Feb. 28: This article was updated to include an announcement on Thursday night from NASA about the status of the Lunar Trailblazer spacecraft. The moon is not bone dry, scientists now know. But how many drops of water will thirsty astronauts find? No one knows for sure. A robotic NASA spacecraft called Lunar Trailblazer, which … Read more
The ocean, a vast and complex ecosystem, is facing unprecedented challenges due to climate change. Rising temperatures are not just affecting surface waters; they are fundamentally altering the base of the ocean food web, with potentially catastrophic consequences for marine life and beyond. The Foundation: Phytoplankton Phytoplankton, microscopic marine algae, are the foundation of the … Read more
The Trump administration’s decision to withdraw foreign aid and dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development is likely to cause enormous human suffering, according to estimates by the agency itself. Among them: up to 18 million additional cases of malaria per year, and as many as 166,000 additional deaths; 200,000 children paralyzed with polio annually, … Read more
In a first test of the Trump administration’s ability to respond to an infectious disease emergency, its top health official has shied away from one of the government’s most important tools, experts said on Sunday: loudly and directly encouraging parents to get their children vaccinated. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the health secretary, was widely criticized … Read more
The opening week of the landmark trial of Greenpeace in a multimillion-dollar lawsuit by Energy Transfer over the Dakota Access Pipeline protests did not bode well for the defense. Lawyers for Greenpeace said so themselves in a petition filed in North Dakota’s Supreme Court. They asked the court on Thursday to move the trial out … Read more
Intuitive Machines landed a robot on the moon last year. Can the Houston company do it again, but keep the spacecraft upright this time? The company’s second lander, named Athena, launched on Wednesday evening on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It is now on an arcing path to … Read more
During the first 17 hours, Dr. Scarpati said, Pompeii was blanketed with pumice lapilli from the column, which fluctuated like a giant fountain through 12 distinct pulses. At 2 p.m., the volcano began to spew pumice mixed with gas. Over the next four hours, roofs began to cave in under the weight of the pumice … Read more
Five years ago Italian researchers published a study on the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D. 79. that detailed how one victim of the blast, a male presumed to be in his mid 20s, had been found nearby in the seaside settlement of Herculaneum. He was lying facedown and buried by ash on a wooden … Read more
Mycorrhizal fungi are the supply chains of the soil. With filaments thinner than hair, they shuttle vital nutrients to plants and tree roots. In return, the fungi receive carbon to grow their networks. In this way, 13 billion tons of atmospheric carbon dioxide — one-third of fossil-fuel emissions worldwide — enter the soil each year. … Read more
A year ago, France embarked on an ambitious goal: To craft the world’s widest ranging ban on the use of harmful “forever chemicals” in everyday products. On Friday, that effort culminated in a national ban on PFAS that environmental and health experts hailed as a big step forward, with one notable exception. After campaigning by … Read more