Maris Fessenden

 

Maris Fessenden is a freelance science writer and artist who appreciates small things and wide open spaces.

Genetically Edited Hercules Dogs Can Pack on Extra Muscles

Scientists use a natural mutation that produces extra muscle to tweak dogs genes

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, part 2

These Brilliant Literary Maps Will Help You Understand Your Favorite Book

A lavishly illustrated atlas for Huckleberry Finn and other classics

A view of the opening to Danger Cave in 1976, when it was nominated to the National Register of Historic Places

Utah’s Danger Cave Will Soon Open For a Rare Tour

The cave houses evidence of human habitation from over 11,000 years ago

Comet Lovejoy (C/2014 Q2) on 12 February 2015

Comet Lovejoy is One Boozy Space Rock

The greenish comet that lit up the sky last January releases as much alcohol as 500 bottles of wine every second during its peak

How Contact Lenses Were Made in 1948

Would you put this on your eye?

Planets forming around a young star (artist’s vision)

92 Percent of Possible Earth Twins Have Yet to Be Born

Our young universe promises trillions of more planets to come

Giant guitarfish (Rhynchobatus djiddensis)

Instead of Eyelids, This Fish Retracts Its Eyeballs

The giant guitarfish can pull its eyes nearly 1.6 inches inside its head

The IceCube Lab with a picture of neutrino data superimposed

The Search For Elusive Neutrinos in Antarctica Generates Massive Amounts of Data

The IceCube observatory at the South Pole collects roughly 36 terabytes of data a year in the search for 'special' neutrinos

The yellow-bellied sea snake usually swims in tropical waters but this week one made its way to the California shore

Venomous Sea Snake Washes Up on California Beach, and El Niño May Be to Blame

The lost sea snake isn’t the only problem the California can expect to face during a strong El Niño year

Where Do Hallucinations Come From? It May Just Be What You've Seen

It may be our brains overriding what is there with what it expects to see, according to new research

Screenshot from Histography 

This Is What 14,000,000,000 Years of History Looks Like

A designer's ingenious timeline covers the Big Bang to the Internet

Lego Superfans Built This Epic Model of Hadrian's Wall

The edge of the Roman Empire, recreated with tiny toy blocks

Cebreros station

Falcons Protect This Deep Space Antenna

Nesting birds and their droppings can keep space scientists’ telescopes from getting a clear signal

A honey bee’s eye dusted with pollen from a dandelion pollen magnified 120 times won 1st prize in the 2015 Nikon Small World competition.

See at a Bee’s Eye Level With 9 Award-Winning Microscopic Photos

The winners of Nikon’s annual photomicrography competition have an eye for detail

Why Does the Internet Hate Renoir?

A tongue-in-cheek protest movement wants to remove the artist's paintings from museums

There's a Fake Egyptian City Buried in California

The incredible, nearly forgotten story behind one of Hollywood's most expensive movie sets

A clutch of titanosaur eggs

Can Eggshells Crack the Case of Whether Dinosaurs Ran Hot or Cold?

Dinosaurs may not be cold or warm blooded, but somewhere in between

A photographer with Reuters, Finbarr O’Reilly, in southern Afghanistan’s Helmand province during 2011

The Technical Challenges of Photojournalism in a War Zone

A short documentary reveals what it's like to work in Afghanistan

Eco-tourists snorkeling with fish in a Brazilian river

Does Ecotourism Hurt or Help?

When critters get used to tourists, they may be less aware of both predators and poachers

The wandering pond snail may be small, but it is giving scientists insights into a rather lofty question: Why do we have personality?

What Extroverts and Introverts Can Learn From Snails

Genes may change a snail’s “personality” and the thickness of its skin (or rather, its shell)

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