Smart News

Can you see the plant in this picture? This small brown Fritillaria delavayi has evolved camouflage in response to heavy harvesting by humans. The more closely the plant mimics its environment, the harder it is for humans to find and harvest the plant.

New Research

Medicinal Plant May Have Evolved Camouflage to Evade Humans

In places where people harvest the plant most aggressively, its color has changed to blend in with the rocky environment

McCubbin's Found spent 115 years hidden beneath the surface of The Pioneer, a 1904 painting widely heralded as one of Australia's greatest masterpieces.

Cool Finds

Missing Australian Masterpiece Spent 115 Years Hiding in Plain Sight

Impressionist Frederick McCubbin painted "The Pioneer" (1904) over an earlier work titled "Found"

The highest concentration of microplastics—119 particles per quart of water—were found around Everest Base Camp, where climbers spend time resting, regrouping and acclimatizing to the high elevation.

Even Mount Everest, the World's Tallest Peak, Can't Escape Microplastics

At 27,690 feet in elevation, the mountain is the highest point above sea level where microplastics have been detected

Children who have been infected with the virus often experience mild or no symptoms at all, making them less likely to get tested.

Covid-19

More Than 1 Million U.S. Children Have Had Covid-19 Since the Start of the Pandemic

Almost 112,000 children tested positive during a one-week period ending on November 12, the largest single week increase in coronavirus cases in kids

Archaeologists made plaster casts of the pair, who are thought to be a high-status older man and a younger enslaved individual.

Cool Finds

Well-Preserved Remains of Two Vesuvius Victims Found in Pompeii

The pair's clenched feet and hands testify to the agonizing nature of their death by thermal shock

The Blue Ring Nebula is invisible to the human eye, but telescopes can measure the ultraviolet light, which is shown here in blue.

New Research

Astronomers Crack the Case of the Blue Ring Nebula

The source of the dazzling display puzzled scientists for more than a decade

An Italian art historian posits that the red chalk drawing of Jesus is a study for Leonardo's Salvator Mundi.

Art Historian Claims a Newly Discovered Drawing Is the Work of Leonardo da Vinci

Much like "Salvator Mundi," the proposed da Vinci sketch is likely to attract intense scrutiny

An American dog tick (Dermacentor variabilis) on a human finger.

New Research

Higher Temperatures Make Some Ticks Pick Humans Over Dogs

The study’s results suggest certain tick-borne diseases could become even more prevalent as climate change heats up the planet

Teams of engineers looked for remedies to help save the telescope, but repairs would be too risky for a construction team to safely undertake.

After Suffering Irreparable Damage, It's Lights Out for the Arecibo Observatory's Iconic Telescope

The 1,000-foot telescope has been a pillar for astronomical research, leading to some of the cosmos' most exciting discoveries

The study was small, lacked diversity in its participants and may have been affected by the volunteers’ expectations of taking the psychedelic drug. However, it suggests that this may be a fruitful path in the search for new antidepressants.

New Research

Active Ingredient in 'Shrooms' Shown to Help Treat Depression

A small study on the effectiveness of psilocybin and psychotherapy presents promising evidence

The musket balls arrived in Scotland two weeks after the Jacobites' defeat at Culloden Moor.

Cool Finds

Trove of Musket Balls Sent to Aid Bonnie Prince Charlie's Jacobite Rebellion Found

The ammunition, shipped from France to Scotland in hopes of helping to restore the Stuart dynasty to the throne, arrived too late

A recently concluded auction featured a trove of artifacts collected by Bob Dylan's close friend Tony Glover.

Long-Hidden Trove of Bob Dylan Letters, Handwritten Lyrics Heads to Auction

The archives of harmonica player and close Dylan friend Tony Glover act as a "time capsule" of 20th-century music, says RR Auction

A new study finds beaver-eating wolves alter the landscape in Voyageurs National Park in Minnesota by changing the number and distribution of beaver ponds.

New Research

Minnesota Wolves Are Eating Beavers and Reshaping Wetlands

A new study finds that when a wolf kills a beaver its abandoned dam falls apart and goes unoccupied for more than a year

But since 2010, the percentage of children around the world receiving the first vaccine has plateaued at around 85 percent; only 71 percent receive the second dose.

A Resurgence of Measles Killed More Than 200,000 People Last Year

Public health experts worry that vaccine availability will be further stalled by the Covid-19 pandemic

Scholars will use A.I. to identify references to specific scents in artwork and texts.

Researchers Are Recreating Europe's Centuries-Old Scents

A team of scientists will curate an "encyclopedia of smell heritage" that spans the 16th through early 20th centuries

Researchers will continue studying the timbers in an effort to determine their age and origin.

Cool Finds

Shipwreck Exposed by Erosion on Florida Coast Could Be 200 Years Old

Archaeologists think the vessel was likely a 19th-century merchant ship

The online exhibition "Missing Masterpieces" highlights 12 works of art that have been stolen or gone missing over the years. Pictured here: Vincent van Gogh's The Parsonage Garden at Nuenen in Spring (1884), which was stolen from a museum in the Netherlands in March at the beginning of the Covid-19 lockdown.

Virtual Travel

Virtual Museum of Lost Art Asks Visitors to Help Track Down Missing Masterpieces

A new online exhibition revisits the fate of stolen or vanished paintings by the likes of van Gogh, Monet and Cézanne

Fourteen years ago, a team of commercial fossil hunters discovered a dinosaur pelvis jutting out of a hillside on a private farm in Montana, and their discovery revealed an intertwined T. rex and Triceratops.

The Mystery of the 'Dueling Dinosaurs' May Finally Be Solved Now That They've Found a Home

The duo is headed to the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, where researchers will soon determine whether the fossils were even sparring at all

Black-and-white tegus are more resistant to cold than most reptiles because they can raise their body temperature about 50 degrees Fahrenheit above that of the environment

These Four-Foot Lizards Will Eat Anything—and They're Invading the Southeastern U.S.

Tegus first appeared in the wild of southern Florida a decade ago, but now they're in Georgia and South Carolina, too

Most people will tell you that the average temperature for the human body is 98.6 degrees. But a growing body of research is challenging that idea, suggesting peoples' bodies now run a bit cooler on average.

New Research

Even in the Bolivian Amazon, Average Human Body Temperature Is Getting Cooler

A new study finds the average body temperature among Bolivia’s Tsimane people dropped by nearly a full degree in just 16 years

Page 274 of 981