Science

It’s well-known that microplastics are pervasive, with scientists finding microplastics in testicular tissue, lungs and even blood. But now, researchers have discovered microplastic pieces in samples of the human brain at higher levels than expected. In a new pre-printed study published early by the National Library of Medicine, scientists analyzed plastic content in the livers, […]

Deep in Canada’s remote Brevoort Island, in the Nunavut territory, a radar technician was killed last week in a rare polar bear attack. Days earlier, a polar bear was spotted in Rankin Inlet, a remote, but fairly populated, Inuit settlement in the same territory. Experts warn that similar encounters with polar bears will likely become […]

Sounds, body language and facial expressions are used to communicate emotions by mammals like pigs, dogs and mice. A new study by a team of French researchers has found that chickens are highly expressive animals with a lot to say. The researchers found that hens blush and fluff the feathers on their heads to express […]

As global heating caused by the climate crisis warms the Arctic as much as four times faster than the worldwide average, Alaska’s Yukon River is eroding thawing permafrost and releasing mercury-laden sediment that has been sequestered for thousands of years into the surrounding environment. The toxic contaminant is putting the food chain and communities that […]

Wind farm operators in Australia are being encouraged to use the simple method of curtailment — increasing the wind speed required for turbines to start rotating — which a new study has found can drastically lower how many bats are killed by the enormous blades. The tactic is already being used in the United States, […]

The United States has a legacy of lead contamination that could be affecting the environment around your home. A new study found that moss in older neighborhoods in Portland, Oregon, had lead levels that were much higher than in nearby rural areas due to lead-sheathed telecommunications cables and leaded gasoline. In pre-1960 Portland neighborhoods, the […]

If you’ve ever wondered what healthy soil sounds like, a new study has found that it emits the clicks, crackles and pops of worms and ants moving around underground. Barely audible to humans, the cacophony of sounds is “a bit like an underground rave concert of bubbles and clicks,” a press release from Australia’s Flinders […]

Abandoned farmlands in Europe — which make up nearly 25 percent of the continent’s landscape  — have the potential to be rewilded, according to a new study published in Current Biology. The researchers found that 289 million acres of European farmland is ripe with rewilding potential, a press release from Cell Press said. “There are […]