genomes produced to date.

It is commonly assumed that any important scientific knowledge would be available in English, and so scientific knowledge used in international studies is predominantly sourced from English-language documents. But is this assumption correct? According to research publishing October 7th in the open access journal PLOS Biology, led by Dr. Tatsuya Amano at the University of Queensland, Australia, the...

The first scientific analysis of images taken by NASA's Perseverance rover has now confirmed that Mars' Jezero crater—which today is a dry, wind-eroded depression—was once a quiet lake, fed steadily by a small river some 3.7 billion years ago.

Blue mussels (Mytilus edulis) spend their days being buffeted by crashing waves. They manage to stay tethered to the rocks or their fellow mussels thanks to a highly effective underwater glue they produce. Because achieving adhesion in the presence of water is so challenging, scientists who are interested in producing effective adhesives for use in wet environments (e.g., for surgical or dental...

Daily cycles in virtually every aspect of our physiology are driven by biological clocks (also called circadian clocks) in our cells. The cyclical interactions of clock proteins keep the biological rhythms of life in tune with the daily cycle of night and day, and this happens not only in humans and other complex animals but even in simple, single-celled organisms such as cyanobacteria.

A lunar probe launched by the Chinese space agency recently brought back the first fresh samples of rock and debris from the moon in more than 40 years. Now an international team of scientists—including an expert from Washington University in St. Louis—has determined the age of these moon rocks at close to 1.97 billion years old.

We regularly hear warnings that climate change may lead to 'tipping points': irreversible situations where savanna can quickly change into desert, or the warm gulf stream current can simply stop flowing. These cautions often refer to spatial patterns as early-warning signals of tipping points. An international team of ecologists and mathematicians has studied these patterns and come to a...

Pasture-raised beef is the cornerstone of the New Zealand meat industry. But do we really understand the benefits we get from the meat when it is raised this way?

A much-touted cleanup of oil pollution in southern Nigeria has yet to start in parts of the hotspot Ogoniland, almost three years after contracts were handed out, and residents remain without proper drinking water, a report said Thursday.

It is no exaggeration to say that science has saved humanity on multiple occasions. The most recent has been through the development of vaccines for the current COVID-19 pandemic.

Just 5% of employed people in the UK worked from home in 2019. The onset of the pandemic and the overnight shuttering of offices during the first lockdown meant 47% of employees were doing the same in April 2020.