Nature

The diabolical ironclad beetle (Phloeodes diabolicus) is notoriously tough.Credit: Alice Abela Scans reveal what makes beetle ‘uncrushable’ They don’t call it the diabolical ironclad beetle for nothing. Phloeodes diabolicus, a rugged insect native to western North America, has an almost supernatural ability to resist compression and blunt hits. Now, 3D scans have revealed that layered

Scientists believe they have just identified the cause of the biggest mass extinction event on Earth, which occurred at the end of the Permian Period and start of the Triassic Period approximately 252 million years ago (MYA). A new period This event signaled the beginning of what scientists call the Triassic Period. The past Permian

Sequencing DNA at the Cancer Genomics Research Laboratory in Gaithersburg, Maryland.Credit: National Cancer Institute/SPL Equity in Science: Representation, Culture, and the Dynamics of Change in Graduate Education Julie R. Posselt Stanford Univ. Press (2020) In 1916, Saint Elmo Brady became the first African American to be awarded a doctorate in chemistry in the United States.

Heavy rains and floods have plagued Hyderabad, with 70 dead in Telangana and grim situations in Karnataka and Telangana. Heavy overnight rains Last Saturday, heavy overnight rains battered many areas in the two states and caused massive destruction.  The Yellow alert advisory was already issued, mostly since heavy rains were thought to affect isolated places in many districts

The challenge trials aim to accelerate the development of COVID-19 vaccines.Credit: Andrey Rudakov/Bloomberg/Getty Young, healthy people will be intentionally exposed to the virus responsible for COVID-19 in a first-of-its kind ‘human challenge trial’, the UK government and a company that runs such studies announced on 20 October. The experiment, set to begin in January in

Hello Nature readers, would you like to get this Briefing in your inbox free every day? Sign up here A transmission electron microscope image of hepatitis C virus particles.Credit: Cavallini James/BSIP/SPL Earlier this month, Michael Houghton was awarded a share of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the identification of hepatitis C virus.

Mothers, beware: a study showed that babies may be drinking millions of microplastic particles a day from warming and shaking the milk from formula bottles.  A bottle of formula milk for your baby is supposed to provide fat and vitamins for growth and development. However, in warming and shaking the milk formula, millions of microplastic

Obesity is linked with diabetes, heart disease and other risk factors for severe COVID-19 symptoms.Credit: Edgard Garrido/Reuters When Jesús Ojino Sosa-García looks out over the people being treated for COVID-19 in his hospital’s intensive-care unit, one feature stands out: “Obesity is the most important factor we see,” he says. Sosa-García works at Hospital Médica Sur

Scientists are calling for the Antarctica Peninsula to be declared as a marine protected area. The West Antarctic peninsula is fast warming, and it is the home of many threatened minke and humpback whales, Gentoo penguins, leopard seals, Adélie penguins, killer whales, chinstrap penguins, skuas, krill, and giant petrels. Disturbed Ecosystems The sea ice has been dwindling, and the melting is now more rapid

Peru (a hospital in Iquitos shown here) has been one of the nations hit hardest by the COVID-19 pandemic.Credit: EFE News Agency/Alamy As much of the world waits for an effective vaccine to curb the COVID-19 pandemic, some in Latin America are turning to an unproven treatment. There isn’t enough evidence that the drug, ivermectin,

A queer-liberation march and rally for Black lives and against police brutality in New York City.Credit: Lev Radin/Pacific Press/LightRocket/Getty ‘Invisible’: that is how many scientists from sexual and gender minorities (LGBT+) describe their status at their institution, laboratory, classroom or office. Sexual orientation and sexual and gender identity are not common topics of conversation in

Scientists are concerned that an unprecedented Mega Tsunami might occur if the Alaska ice melt occurs. Triggering a Tsunami This upcoming giant and catastrophic mega-tsunami will be triggered in Alaska by a rock landslide that becomes unstable with the melting glacier. Scientists think that this can happen within the next twenty years decades, or even

China will have to massively increase its solar and wind capacity to become carbon neutral by 2060.Credit: Li Zongxian/VCG/Getty China, the world’s largest emitter of carbon dioxide, has promised to become carbon neutral before 2060, and to begin cutting its emissions within the next ten years. President Xi Jinping made the ambitious pledge to a

The fire on Kilimanjaro in Tanzania has now been contained. According to authorities, the inferno which broke out on its slopes was controlled by Saturday after six days of burning. Extent of the Fire Pascal Shelutete, the spokesman for TANAPA or Tanzania National Parks Authority, said that the fire is basically contained. The activities for tourism are currently ongoing and have not

Madagascar used to be house giant birds and mammals, giant tortoises, and even giant lemurs, but today, these massive animals are not found on the island anymore. There had been an endless debate about whether climate change or human activities are to be blamed for the loss.  Recently, a study of cave deposits on an

Among the windswept glaciers and icebergs of the western Antarctic Peninsula is an oasis of life. Threatened humpback and minke whales patrol the waters. Fish, squid and seals swim alongside noisy colonies of chinstrap, Adélie and gentoo penguins on the shore. It’s a complex web of life. All these species feed on small, shrimp-like crustaceans

A godwit bird just broke the record for the longest non-stop bird flight, flying from Alaska to New Zealand, covering 7,500 miles (or 12,000 kilometers) over 11 days. This achiever is a bar-tailed godwit (scientific name: Limosa lapponica), a species capable of undertaking lengthy migratory flights between New Zealand and Alaska without any break. The Bar-Tailed Godwit The National Audubon Society says that the bar-tailed godwit is

Hello Nature readers, would you like to get this Briefing in your inbox free every day? Sign up here Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced the approval of a second coronavirus vaccine. The vaccine, EpiVacCorona, was described as a “peptide-based shot”. It was developed by biotechnology company State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology VECTOR.

Students observe social-distancing measures at Glasgow University, UK.Credit: Andy Buchanan/AFP/Getty Autumn heralds the start of a new academic year in much of the world, but in 2020, the term comes with the disruption of the COVID-19 outbreak and a surge in infections in many regions. Many universities have welcomed students and researchers back to campus

Officials lifted all evacuation orders and reopened the road on Thursday evening as fire crews were able to contain 50 percent of the Bruder fire in southern Redlands by about 5:15 pm. About 50 homes were under mandatory evacuation as a newly sparked Bruder Fire is burning in San Bernardino County Wednesday night. According to

A researcher scales the 100.8-metre tree named Menara in northern Borneo. The rarity of strong winds in the region has helped its rainforest to reach great heights. Credit: A. Shenkin et al./Front. For. Glob. Change (CC BY 4.0) Ecology 15 October 2020 Scientists find that strong winds constrain tropical forest height, but island’s gentle breezes

A new study explored the dynamics of cooperation among male lions in the Gir Forest in India. It is a complicated process that is not common, since according to natural selection, males should be competing with one another for mates and food. This is especially true in unrelated individuals. Studying Cooperation in Male Lions The Asian lions in India’s Gir Forest are

The placenta is a defining feature of being a mammal, and its formation is one of the first steps in mammalian development. The embryo begins to make its placenta without direct guidance from its mother — rather, it follows a set of molecularly encoded, do-it-yourself assembly instructions. Whether these instructions are universal or unique to

NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft is set to sample the diamond-shaped asteroid Bennu.Credit: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona NASA is about to grab its first-ever taste of an asteroid. On 20 October, some 334 million kilometres from Earth, the agency’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft will approach a dark-coloured, diamond-shaped asteroid named Bennu, with the aim of touching its surface for a

A Michigan poacher who illegally hunted wildlife, including three bald eagles and 18 wolves, was jailed, fined, and had his hunting license and hunting privileges invalidated for life.  Guilty The man from Michigan pleaded guilty to multiple nature and wildlife crimes after a thorough investigation. Upon being proven guilty of the illegal activities, the Michigan

Credit: Jussi Puikkonen/KNAW Georgina Mace shaped two cornerstones of modern ecology and conservation. One was the global inventory of species threatened with extinction, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List. The second was the United Nations Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. One of the sharpest minds of her generation, she strove to document and

Members of the Native American Tribe based in California named Karuk Tribe has been urging the government to use indigenous burning techniques that they have been practicing for centuries to control forest fires but to no avail. Lately, however, scientists and authorities are listening to how they have been doing it. Dozens of Karuk Tribe members, a

Steve Vamosi and Christie Sampson collaborate on a water-quality project with the organizations Alberta Environment and Parks, Cows and Fish; Trout Unlimited Canada; and the University of Calgary.Credit: Briana Van Den Bussche In February 2020, one of us (C.S.) packed up her life in Clemson, South Carolina, to drive across the continent and start a

Every five or so years, it rips me apart to watch the same tragedy: a La Niña weather cycle brings devastating drought and hunger to East Africa, threatening the lives and livelihoods of millions of people in Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya. Using climate models and Earth observations, we can now predict these droughts. And once

South Korea has a serious problem in its hands: it is slowly sinking from sea level rise and other effects of climate change. Jeju Island’s Ecological Woes Jeju is a popular tourist destination, and starting in 2016, a seaside rock site had to be closed 302 days every year because of the high sea level. According

Credit: Taj Francis Most people would describe a headache as a dull pain, a feeling of pressure, perhaps accompanied by a stiff neck — an inconvenience, but not something requiring medical assistance. However, the more than one billion people who experience migraines and cluster headaches have a very different understanding. For them, a headache is

Researchers have just recently discovered why human blood is so attractive to mosquitoes. Their discovery may be the first step in developing a pharmaceutical solution that will change how our blood tastes, making us unattractive to these disease-transmitting insects. READ: All Natural: Hand Pollination Increases Cocoa Yield and Farmer Income, Not Agrochemicals A Revolutionary Breakthrough A US research team

“In the next room you’ll learn about those heroic working-class robots who sparked the revolution that led to the brave new world we inhabit today.” Gort activated the door with a pulse from his eye-slot laser. The 14:30 group passed through. “What robot revolution?” A 40-something man scratched his scalp while looking baffled. “The one

Division of Hematology/Oncology, Boston Children’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA Erik L. Bao, Satish K. Nandakumar, Xiaotian Liao, Caleb A. Lareau & Vijay G. Sankaran Department of Pediatric Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA Erik L. Bao, Satish K. Nandakumar, Xiaotian Liao, Caleb A. Lareau & Vijay G. Sankaran Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, MA, USA Erik

The devastating California wildfire season now enters into full force, with a new alert for conditions that can reach levels of elevated up to critical, known as “critical wildfire danger.” Residents can expect these conditions to come to most areas in California starting Wednesday up to Friday. Causes Climate change is making wildfires more difficult

Joe Biden must be given an opportunity to heal a divided nation and begin the urgent task of rebuilding the United States’ reputation in the world.Credit: Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty On 9 November 2016, the world awoke to an unexpected result: Donald Trump had been elected president of the United States. This journal did not hide its

Scientists have recently released video footage for the first time that shows how pot fishing causes severe environmental impacts. New research has shown that the industry of pot fishing worldwide may have an even worse effect on seabed species, such as sponges and corals than previously realized. The study was published in the journal Marine Environmental Research. [embedded content]

Drought forced Wyoming’s Old Faithful geyser into hiatus in the thirteenth century. Credit: Raul Touzon/National Geographic Hydrology 13 October 2020 Future climate change could slow the eruptions of the legendary volcanic spring. The iconic US geyser called Old Faithful, now a symbol of reliability, has not always lived up to its name: it stopped erupting

  Last weekend, a jogger in Utah had a nerve-wracking enconter with a cougar while on a well-defined trail near Provo in Slaate Canyon. Video Account of the Ordeal The jogger is Kyle Burgess, who made various attempts at shooing away the angry mother cougar and threatening her, hoping to dissuade her from following him.

When it comes to finding funding, the odds are stacked against early-career researchers.Credit: Adapted from Getty I am fortunate to be starting a three-year, charity-funded fellowship in neuroimmunology at the University of Oxford, UK. My first postdoctoral position was in Denmark and was for only a year. From there, I moved to Oxford to an

Fires are the biggest challenge between June and October in Sesc Pantanal, a privately owned natural heritage reserve of 108,000 hectares in the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil. This year, in the first three months of the dry season, more than 50% of the land was damaged by flames, and the drier areas were burnt

Hong Kong has declared the tropical cyclone Nangka a storm signal T3 category. It is currently heading for the coast, and by this Tuesday morning, it could be upgraded to a category T8. It is expected that the new signal number will be declared at 6 AM or earlier today, Oct 13, 2020. Winds are expected to strengthen further. The

A group of publishers has agreed to make article summaries available a common format.Credit: Getty In a bid to boost the reach and reuse of scientific results, a group of scholarly publishers has pledged to make abstracts of research papers free to read in a cross-disciplinary repository. Most abstracts are already available on journal websites

The Oakland Zoo is adopting two more babies: mountain lion cubs that a firefighter rescued from the California Wildfires. We have taken in 2 more rescued mtn lions as the worst fire season in CA history rages on. These two female cubs lost their mother in the #ZoggFire, the same fire that injured and orphaned

Imelda Hicoombolwa, a smallholder farmer in Zambia, is receiving help from the World Food Programme to grow crops after a severe drought last year.Credit: Guillem Sartorio/AFP/Getty How can research help to end hunger? One way to answer this question is to assess published research on hunger, and determine which interventions can make a difference to

In 2018, Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands began building a community of data champions across all faculties, from aerospace engineering to technology, policy and management. These champions’ role? To nudge staff and students to manage their research data better. Among other incentives, they can apply for dedicated grants to do so. Imperial College

So far, the natural disasters that plagued the US this year, which include hurricanes, heatwaves, wildfires, and drought, have cost 16 billion dollars in damages. Particularly noteworthy is last month, which produced a lot of historic, extreme, and record events. The West experienced historic wildfires; the Atlantic saw unprecedented storms, and many states got record heat levels. This year, from January

More than the death, injuries, displacement, damage of properties, and deteriorating environment brought about by climate change, we are faced with another unseen concern: climate anxiety leading to mental illness. 2020 is not an easy year for everyone. In the middle of a pandemic that has claimed more than a million lives worldwide, the American