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Chicken Little

Lab-Grown Meat Is on Shelves Now. But There’s a Catch

A store in Singapore is selling lab-grown chicken, but it contains only 3 percent animal cells.
Obesity

Wegovy Can Keep Weight Off for at Least 4 Years, Research Shows

Hot Heads

Saunas Are the Next Frontier in Fighting Depression

Health

Despite Bird Flu Risk, Raw-Milk Drinkers Are Undaunted

As H5N1 continues its spread among US cow herds, raw milk enthusiasts remain utterly unfazed.

The First Person to Receive a Pig Kidney Transplant Has Died

The hospital that carried out the procedure two months prior says there’s “no indication” that the transplant was related to his death.

These Artificial Blood Platelets Could One Day Save Lives

Platelets help blood clot, but they have a short shelf life. With blood in short supply, synthetic platelets could help meet demand.

How Not to Get Brain-Eating Worms and Mercury Poisoning

Independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had both a brain parasite and mercury poisoning at the same time. Just how rare is each condition?

Space

NASA’s Quest to Touch the Sun

The outer layers of the sun’s atmosphere are a blistering million degrees hotter than its surface. NASA sent a probe to find out why—by getting closer to the star than ever before.

The Northern Lights Could Be Visible Across the US Thanks to a Rare Solar Storm

Three bursts of charged particles ejected from the sun have merged into a wave that could lead to brilliant auroras being visible from Moscow to Oklahoma City.

Boeing’s Starliner Is Almost Ready to Launch a NASA Crew Into Space

Seven years behind schedule, this month Starliner will send two astronauts to space on a mission for NASA. The troubled company still has lots of catching up to do.

An Old Abstract Field of Math Is Unlocking the Deep Complexity of Spacecraft Orbits

Mathematicians think abstract tools from a field called symplectic geometry might help with planning missions to far-off moons and planets.

Environment

In Defense of Parasitic Worms

Nature can’t run without parasites, and climate change is driving some to extinction. What happens when they start to disappear?

The Earth Is About to Feast on Dead Cicadas

Two cicada broods, XIX and XIII, are emerging in sync for the first time in 221 years. They’re bringing the banquet of a lifetime for birds, trees, and humans alike.

No One Knows How Far Bird Flu Has Spread

With little incentive for US farmers to test their cattle, and many undocumented laborers on dairy farms, the full scale of the outbreak is unclear.

How One Corporation Is Cashing In on America’s Drought

In an unprecedented deal, a private company purchased land in a tiny Arizona town—and sold its water rights to a suburb 200 miles away. Local residents fear the agreement has “opened Pandora’s box.”

Climate

These Electric School Buses Are on Their Way to Save the Grid

Loaded with ever more renewables, the grid will need to store a whole lot of energy. Enter: a new kind of magic school bus—one that can both charge and give power back.

Climate Protesters Storm Tesla’s Gigafactory in Europe

The carmaker’s only European gigafactory has become the target of increasingly radical protests since announcing expansion plans.

City Trees Save Lives

Green spaces significantly cool our ever-hotter cities. New research suggests more trees could cut heat-related ER visits in LA by up to two-thirds.

The One Thing That’s Holding Back the Heat Pump

It’s not the technology itself. It’s that we don’t yet have enough trained workers to install heat pumps for full-tilt decarbonization.

Energy

Tesla’s Controversial Factory Expansion Is Approved

After anti-Tesla activists clashed with police in Germany last week, local councillors today backed Elon Musk’s plan to make Tesla’s only European Gigafactory even bigger

Inside the Climate Protests Hell-Bent on Stopping Tesla

Tesla’s gigafactory in Germany has temporarily paused production as protests ramp up.

A Company Is Building a Giant Compressed-Air Battery in the Australian Outback

Hydrostor, a leader in compressed-air energy storage, aims to break ground on a 200-MW plant in New South Wales by the end of this year. It wants to follow that with a 500-MW facility in California.

What Kind of Battery Would You Need to Power a Lightsaber?

On Star Wars Day, we use some basic physics to measure the power of the Force. It’s strong!

Physics and Math

The Mysterious ‘Dark’ Energy That Permeates the Universe Is Slowly Eroding

Physicists call the dark energy that drives the universe “the cosmological constant.” Now the largest map of the cosmos to date hints that this mysterious energy has been changing over billions of years.

Here’s a Clever Way to Uncover America’s Voting Deserts

Mathematicians are using topological abstractions to find places poorly served by polling stations.

The Quest to Map the Inside of the Proton

Long-anticipated experiments that use light to mimic gravity are revealing the distribution of energies, forces, and pressures inside a subatomic particle for the first time.

Can You Really Run on Top of a Train, Like in the Movies?

To pull off this classic Hollywood stunt, you gotta know your physics!

Biotech

Elon Musk’s Neuralink Had a Brain Implant Setback. It May Come Down to Design

Neuralink experienced a mechanical issue with its first human brain-computer interface implant. Its novel design may make it more prone to failure.

The US Is Cracking Down on Synthetic DNA

Synthetic DNA could be used to spark a pandemic. A move by President Biden aims to create new standards for the safety and security of mail-order genetic material.

China Has a Controversial Plan for Brain-Computer Interfaces

China's brain-computer interface technology is catching up to the US. But it envisions a very different use case: cognitive enhancement.

Doctors Combined a Heart Pump and Pig Kidney Transplant in Breakthrough Surgery

In the first procedure of its kind, a 54-year-old New Jersey woman received a genetically engineered pig kidney and thymus after getting a heart pump.

Robots

The Atlas Robot Is Dead. Long Live the Atlas Robot

Before the dear old model could even power down, Boston Dynamics unleashed a stronger new Atlas robot that can move in ways us puny humans never can.

Meet the Next Generation of Doctors—and Their Surgical Robots

Don't worry, your next surgeon will definitely be a human. But just as medical students are training to use a scalpel, they're also training to use robots designed to make surgeries easier.

AI Is Building Highly Effective Antibodies That Humans Can’t Even Imagine

Robots, computers, and algorithms are hunting for potential new therapies in ways humans can’t—by processing huge volumes of data and building previously unimagined molecules.

This Artificial Muscle Moves Stuff on Its Own

Actuators inspired by cucumber plants could make robots move more naturally in response to their environments, or be used for devices in inhospitable places.

Psychology and Neuroscience

Scientists Are Unlocking the Secrets of Your ‘Little Brain’

The cerebellum is responsible for far more than coordinating movement. New techniques reveal that it is, in fact, a hub of sensory and emotional processing in the brain.

Meet the Designer Behind Neuralink’s Surgical Robot

Afshin Mehin has helped design some of the most futuristic neurotech devices.

Are You Noise Sensitive? Here's How to Tell

Every person has a different idea of what makes noise “loud,” but there are some things we all can do to turn the volume down a little.

Why You Hear Voices in Your White Noise Machine

If you've ever heard music, voices, or other sounds while trying to sleep with a white noise machine running, you're not losing your mind. Here's what's going on.

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