To predict how diet shapes a person’s gut microbiome, researchers came up with a new way to categorize foods.

Wolves lack the facial muscles required to raise their eyebrows—a feature that makes dogs especially endearing to people.

Around the world, aging and inadequate water systems are a huge public health problem. Now, researchers are using artificial intelligence to help conserve and monitor the quality of drinking water.

Accelerating ice melt in the Himalayas may imperil up to a billion people in South Asia who rely on glacier runoff for drinking water and more.

A new study suggests a half-ton bird roamed Europe nearly 2 million years ago, around when our Homo predecessors were first entering the region.

Two research teams went into the weeds to quantify the magic behind the flight of the dandelion seed.

A study finds that close to a trillion trees could potentially be planted on Earth—enough to sequester more than 200 billion tons of carbon. But environmental change on this scale is no easy task.

A swine virus that appeared in the U.S. in 2013 has proven hard to track. But an algorithm might help researchers predict the next outbreak.

Human-made shields that block UV rays and concentrate heat on the Martian surface could provide both liquid water and protection from radiation.

The new material could have applications in robotics and medicine.

Killing red tide cells en masse can unleash their potent toxin. That means researchers need to get creative.

Even while still in their eggs, baby birds can hear their parents’ alarm calls. They then pass the message along to unhatched siblings so the entire clutch emerges aware of the dangers ahead.

PBS leads the list with 47 nominations.

The border collie achieved international fame for her remarkable grasp on vocabulary and sentence structure.

Physicists built a machine that might help explain how solar wind forms—all without leaving Earth’s atmosphere.

This crustacean-like critter stalked the seas half a billion years ago.

The trifecta, discovered by NASA’s TESS, includes a “super-Earth” and two “sub-Neptunes” in a system called TOI-270.

Using data from an especially bright population of stars, astronomers have reconstructed the Milky Way’s peaks and valleys like never before.

These two genes are all it takes to determine the sex of a kiwifruit.

Researchers eroding clay in water may have uncovered secrets of meteorites’ aerodynamic stability.

The long-sought molecule could one day power high-energy electronics.

The LIGO and Virgo observatories appear to have picked up gravitational waves from a first-of-its-kind astronomical observation.

Scientists injected CRISPR gene-editing machinery into unfertilized eggs still developing in female lizards’ ovaries.

Artifacts unearthed in Idaho challenge the idea that the first people to populate the Americas made the journey on foot around the end of the Ice Age.

These nosy rodents may not speak bird-ese, per se, but they can still use avian chatter as a safety cue.

Lava descending into Hawai‘i’s ocean drove an upward surge of deep sea nutrients, cultivating life at the surface.

That earns this fish, Electrophorus voltai, the title of the strongest known living source of electricity.

Scientists say the planet, called K2-18b, is “the best candidate for habitability” beyond our solar system.

Delays during migration can imperil birds’ chances of a successful breeding season.

It’s almost too dense to exist. Almost.

A new study hints at the ways in which air pollution may directly impact a fetus.

A new study suggests a plume of dust once blocked the sun’s rays from Earth, triggering an ice age some 466 million years ago.

American pikas’ responses to climate are driven by location, location, location.

Gut microbes react differently to raw and cooked versions of the same foods.

A new analysis predicts that 3,196 animals will join the 5,579 already snared in the global wildlife market.

Light from nearby galaxies illuminated the web’s ‘threads,’ making them directly visible to telescopes on Earth.

Even forests that look green from space can show symptoms of impending decline.

A new refrigeration technique harnesses the ability of rubber and other materials to cool down when released from a tight twist.

The comet, 2I/Borisov, comes from another planetary system, but bears a remarkable resemblance to local space rocks.

Mathematical modeling and AI can pick out patterns preceding epidemics that human brains can’t readily discern.

Saharan silver ants don’t have the longest limbs. But they make up for it with a sprightly combination of fast pacing, light-footedness, and synchronized stepping that effectively turns their six legs into two.

Researchers have uncovered a new category of giant storm on Saturn’s surface.

If validated, Google’s new technology may bring us closer to a future of ultra-efficient computing.

Thousands of fossils from Colorado show how plants and animals evolved together after an asteroid devastated life on Earth.

The algorithm was based on the faulty assumption that health care spending is a good proxy for wellbeing. But there seems to be a quick fix.

New research quantifies the fire risks of eight species of invasive grass.

The images confirm the species, which has been “lost” to science for 29 years, is alive and well in its native Vietnam.

A glimpse into the lives of the MOSAiC mission’s polar bear guards—and the powerful predators they watch for.

A giant tortoise, a seabird, and a gecko all went undetected by scientists for more than a century.

New findings bolster the argument that the two groups of early humans had a lot of behavioral similarities.