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Smart News / Smart News Science

Researchers say they found a way to perfectly boil eggs that accounts for the different temperature needs of the white and the yolk.

Scientists Say They’ve Found the Perfect Way to Boil an Egg. It Takes 32 Minutes and Lots of Attention

The team used computer models of computational fluid dynamics, then tested out the painstaking—yet reportedly delicious—recipe for themselves

By studying seismic waves, researchers are revealing more about the mysterious nature of our planet's inner core.

Earth’s Inner Core Is Changing Shape, Study Finds, Indicating Even More Dynamic Shifts Deep Within Our Planet

Seismic wave data previously suggested the Earth’s hot inner core is slowing its spin. Now, researchers say it’s also deforming around the edges

The tire tracks, which cover more than two miles, were discovered in late December.

Driver Vandalizes Threatened Plants in Death Valley National Park

National Park Service officials haven’t identified the person or people who illegally drove more than two miles across Eureka Dunes, home to the federally protected Eureka dunegrass

An impression of the large-scale structure of the universe, showing galaxy clusters and superclusters arranged in long filaments and concentrated at nodes.

An Enormous, Branching String of Galaxy Clusters Is the Largest Known Structure in the Universe, Scientists Say

The cosmic superstructure Quipu is more than 13,000 times the length of the Milky Way, and its mass is 200 quadrillion times that of the sun, according to preliminary research

Researchers think the portrait depicts a businessman, lawyer or banker.

Cool Finds

Experts Say They’ve Found a Portrait of a Mysterious Businessman Hidden Beneath a Titian Masterpiece

When the Renaissance artist painted his famous “Ecce Homo” around 1570, he covered up a portrait of an “an unknown professional man” standing at a desk

Looking through a telescope or binoculars can help you see Venus in its crescent phase on Valentine's Day—but the planet is visible to the naked eye.

Venus, the Planet of Love, Will Shine Bright on Valentine’s Day. Here’s How to See It

Around the time of your romantic dinner, head outside and look to the southwest to spot the super brilliant planet in the night sky

Teeth from humans who belonged to the Pavlovian culture show unexpected signs of wear.

New Research

Did These Ice Age Europeans Wear Cheek Piercings?

Wear patterns on the teeth of skeletons found in Central Europe suggest children as young as 6 may have been wearing labrets between 25,000 and 29,000 years ago

Mice have an instinctive reaction to hide when the shadow of a bird passes over. In a new study, scientists taught the rodents to overcome that fear.

How Can the Brain Overcome Fear? New Study of Mice Offers Clues to PTSD and Anxiety Treatment

Researchers identified two brain areas in mice that helped the animals learn to suppress their instinctive fears of predators

Galaxy NGC 6505 and its surrounding Einstein ring, which represents light from a more distant galaxy behind it.

Cool Finds

Astronomers Discover Extremely Rare Einstein Ring in Early Euclid Telescope Data, Revealing Warped Space-Time

Such examples of gravitational lensing can help astronomers learn more about the properties of dark matter

Weighing up to 1,100 pounds, Risso's dolphins live throughout the world's temperate and tropical oceans.

See a Rare ‘Super Pod’ of More Than 1,500 Risso’s Dolphins Spotted off the Coast of California

Whale-watching tour operators encountered the mass gathering of cetaceans while looking for migrating gray whales

The Schrödinger impact crater near the lunar south pole features two long canyons close by: Vallis Schrödinger and Vallis Planck.

Two of the Moon’s Grand Canyons Were Formed in Just Ten Violent Minutes, New Study Suggests

Scientists say Vallis Schrödinger and Vallis Planck—dramatic trenches near the lunar south pole—were carved in a blast that unleashed 130 times the amount of energy in Earth’s global nuclear weapons inventory

Images and schematic line drawings of the recently discovered neck vertebra of Cryodrakon boreas that bears a puncture mark, presumably from a predator or scavenger.

Cool Finds

Rare Neck Fossil With Puncture Mark Suggests a Prehistoric Crocodilian Snacked on a Young Pterosaur 76 Million Years Ago

The fossil sheds light on interactions within the Cretaceous food web and may represent the first record of this type of predation in North America

A humpback whale

Humpback Whale Song Shares a Key Pattern With Human Language That Might Make It Easier for the Animals to Learn

Despite humans and whales being separated by millions of years of evolution, our vocalizations follow the same principle outlined in Zipf’s law

An artist's illustration of a plesiosaur, based on new research that finds these now-extinct sea monsters had both smooth and scaly skin.

Rare Fossil of 183-Million-Year-Old ‘Sea Monster’ Reveals Both Smooth and Scaly Skin

For the first time, scientists have completed an in-depth analysis of fossilized soft tissues from a plesiosaur

Eastern gray kangaroo genetic material was used for the study, which produced embryos via IVF.

Scientists Produced the First Kangaroo Embryos Through IVF. They Could Be Key to Marsupial Conservation in Australia

With continued work in the future, the team hopes to promote live births of endangered marsupial species, including Tasmanian devils, koalas and northern hairy-nosed wombats

An illustration of the Vegavis iaai diving for fish off the coast of the Antarctic peninsula.

Paleontologists Discover Fossil of the Oldest Known Modern Bird—but It Raises More Questions Than It Answers

The fossil suggests that modern birds evolved before the dinosaur-killing asteroid, perhaps in Antarctica

Doctors at NYU Langone Health recently performed a transplant surgery using a gene-edited pig kidney. The patient, Towana Looney, is now more than two months out from surgery and recovering well,

FDA Approves Transplant Trials for Gene-Edited Pig Kidneys

Two biotechnology companies will begin testing the procedures in patients suffering from kidney failure

Ancient DNA reveals Indo-European speakers came from a region where multiple populations mixed and migrated over time.

Ancient DNA Sheds Light on the Origins of Indo-European Languages

New research suggests that the first Indo-European speakers lived in southern Russia 6,500 years ago, challenging long-standing debates about the language family’s origins

An artist's impression of a generic asteroid.

Astronomers Raise Odds of Asteroid Impact in 2032 to 2.3 Percent—Here’s Why You Shouldn’t Panic

The chance of a newly discovered space rock hitting Earth in about eight years was predicted at 1.6 percent last week. Though that number’s rising, experts say further research could bring it to zero

Arctic grayling live in many northern waterways, but they disappeared from Michigan in 1936.

These Shimmery Fish Disappeared From Michigan Nearly a Century Ago. Can They Make a Comeback?

Great Lakes tribes and state biologists are working together to reintroduce Arctic grayling to northern Michigan’s waterways

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