When playful pups skid across an icy pond or romp in a snowdrift, their paws plunge into frosty places. If people go barehanded and barefooted in such cold places, their skin may freeze in a painful condition called frostbite. Dogs frolic without fear of frostbite, and scientists from Japan say they’ve figured out why. Read
No frostbite for dogs Read More »
James Bond and his enemies would be interested in the goings-on at the laboratory of John Rogers. So would Batman, the Spy Kids, Darth Vader and their enemies. That’s because Rogers, a materials scientist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, mixes electronics with the human body to create new devices not found even
Keeping track of water makes for tricky science. It drains through soil, slips through cracks in rocks and refills underwater reserves. It bubbles up through springs and runs in rivers. Water evaporates and forms clouds; rain brings it back to earth, where it keeps plants alive and drains into the soil again. Scientists who study
Searching for underground water, from the sky Read More »
The ability to take a picture of a dream sounds like something that’s possible only in a dream, but a team of researchers in Germany has done just that. Brain scan images taken during specific dreamed events may help researchers understand how the brain combines thoughts and memories to fashion dreams. Read more at Science
What a dream looks like Read More »
Giant beavers, which vanished from North America about 10,000 years ago, had a secret in their heads: a long compartment that stretched from front to back in the animals’ skull. Caroline Rinaldi, a paleontologist who studies extinct mammals, may have figured out the chamber’s purpose. Read more at Science News for Kids. My article is
The secret songs of giant beavers Read More »
If you were stranded on a recently discovered planet called Kepler-16b and looked up during the day, you’d see an unusual light show: two glowing orbs making their way across the sky. Read more about the new Tattooine in this article from Science News for Kids, which came from an original story by Nadia Drake
Double sunsets on a distant world Read More »
For a person who has the rotten luck to get bitten by a poisonous snake, every second counts. That’s because venom can spread quickly from the site of the bite to the rest of the body, causing pain, suffering — even death. Australian scientists now have found a way to give snakebite victims more time
Lotion takes a bite out of snake venom Read More »
The sun’s next cycle is off to a slow start, say researchers at the National Solar Observatory in Tucson. This short news article for kids is adapted from a Science News article by Ron Cowen.
Not Seeing Sunspots Read More »
The tsunami that struck Japan shook up the atmosphere, too. It caused airglow ripples that chased the giant waves across the Pacific; scientists in Hawaii caught photos of the fleeing waves. I wrote a short article for Science News for Kids about this finding; my snapshot was based on an original article by Alex Witze.
Tsunami, from the sky Read More »
For every cell in your brain, bones, organs and blood, there are 10 bacteria. They’re not going anywhere, so you might as well get used to them. Bacteria can be helpful: Some live in the intestines and aid with digestion. They can also be harmful: Some bacteria cause serious disease. And some bacteria can be
