Ion channel at base of plant’s sensory hairs amplifies initial signals above critical threshold. To trap its prey, the Venus flytrap sends rapid electrical impulses, which are generated in response to touch or stress. But the molecular identity of the touch sensor has remained unclear. Japanese scientists have identified…
This is a “step forward in the transition of European launch systems toward full reusability.” The European Space Agency signed a contract Monday with Avio, the Italian company behind the small Vega rocket, to begin designing a reusable upper stage capable of flying into orbit, returning to Earth, and…
The storm literally snapped the bones in their wings. One hundred and fifty million years ago, the Solnhofen Limestones of Germany were covered in small islands and warm saltwater lagoons. Coral reefs flourished with crinoids, sponges, jellyfish, and crustaceans; Dragonflies buzzed above the water as small reptiles sunned themselves…
A vaccine developer and a climate scientist walk into a bar write a book. We’re about a quarter of the way through the 21st century. Summers across the global north are now defined by flash floods, droughts, heat waves, uncontainable wildfires, and intensifying named storms, exactly as predicted by…
It’s a bit like a handheld 3D printer, with all the accuracy challenges that implies. Most guns are tools for doing harm, but a team of American and Korean scientists has developed one that does the opposite, helping to patch up bone injuries. It comes a bit short of…
Letter urges Congress to take action to safeguard integrity of independent peer-review system. Last month, the Trump administration issued an executive order asserting political control over grant funding, including all federally supported research. In general, the executive order inserts a layer of political control over both the announcement of…
A new genetic technique lets museum samples track population dynamics. In late 2017, a study by Krefeld Entomological Society looked at protected areas across Germany and discovered that two-thirds of the insect populations living in there had vanished over the last 25 years. The results spurred the media to…
“Russia and China already occupy important strategic hills and mountains in space.” Germany’s defense minister, Boris Pistorius, said Thursday that it’s time for his country to consider putting “offensive capabilities” in space after revealing Russian spacecraft are tracking two communications satellites used by the German military. Speaking at the…
Drug patents frequently cite research that the NIH wouldn’t be able to fund. The proposed federal budget would see drastic cuts made to most of the agencies that fund science. The sheer magnitude of the cuts—including a 40 percent slashing of money going to the National Institutes of Health—would…
An AI figures out how robots can get jobs done without getting in each other’s way. A lot of the stuff we use today is largely made by robots—arms with multiple degrees of freedom positioned along conveyor belts that move in a spectacle of precisely synchronized motions. All this…
