Arctic hares can go the distance. A member of Lepus arcticus in northern Canada has traveled farther than anyone knew possible. BBYY, as the adult female was known, made a…
Author: ID
Here’s how spider geckos survive on Earth’s hottest landscape
A handful of small, nocturnal geckos have spilled their guts for science, revealing how the creatures get by in a part of Earth’s hottest landscape. Surface temperatures in the Lut…
The spongy moth’s new name replaces an ethnic slur
A menacing pest just became a bit less problematic, at least socially, after getting an update to its common name. Lymantria dispar is an invasive insect previously known as the…
Africa’s fynbos plants hold their ground with the world’s thinnest roots
Some plant roots draw a line in the sand — literally. In South Africa, you can move between cool, green forest and sunbaked shrubland in a single stride. These narrow…
Earth may have 9,200 more tree species than previously thought
Trillions of trees are growing on Earth, though how many kinds there are has been underestimated, a new study finds. Earth hosts roughly 64,100 known tree species. But there could…
Simple hand-built structures can help streams survive wildfires and drought
Wearing waders and work gloves, three dozen employees from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service stood at a small creek amid the dry sagebrush of southeastern Idaho.…
The thickness of lead’s neutron ‘skin’ has been precisely measured
Some atomic nuclei are thin-skinned — they’re surrounded by a slim shell of neutrons. Physicists now know how thick that neutron skin is for one particular type of nucleus. The…
The already tiny neutrino’s maximum possible mass has shrunk even further
To understand neutrinos, it pays to be small-minded. The subatomic particles are so lightweight, they’re almost massless. They’re a tiny fraction of the mass of the next lightest particle, the…
How matter’s hidden complexity unleashed the power of nuclear physics
Matter is a lush tapestry, woven from a complex assortment of threads. Diverse subatomic particles weave together to fabricate the universe we inhabit. But a century ago, people believed that…
Muon magnetism could hint at a breakdown of physics’ standard model
A mysterious magnetic property of subatomic particles called muons hints that new fundamental particles may be lurking undiscovered. In a painstakingly precise experiment, muons’ gyrations within a magnetic field seem…
