Science

Mysterious metallic spheres dubbed "space balls" washed ashore on Forrest Beach in Queensland, Australia. The objects were identified by the Australian Space Agency as pressure vessels from a space launch vehicle that re-entered Earth's atmosphere, and crews successfully removed the safe debris.

Banerjee’s research team is among the first to examine the interactions between foodborne pathogens and plastic particles, thereby advancing this emerging field from a food safety perspective.

Alien signals might be getting scrambled near their own stars before they reach Earth, so scientists searching for perfectly clear signals could be missing them.

Opioid drugs including oxycodone, heroin and fentanyl have fueled an ever-worsening epidemic in the US. And after giant events in New Orleans they are popping up in the wastewater. 

Israel’s water and agricultural technologies didn’t emerge from ideal conditions. They were developed under pressure: low rainfall, saline water, political isolation, lack of energy resources, and the constant need to feed a growing population with limited land. Over the years, I’ve written about many of these companies not as miracle-makers, but as problem-solvers. That’s what makes them relevant to places like Somaliland. Israel was the first country in the world to recognize Somaliland as an independent state although Ethiopia has been treating the nation as such for decades.

Most bacteria in soil cannot be cultured in the lab, and that has long been a barrier for science. Yet the soil beneath our...

In the global effort to cure HIV, one of the biggest scientific barriers is locating the virus’s reservoirs — hidden sites in the body where HIV can lie dormant, invisible to antiretroviral therapy (ART). The Last Gift Study, conducted by UC San Diego and collaborators, offers a novel way forward.

On Earth, similar mineral–organic interactions can be biological or abiotic. In Jezero Crater, the long geological timescales suggest the reduced vivianite and sulfides may have formed without biology — but organic compounds could still have driven the chemistry.

Mushrooms, microbes, and machine learning? Why does this matter? The underground networks built by fungi and bacteria are essential for healthy ecosystems—and for our ability to grow resilient crops in a changing climate. Fungi, in particular, act as “middlemen”, connecting roots across distances and helping move nutrients, water, and even chemical signals between plants.

“While we found that both the mother’s and father’s exposures were linked to when their daughters and granddaughters began puberty, the father’s influence was surprisingly strong

SpaceX has taken steps to address concerns, including darker satellite coatings and directional signal shielding. But critics argue that without enforceable global standards, voluntary measures may not go far enough. Meanwhile, scientists at SETI and other institutions continue developing tools to protect the last wild frontier: the cosmic spectrum.

the relationship between the natural environment and industrial processes to promote sustainable development. The aim of this idea is to minimize environmental impacts and promote efficiency by integrating production and consumption development.

Since the 1990’s scientists in Ukraine and overseas have been saying that the land can be safely used again despite contamination by radiocaesium and radiostrontium. But political complexities have meant that the land remains officially abandoned. That hasn’t stopped a few farmers taking matters into their own hands and beginning unofficial production in some areas. The new study has confirmed that the farmers were right – crops can be grown safely in most areas.

A new study led by researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and the Missouri Botanical Garden has uncovered a surprising layer of diversity in tropical forests. Not only are the forests populated by a dizzying number of tree species, but each of those species takes a different approach to chemistry, increasing the array of natural compounds that provide important functions for the plants — and potentially for humans.

The energy from ‘microlightning’ might have powered chemical reactions that formed the building blocks for life on Earth. When water sprays as a fine mist — after the crash of a wave, for example — it forms minute, charged droplets. The proximity of oppositely-charged droplets to one another generates an electrical discharge and a tiny flash of light.