China begins building three-person space station, first launch to take place soon
Chernobyl’s toxic nuclear site presents a unique chance to protect biodiversity
Biden fills out science team with NOAA, DOE, and diplomacy picks
President Joe Biden is rounding out his science team. The White House yesterday announced nominees to lead the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Office of Science, and the Department of State’s Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Science Affairs. The trio includes two […]
Malaria vaccine has striking early success after decades of disappointment
After decades of disappointing results, recent findings have revived hopes for an effective vaccine against malaria, which kills some 400,000 people every year, most of them children. An experimental vaccine that targets the most dangerous form of the malaria parasite was found to have an efficacy of 74% to 77% […]
How highly magnetized neutron stars set off powerful cosmic explosions
In 1979, a messenger arrived from deep space: Satellites detected a mysteriously short and powerful flash of gamma rays, the highest energy form of light. In the decades since, researchers have narrowed in on the origin of these bursts: magnetars, neutron stars with magnetic fields 1 trillion times stronger than […]
Rebuilding Louisiana’s coast, and recycling plastic into fuel
Host Sarah Crespi talks with Contributing Correspondent Warren Cornwall about a restoration project to add 54 square kilometers back to the coast of Louisiana by allowing the Mississippi River to resume delivering sediment to sinking regions.
Gravity-based batteries try to beat their chemical cousins with winches, weights, and mine shafts
EDINBURGH, U.K.—Alongside the chilly, steel-gray water of the docks here stands what looks like a naked, four-story elevator shaft—except in place of the elevator is a green, 50-ton iron weight, suspended by steel cables. Little by little, electric motors hoist the weight halfway up the shaft; it is now a […]
Rerouting the Mississippi River could build new land—and save a retreating coast
In a swamp at the edge of Louisiana’s Barataria Bay, plastic-capped GPS antennas sprout like oversize mushrooms from four small wooden platforms. The gear, which helps scientists monitor changes in the surrounding marsh, is easy to miss in this expanse of water and swampland the size of Delaware. But it […]