Popular Science
Turning last night’s leftovers into fuel for airplanes of the future
One person’s trash is another person’s… jet fuel? Strange as it might sound, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana–Champaign ...
What causes ‘mind blanking’?
Researchers think that our minds are blank somewhere between 5 and 20 percent of the time ... Athena Demertzi, a cognitive neuroscientist ...
E-taste—What can we expect with the advent of virtual reality ‘bio-integrated gustatory interfaces’
Virtual reality can, in its own imperfect ways, transport a user into distant experiences. With a headset on, an everyday ...
Astronauts will be spending longer stretches in space. How will that impact their brains?
Extended time in space is not exactly harmless to the human body. Radiation, altered gravity, sleep loss, can all take their toll on astronauts. Some ...
The first AI-guided garden where the plants tell you when they are thirsty
Have you ever joyously stepped out to your backyard garden, freshly brewed coffee in hand, only to find your meticulously cared-for ...
Meet Daisy: The AI grandmother who is fighting back against scammers
AI-generated UK grandmother named “Daisy” is [making] scammers’ jobs a bit more tedious.... Using ChatGPT-like large language models, Daisy will ...
Pong addict? You should take a shot at playing a human created lifeless blob—that gets better over time
Inspired by recent advancements in brain organoid systems, researchers have designed a simple hydrogel-electrode array that not only can “play” Pong, but ...
Just in case: If humans near extinction, a 5-D ‘memory crystal’ might revive us
Researchers have encoded the entire human genome onto a “5D memory crystal” in the off chance our species finds itself ...
Ecosystem engineers: The intriguing ways humans are still evolving
We’ve conquered biology and eliminated the effects of evolution on our species, but that’s not what the science says ...
Are you a loud sneezer? Here’s why that might be a good thing
While the causes of sneezing vary, there’s no reason a virus should produce a louder sneeze than grass pollen ...
‘Forest reset’: When dinosaurs went extinct, rainforests thrived — allowing new vining grapes to evolve
A lack of dinosaurs traipsing around following the K-T mass extinction may have allowed the grape we know and love to spread and thrive. A team ...
What makes humans great long distance runners?
Endurance running when hunting for game shows that it may be just as efficient as other more traditional hunting methods ...
Sensitivity to pain may be linked to our inherited Neanderthal genes
Scientists are still not sure if carrying these ancient genetic variants and greater sensitivity to pain was an evolutionary advantage ...
Brain atlas: First large-scale map of more than 3,000 human brain cells opens door to personalized medicine
We’re closer than ever to mapping the entire brain to the microscopic level. Hundreds of neuroscientists across the world recently ...
Smart bandage: This high-tech bandaid can monitor wound healing in real time
Millions of people dealing with diseases and suppressed immune systems are often forced to deal with chronic wounds—often minor injuries ...
Banana flavored beer? Gene edited yeast expands beer taste possibilities
Beer may have lost some of its past flavor. Beer had historically been brewed in open, horizontal vats, but the ...
Just add air and water: The simplest recipe for life on Earth
The origins of how life on Earth arose remains a deep existential and scientific mystery. It’s long been theorized that ...
As climate dislocations accelerate, here’s how genetically modified mosquitoes could offer lifeline to controlling dengue, Zika and other mosquito-vectored diseases
With insecticide resistance increasing and climate change priming the environment for longer breeding seasons and a wider geographic range, the ...
Replacing industrial produced fertilizers: Specially-bred soil-enriching bacteria poised to dramatically cut crop chemical inputs, protecting farms and the climate
[A]s the world’s demand for agricultural products has grown, the nutrients needed to grow all our crops has far outpaced ...
Popular Science weighs in on the GMO debate: ‘Food safety experts agree genetically modified organisms, from plants to animals, are safe for human consumption’
By January 2022, products that have been bioengineered, or have an ingredient in them that’s been bioengineered, will require a ...
Synergistic effect of ‘agricultural chemical cocktails’ commonly used by farmers pose harm to pollinating insects
For bees, the threats are numerous, including habitat loss, climate change, and intensive agriculture. As fields of flowering plants are ...
When it comes to evolution, could humans be more impactful than nature?
The composition of our air and water is different from what it was even a few decades ago. There is ...
‘Future foods’: How kelp, maggots, fungus and other nutrients grown outside of the traditional agriculture system can help fight climate change
In a new perspective piece, researchers at the University of Cambridge’s Centre for the Study of Existential Risk explain that ...
How should trans athletes qualify for women’s sports?
In 2004, the nationally ranked long-distance runner [Joanna Harper] started hormone therapy (HT) as part of her transition to female ...
Prehistoric footprints offer snapshot of how our ancestors divided labor between men and women
Prehistoric footprints are a remarkable and precious source of evidence for the behavior and biology of ancient organisms, capturing a ...
Do you miss or spot Hollywood movie ‘continuity errors’? Here’s how ‘change blindness’ works
Gaze at the top image of Ben Franklin’s famous kite study. Now, the one below it. See the changes? You ...
Something’s fishy: We got arms, legs and other skeletal features from our aquatic ancestors
In his 20 years as an ichthyologist, [John Sparks has] seen a lot of fish—intact and not. He’s traveled to ...
Mongolians, and their gut bacteria, may be the key to solving lactose intolerance
[Archaeogeneticist Christina] Warinner was there to solve a mystery: Despite the dairy diversity she saw, an estimated 95 percent of ...
