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Science / Our Planet

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What Can Old Menus From Hawaii Tell Us About Changing Ocean Health?

A study of vintage menus reveals the drastic decline of the state’s local fish populations between 1900 and 1950

Are test-tube burgers transformative science?

11 Strange Science Lessons We Learned This Summer

In vitro meat? Teeth grown from urine? Screaming rocks and singing bats? It’s all real science from the summer of 2013

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These Ocean Waves Look Like Liquid Sculptures

Photographer Pierre Carreau captures waves mid-break, showing the surf’s delicate balance of power and fragility

New research shows that bottlenose dolphins are capable of long-term memory, recognizing the distinctive whistles of tankmates up to 20 years after they last lived together.

Dolphins Can Remember Their Friends After Twenty Years Apart

Tests on captive animals reveal that the marine mammals now hold the record for retaining memories longer than any other non-human species

Individual sharks, like people, possess their own distinct personalities.

Do Sharks Really Have Personalities?

A popular online quiz matches you with the shark species that best represents you, but individuals within a species can vary greatly, experts say

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Sharks Made Out of Golf Bags? A Look at the Big Fish in Contemporary Art

Intrigued by the powerful hunters, artists have made tiger sharks, great whites and hammerheads the subjects of sculpture

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Top Ten Stories About Sharks Since the Last Shark Week

Shark tourism, cannibalistic shark embryos, wetsuits designed to camouflage from sharks and more

A new study finds that across cultures, time and space, we consistently see more conflict as temperatures rise and rainfall becomes more erratic.

Climate Change Could Increase Armed Conflicts By 50 Percent Worldwide

A new study finds that across cultures, time and space, we consistently see more violence as temperatures rise and rainfall becomes more erratic

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VIDEO: Mantis Shrimp vs. Octopus

Watch as the popular crustacean gets snared by its predator’s tentacles. Will it survive?

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Toxic Runoff Yellow and Other Paint Colors Sourced From Polluted Streams

An engineer and an artist at Ohio University team up to create paints made of sludge extracted from streams near abandoned coal mines

Nuclear power produces a great deal of energy–and waste.

Energy Innovation

Is Shale the Answer to America’s Nuclear Waste Woes?

With the plans for a Yucca Mountain waste repository scrapped, scientists suggest that clay-rich rocks could permanently house spent nuclear fuel

New work suggests that dolphins each have their own distinctive whistle, and respond to hearing their sound made by calling right back.

Do Dolphins Use Whistles to Call Themselves by Unique Names?

Audio experiments show that the marine mammals each have their own whistle, and respond to hearing their distinct whistle by calling right back

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The End of the World Might Just Look Like This

Artist Ron Miller presents several scenarios—most of them scientifically plausible—of landscapes imperiled and of Earth meeting its demise

ARBIMON—a system of distributed recording stations and centralized analysis software—was used to track populations of the endangered plains coqui frog, in Puerto Rico.

A New Technology Can Remotely Analyze an Ecosystem’s Species By its Sound

By distributing networks of microphones to wetlands and forests around the world, biologists could track biodiversity in a whole new way

A community of glass sponges under Antarctica’s ice.

Glass Sponges Move In As Antarctic Ice Shelves Melt

Typically slow-growing glass sponge communities are popping up quickly now that disappearing shelf ice has changed ocean conditions around Antarctica

What do you see?

Fruits and Veggies Get a Close-Up

In the darkroom, photographer Ajay Malghan creates abstract art by casting light through thin slices of produce

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Powering the 21st Century

Tour the Country’s Energy Infrastructure Through A New Interactive Map

Examining the network of power plants, transmission wires, and pipelines gives new insights into the inner workings of the electrical grid

Harnessing the swift tides of the Pentland Firth, a waterway along Scotland’s Northern coast, could generate enough electricity to meet half of the country’s needs.

Energy Innovation

Is Scotland the “Saudi Arabia” of Tidal Power?

The Pentland Firth, a seaway along Scotland’s Northern coast, could generate enough electricity to meet half of the country’s needs, new research finds

Plant impressions found underneath a pair of ancient humans (at left) indicate they were buried atop a bed of flowers (as depicted at right).

Archaeologists Find Evidence of Flowers Buried in a 12,000-Year-Old Cemetery

Plant impressions found underneath a pair of ancient humans in Israel indicate they were buried ceremonially, atop a bed of flowers

Less conspicuous than the rugged Rocky, Cascade and Coast Mountain Ranges in this photograph are the markings of agriculture, in the bottom center.

It’s a Green, Green, Green, Green World

NASA and NOAA release satellite images of Earth and all its vegetation

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