Science

Once upon a time, Earth may have sported a planetary ring of its very own. The hypothetical ring didn’t last long, cosmically speaking – just a few tens of millions of years. But that was long enough to have left a lasting impression on Earth’s geological record, according to an analysis led by planetary scientist … Read more

Pregnancy is a transformative time in a person’s life where the body undergoes rapid physiological adaptations to prepare for motherhood — that we all know. What has remained something of a mystery is what the sweeping hormonal shifts brought on by pregnancy are doing to the brain. Researchers in Professor Emily Jacobs’ lab at UC … Read more

A search for chemicals that could inadvertently activate parts of the brain responsible for reproductive functions has identified compounds many of us may encounter in our environment, highlighting a potential trigger for early puberty in women. One is a musky scent, once commonly used in men’s fragrances, which was banned by the European Union, yet … Read more

Those mesmerizing blue and orange hues in the sky at the start and end of a sunny day might have an essential role in setting humans’ internal clocks. In new research from the University of Washington in Seattle, a novel LED light that emits alternating wavelengths of orange and blue outpaced two other light devices … Read more

William Hersh, M.D., who has taught generations of medical and clinical informatics students at Oregon Health & Science University, found himself curious about the growing influence of artificial intelligence. He wondered how AI would perform in his own class. So, he decided to try an experiment. He tested six forms of generative, large-language AI models … Read more

Renewable energy sources like wind and solar are critical to sustaining our planet, but they come with a big challenge: they don’t always generate power when it’s needed. To make the most of them, we need efficient and affordable ways to store the energy they produce, so we have power even when the wind isn’t … Read more

Some microbes have a growing resistance to our antibiotics iStockphoto The number of global deaths directly attributable to antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections is forecast to rise from a record 1.27 million a year in 2019 to 1.91 million a year by 2050. In total, antibiotic resistance is expected to kill 39 million people between now and … Read more

Infections of drug-resistant superbugs are projected to kill nearly 40 million people over the next 25 years, a global analysis predicted on Monday, as the researchers called for action to avoid this grim scenario. Superbugs – strains of bacteria or pathogens that have become resistant to antibiotics, making them much harder to treat – have … Read more

Adversity early in life can have permanent health consequences for people — even if their circumstances improve dramatically later on. Scientists use a cumulative adversity index, or CAI, which quantifies measures of hardship including poverty and stress, to understand health and longevity over the course of an individual’s life. This has been helpful in identifying … Read more

The US Coast Guard’s Titan submersible hearing kicked off with a startling revelation. “I told him I’m not getting in it,” former OceanGate engineering director Tony Nissen said to a panel of Coast Guard investigators, referring to a 2018 conversation in which CEO Stockton Rush allegedly asked Nissen to act as a pilot in an … Read more