Whales Briefly Benefited From Decrease In Shipping Traffic After 9/11
According to a new study, baleen whales suffered less stress from ship noise after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center.
Latest Science Stories
Explaining Dune Field Patterns
In a study of the harsh but beautiful White Sands National Monument in New Mexico, University of Pennsylvania researchers have uncovered a unifying mechanism to explain dune patterns.
Utah Botanist Finds Smaller Amorphophallus Species
The famed "corpse flower" plant – known for its giant size, rotten-meat odor and phallic shape – has a new, smaller relative: A University of Utah botanist discovered a new species of Amorphophallus that is one-fourth as tall but just as stinky.
Redder Ladybirds Are More Deadly
A ladybird's color indicates how well-fed and how toxic it is, according to an international team of scientists. Research led by the Universities of Exeter and Liverpool directly shows that differences between animals' warning signals reveal how poisonous individuals are to predators.
Studying Nature's Rhythms: Soundscape Ecologists Spawn New Field
Geophony. Biophony. Anthrophony. Unfamiliar words. But they shouldn't be. We're surrounded by them morning, noon and night, say ecologist Bryan Pijanowski of Purdue University and colleagues.
Experts Say Advances In Neuroscience May Affect Future Of Warfare
As is the fate of nearly all scientific and technological advances, military experts are already prowling for ways to convert recent advances in neuroscience into advantages on the battlefield.
Entire Genome Of Extinct Human Decoded
Researchers have decoded the entire genome of a fossil from an extinct species of human related to Neanderthals.
Alien Ladybug In Europe Dropping Native Species Population
An alien predator in Europe is leading to a rapid decline of a native ladybugs in Britain, Belgium and Switzerland.
Researchers Recreate Fossil Cricket Love Song
An international team of scientists took it upon themselves to recreate the love song of an extinct cricket that lived more than 160 million years ago during the Jurassic Period.
Scientists Shed New Light On Mariana Trench
An ocean mapping expedition has shed new light on deepest place on Earth, the 2,500-kilometer long Mariana Trench in the western Pacific Ocean near Guam.
Cape Cod Dolphin Strandings At Record High For January
Since early January, 129 common dolphins have been found stranded on the beaches, said Katie Moore a marine mammal rescue and research manager for the International Fund for Animal Welfare.
Man Arrested For Stealing Bits Of Glacier For Designers Ice Cubes
Chilean authorities arrested a man for stealing ice from the Jorge Montt glacier. The stolen ice was being taken to Santiago, Chile in order to be used as designer ice cubes in upscale restaurants and bars.
Satellite Reveals Sea Turtle Feeding Hotspots
Satellite tracking of threatened loggerhead sea turtles has revealed two previously unknown feeding ‘hotspots’ in the Gulf of Mexico that are providing important habitat for at least three separate populations of the turtles.
Domestic Cats, Wild Bobcats And Pumas Living In Same Area Have Same Diseases
Domestic cats, wild bobcats and pumas that live in the same area share the same diseases. And domestic cats may bring them into human homes, according to results of a study of what happens when big and small cats cross paths.
New Species Of Bamboo-feeding Plant Lice Found In Costa Rica
Several periods of field work during 2008 have led to the discovery of a new species of bamboo-feeding plant lice in Costa Rica's high-altitude region "Cerro de la Muerte".
The Consequences Of Non-intervention For Infectious Disease In African Great Apes
Infectious disease has joined poaching and habitat loss as a major threat to the survival of African great apes as they have become restricted to ever-smaller populations.
Russian Scientists Reach Ancient Antarctic Lake
After years of drilling, Russian scientists have finally managed to reach down to reveal a unique sub-glacial lake. The scientists drilled 12,362 feet to reach the sub-glacial Antarctic lake, Vostok, which has been sealed for the past 20 million years.
Philippines Struck By 6.9 Magnitude Earthquake
A 6.9 magnitude earthquake struck the Philippines on Monday morning, killing at least 13 people and leaving dozens trapped under houses and buildings.
Tree Rings May Underestimate Climate Response To Volcanic Eruptions
Some climate cooling caused by past volcanic eruptions may not be evident in tree-ring reconstructions of temperature change because large enough temperature drops lead to greatly shortened or even absent growing seasons.
The Mystery of the Blue Balls
Blue balls that fell from the sky and pelted a UK residence last week led to wild speculation, but scientists on Friday announced that they had determined the origins of the marble-like objects, and they are disappointingly mundane.
A Battle Of The Vampires, 20 Million Years Ago
They are tiny, ugly, disease-carrying little blood-suckers that most people have never seen or heard of, but a new discovery in a one-of-a-kind fossil shows that “bat flies” have been doing their noxious business with bats for at least 20 million years.
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Word of the Day
Quote of the Day
To us, men of the West, a very strange thing happened at the turn of the century; without noticing it, we lost science, or at least the thing that had been called by that name for the last four centuries. What we now have in place of it is something different, radically different, and we don't know what it is. Nobody knows what it is. 
- Simone Weil (1909 - 1943), French philosopher, mystic.