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Smart News / Smart News Science

Oarfish model in a museum

A Giant Oarfish Just Washed Up in California

Every time an oarfish washes up on the beach, the world freaks out. Here’s the most recent one

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Music Makes Working Out Hurt Less

Music doesn’t solely work by distracting us or syncing our motions up with its encouraging beat

Agricultural Pollution Is Threatening America’s National Parks

Gases from heavy fertilizer use are threatening the ecological balance of America’s natural parks

A false killer whale and a bottlenose dolphin hanging out at a zoo in Japan.

Dolphins Have Interspecies Hunting Parties

A real life tale of animal BFFs

This New Burial Technique Turns a Corpse Into a Tiny Pile of Freeze-Dried Fertilizer

In the future wills may include specifications for the type of flower or bush we’d like to fertilize rather than the make of coffin or urn

It Might Rain Diamonds on Jupiter

Take some methane, add lightning and massive pressures, and what do you get? Diamond hail

Even Babies Can Be Depressed

For a long time, people didn’t believe that children could become depressed, but they certainly can

Being Around Predators Changes the Shape of This Fish’s Penis

Armadillos have bony plates, stick bugs evolved camouflage, and the Bahamas mosquitofish evolved a bigger penis

Hurricane Phailin approaching India last night

Hurricane Phailin Is As Strong as Katrina, Twice as Wide as Sandy And About to Devastate India

India is bracing for what is potentially the strongest hurricane they’ve ever seen

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Hibernating Turtles Are Still Aware of What’s Going on Around Them

Researchers assumed they entered a coma-like condition during winter hibernation, but turtles are paying attention to the things that matter most

How We Spot Friends in the Crowd Before Being Able to See Their Face

Facial recognition is already very much in place in all sorts of ways, from Facebook to surveillance cameras. Perhaps now they’ll add body recognition too

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There’s a New Breed of Botulism, And We Don’t Have a Cure for It

It’s new, it’s deadly, and it fights off our best anti-toxins

Where Did the Word Asteroid Really Come From?

It wasn’t until the 1850’s that the word was accepted by scientists. Today, we use the word all the time. We just credit the wrong guy for its invention

An artist’s idea of what PSO J318.5-22 may look like

This Baby Rogue Planet Is Wandering the Universe All by Itself

This planet, six times bigger than Jupiter, is sailing through space just 80 light-years away

Plants and animals living in the tropics will be pushed out of their natural temperature range the fastest.

What Does “Unprecedented Climate” Mean?

Starting in just 30 years, the coldest year will still be hotter than any year in the past 150 years

Cockroaches Stick to Different Neighborhoods Just Like New Yorkers Do

Cockroaches from the Upper East Side, the Upper West Side and nearby Roosevelt Island all have a distinctly different genetic makeup from one another

These Male Marsupials Put So Much Energy Into Mating, It Kills Them

Males with the largest testes, most fit sperm and longest endurance in the sack tended sired more offspring with promiscuous females

Men And Women’s Migraines Affect Different Parts of the Brain

Women’s migraines affect the parts of the brain that handle emotions

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Secret Cameras Caught an Endangered Sumatran Rhino Happily Hanging Around on Borneo

Only an estimated 220 to 275 Sumatran rhinos - the smallest species of rhino in the world at just 3.3 to 5 feet tall - still exist

The ancient brain, preserved by flame

Archaeologists Just Found Someone’s 4,000-Year-Old Brain

Boiled in its own juices by fire, this brain has been preserved for the past 4000 years

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