Jan 31 Mars Rover Overbudget, Long-Lasting Dispersants and Dancing Brittle-Stars By Jenny Marder The Brittle-Stars Danced. The Stingray Smoked a Pipe. Sea creatures with bodies like snakes and heads like sea urchins. Monkeys with Lollipop Paws. Dancing brittle-stars. A wonderful, whimsical article on the connection between nonsense verse and biology and… Continue reading
Jan 28 The day the world witnessed a nightmare By Miles O'Brien Editor's note: As we mark the 30th anniversary of the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger, we return to this column by NewsHour science correspondent Miles O'Brien. This piece originally ran on Jan. 28, 2011. I was fast asleep when… Continue reading
Jan 28 One Year Later, Strong Sales for iPad As New Competitors Eye Market By kmoodley, Hari Sreenivasan While Steve Jobs' decision to take medical leave from Apple marked a shakeup in its leadership, it's clear that his company is still in good shape. That's evidenced as we mark one year since the introduction of the iPad… Continue reading
Jan 27 Tools Hold Clues to Early Human Migration Out of Africa A large sampling of ancient stone tools unearthed from a once-fertile area in the Persian Gulf Basin may indicate that early humans migrated from Africa much earlier than previously thought. The artifacts, dug up from the Jebel Faya… Continue reading
Jan 27 Astronomers Say They've Found Oldest Galaxy Yet Hubble has peered back into the far-ancient past and spotted a tiny galaxy of blue stars, possibly the oldest ever seen, researchers reported in the journal Nature. In images, it's underwhelming - just a faint smudge of light. Continue reading
Jan 25 What is a Neutrino...And Why Do They Matter? By Jenny Marder Neutrinos are teeny, tiny, nearly massless particles that travel at near lightspeeds. Born from violent astrophysical events like exploding stars and gamma ray bursts, they are fantastically abundant in the universe, and can move as easily through lead as we… Continue reading
Jan 24 What We're Reading: Giant Crayfish, Wacky Weather and Geomagic Squares Giant Crayfish Found in Tennessee is new Species A new species of crayfish was spotted climbing out from under a rock in Tennessee, according this Reuters story. It is five inches long -- that's twice the size of… Continue reading
Jan 20 2010 Ties as Hottest Year on Record Despite slight variations in data, a flurry of reports from different agencies has reached the same general conclusion: 2010 takes the prize as one of the hottest years ever recorded. The World Meteorological Organization, which released its… Continue reading
Jan 19 Watch NOVA's 'Making Stuff' Explores Spinning of Steel-Strength Spider Silk NOVA and New York Times technology columnist David Pogue look at innovative technologies for stronger, sleeker future products, including Kevlar, nanotubes and "invisibility cloaks."… Continue watching
Jan 18 David Pogue Learns What Goes Into 'Making Stuff' NOVA has enlisted the help of New York Times technology reporter David Pogue to answer the question: 'What will the future be made of?' The new miniseries called "Making Stuff" is a four-part look at… Continue reading