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Science

The patient, in a rare moment of calm.

Cats Get Breast Cancer Too, and There’s a Lot We Can Learn From It

Understanding aggressive tumors in pets may lead to better treatments for the nastiest forms of the disease in people

National Museum of Natural History.

Anthropocene

Watch Highlights From the Smithsonian’s “Age of Humans” Symposium

Experts on the science, economics and innovations of climate change spoke at this one-day event in Washington, D.C.

Before it departed from Abu Dhabi, the plane carried out an inaugural flight, taking off from the Payerne airport in Switzerland.

This Solar-Powered Plane is Currently Circumnavigating the World

With 17,000 solar cells in its wing and tail, the aircraft relies solely on sunshine to keep its motors running

Good reads about our home planet.

Anthropocene

Five Must-Read Books About Earth

Geologist Robert M. Hazen selects works spanning genres that offer insights into our planet’s history and inner workings

Workers with the Nigiri Project head out to test pens in the flooded rice fields near Sacramento.

Anthropocene

Rice Can Help Save Salmon If Farms Are Allowed to Flood

The Nigiri Project aims to restore the beloved fish by cutting a notch in a California levee and letting some floodplains return to nature

Marijuana buds are often two to three times as potent as they were 30 years ago.

New Research

Modern Marijuana Is Often Laced With Heavy Metals and Fungus

Medical and recreational marijuana use is increasingly legal—but do consumers know what they’re smoking?

Best Space Photos of the Week

A Rainbow Eclipse and X-Ray Fireworks Are Among These Cosmic Treats

A solar eclipse painted the cloudy U.K. skies and an explosion rocked a stellar corpse in our picks for this week’s best space images

Art Meets Science

The Terrible Beauty of Glaciers Melting and Oceans Rising

Daniel Beltra’s aerial photographs reveal the human impact on nature

The natural habitats of many bumblebees are nearly gone and restoring floral diversity is vital to promote their survival.

Can Returning Farmland to the Wild Help Bumblebees in Crisis?

Even if only a small percentage of current farmland became wild meadows, it could bring populations back to previous levels

A large colony of Mexican free-tailed bats can consume an estimated 250 tons of insects in a single night.

These Bats Use Sonar to Jam the Signals of Their Rivals

How hungry Mexican free-tails sabotage the competition

Members of the Xhosa tribe, like the young initiates seen here in Khayelitsha, are among the South African groups that practice ritual circumcision. The affiliation of the young man who received a transplant is not known.

Trending Today

The Trickiest Part of a Penis Transplant? Finding a Donor

The doctors who announced the first successful procedure last week had a particularly difficult time finding willing organ donors

The iTBra by Cyrcadia Health aims to screen for breast cancer in a new way, but still requires much testing.

Could a Bra Actually Detect Breast Cancer?

Using thermodynamic sensors, the iTBra could one day screen for breast cancer, but experts are wary

Electric vehicles, such as the ones sold by Tesla, could help to reduce city temperatures.

Anthropocene

Electric Cars Can Make Cities Cooler

It’s not just the flash and style, either—electric engines emit less heat than gas ones and could combat the urban heat island effect

A barn owl by the light of the moon.

American South

Best Places to See Nature After Dark

The sun may power most of our world—but some things come alive only at night

Terrifying. An ancestor of the modern-day croc stood nine feet tall and walked on its hind legs. It's been lovingly christened the "Carolina Butcher."

Before There Were Crocodiles, There Was the “Carolina Butcher”

A newly discovered crocodilian ancestor was a nine-foot-tall predator that stood on its hind legs

"The show was another spectacular one! Reds and greens and yellows! The sky has just been on fire!" the photographer enthuses on Spaceweather.com.

Severe Solar Storm Paints the Sky Green on St. Patrick’s Day

A burst of particles from the sun is hitting our atmosphere and lighting up the night as far south as Illinois

The colorful salt terraces in the Dallol region of Ethiopia are hot targets for astrobiologists seeking extreme microbial life that could resemble extraterrestrials.

New Research

This Alien Color Catalog May Help Us Spot Life on Other Planets

A digital library of reflectance spectra from microbes could be a powerful tool for spotting signs of extraterrestrials

New Research

Politicians Are More Persuasive During Interactive Town Hall Meetings

When given a chance at direct persuasion, most politicians are surprisingly good at changing our minds

The ubiquitous shamrock has mythical origins.

No One Really Knows What a Shamrock Is

The three-leaf clover is what everyone wears, but what species is it?

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