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Smart News / Smart News Science

The unabashed depiction of violence seen in Caravaggio's "Judith Beheading Holofernes" underscores its creator’s bestial inclinations

Art Meets Science

Caravaggio May Have Died of Infected Sword Wound, Not Syphilis

The Italian Old Master had a notoriously mercurial temperament and was forced to flee Rome in 1606 after killing his rival in a duel

Portrait of Galileo Galilei (1636) by Justus Sustermans

Newly Discovered Letter Catches Galileo in a 400-Year-Old Lie

Fearing repercussions of his groundbreaking scientific claims, which flew in the face of church doctrine, the famed astronomer fibbed

Giant pandas put it all out there when calling out for love.

Pandamonium

Giant Panda Mating Calls Say a Lot About Them

Panda love grunts are packed with information, like size of the potential mate and more, but long distance calls are less reliable

Researchers produced the immature egg cells (seen in pink) out of stem cells created using human blood

Scientists Create Immature Human Eggs Out of Blood Cells For the First Time

The lab-grown eggs were not advanced enough for fertilization, but researchers say this next step in the future of reproduction could arrive soon

New Research

Explorers Will Face Dangerous Amounts of Radiation On Their Trip to Mars

New data from the Mars Trace Gas Orbiter shows just the flight there and back alone will expose astronauts to 60 percent the lifetime radiation dose

Halema‘uma‘u aerial view on June 12, 2018

Hawaii Volcanoes National Park to Reopen Without Molten Lava or Lava Glow

The lava lake in the Halema‘uma‘u crater is gone and lava flows from Puʻu ʻŌʻō crater have stopped

Researchers first discovered Dickinsonia fossils back in 1946.

New Research

The World’s Earliest Known Animal May Have Been a Blob-Like Undersea Creature

Traces of fat found on a 558-million-year-old fossil suggest Dickinsonia was an animal rather than fungus, plant or single-celled protozoa

R.I.P., guppy.

New Research

Praying Mantis Seen Hunting Fish for the First Time

The ravenous insect repeatedly returned to the hunting site, suggesting praying mantises may be capable of complex learning

Researchers fed microplastics to mosquito larvae in the lab.

New Research

Mosquitoes Are Passing Microplastics Up the Food Chain

These reviled insects are adding another charge to their rap sheet: ferrying harmful microplastics ingested from contaminated water

Faced with rising floodwaters that threaten to top their 19-inch absorption limit, the open-air pits could pose a significant environmental and health hazard

Florence Fall-Out Threatens to Release Waste Stored in Dozens of North Carolina Hog Lagoons

As of noon Wednesday, the Department of Environmental Quality had identified 21 flooded lagoons actively releasing hog waste into the environment

New Research

The Universe’s Strongest Material is a Cosmic Lasagna

A new study suggests that the “nuclear pasta” found in neutron stars is 10 billion times stronger than steel

Trending Today

Why Washington Mountain Goats Are Being Flown From One National Park to Another

Olympic National Park’s mountain goats are moving to saltier pastures

Real Planet Discovered Where Vulcan Home World in “Star Trek” Is Set

“Fascinating, Captain”

SpaceX released an updated rendering of the Big Falcon Rocket launching into the solar system

Art Meets Science

Elon Musk Is Sending a Japanese Billionaire to the Moon, and He’s Taking a Group of Artists With Him

Yusaku Maezawa hopes to recruit six to eight artists for the week-long mission, which is expected to launch as early as 2023

New genetic evidence confirms that ivory poaching in Africa involves only a few powerful players who consolidate the goods for illegal trade abroad.

How DNA Testing Could Bring Down Ivory Trade’s Biggest Criminals

Genetic testing exposes three major cartels illegally trafficking ivory out of several African countries

New Research

This Pulsar is Giving Off Weird Infrared Light and We’re Not Sure Why

Researchers believe a disk of dust from a supernova or a pulsar wind nebula could explain the strange energy signal

Trending Today

Five Baby Squirrels Saved From Truly Knotty Predicament

Five gray tree squirrels in Wisconsin were found with their tails hopelessly knotted together, requiring some help from a wildlife rehab

Humans' CMAH gene mutation may enable them to exhibit higher endurance over long periods of exercise

Human Gene Mutation May Have Paved the Way for Long-Distance Running

Mice with engineered versions of the CMAH gene exhibited 30 percent better endurance than those without

The wolf cub is the better-preserved of the two specimens, with everything from its fur to its tail and curled upper lip still intact

Cool Finds

Gold Miners Unearth 50,000-Year-Old Caribou Calf, Wolf Pup From Canadian Permafrost

Both animals’ fur, skin and muscle are almost perfectly preserved

Group of Belugas May Have Adopted Young Narwhal

The narwhal was seen frolicking with its beluga buddies some 600 miles south of its normal range

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