Science

A new study from the Tufts University Center for Cellular Agriculture (TUCCA), recently published in Food Quality & Preference, explores how terminology influences consumer perceptions of cultivated meat products in the United States and Germany.

Approximately 160 million years ago, during the Age of Dinosaurs, giant marine reptiles ruled the seas. One such creature, an ichthyosaur, swam in a sea near present-day Peterborough, England. This huge animal, shaped like a dolphin, was a quick swimmer that chased prey such as ammonites and squid for sustenance.

How do children learn math? It's shaped by what they know as well as their motivation and engagement. Historically, research on children's math learning has been focused on parents' cognitive practices (such as math talk—informal conversations that involve math), however emerging evidence shows how parents' motivational practices (encouraging independence and helping children enjoy math) may also play a critical role in their math abilities.

By letting Muddy Waters hear himself for the first time, he unlocked a new confidence that set the sharecropper on the path to superstardom. And that’s just the start of what he found in churches, prisons and even lumberjack camps

Sequoyah’s syllabary faced suspicion initially, but after a demonstration, his version of “talking leaves” was widely embraced. And then the word spread

Thriving in the dark.ScienceAlert stories are written, fact-checked, and edited by humans, never generated by AI. Don't miss a story, subscribe here.

Baker's work was instrumental in the success of the NAACP and other organizations, but she did it in a way that didn’t put herself in the spotlight. That was by design

There are encouraging signs for the endangered Maugean skate, with a new monitoring report finding that a new cohort of skates born in Macquarie Harbor has reached adulthood.

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A groundbreaking new connectome maps every neural connection in an adult fruit fly’s central nervous system, creating an unprecedented view of how the brain and body work together. The findings suggest that complex behaviors emerge from distributed local circuits rather than a single central controller, offering new clues about intelligence, movement, and brain function.

Physicists at University College Cork have developed a new approach in the search for a quantum spin liquid, a long-sought state of quantum matter resembling a magnetic liquid whose quantum properties mean it never freezes. The work is a key step in the search for quantum silicon, a mineral that could be used to create quantum computers, just as silicon is used in traditional computers. The resulting paper appears in Nature Physics.

Scientists have long known that sunlight helps break down plastic. So, why do plastic products linger for decades and even centuries in rivers, lakes, and oceans—even when bathed in direct sunlight? Northwestern University engineers have uncovered an unexpected answer. The surprising culprit is the water itself.

Wearable and implantable biosensors have the potential to revolutionize health care by diagnosing, monitoring, and even treating a wide range of health conditions. Recent innovations in the lab of Wei Gao, professor of medical engineering at Caltech and a Heritage Medical Research Institute Investigator, are pushing the field forward through the creation of soft, stretchable, tissue-integrated bioelectronics for continuous sensing and adaptive therapy.

Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano is hoping to bring a taste of his homeland to the Artemis III mission, which he will pilot near Earth in 2027 to test two lunar modules.

Earth’s earliest animals may have held evolution back because they reproduced asexually, creating low-competition communities that changed very little over time. When environmental pressures pushed them toward sexual reproduction, biodiversity exploded and evolution accelerated dramatically.