A nervous Mexico City struggles to recover from the earthquake, while...
Mexico City and surrounding states are just recovering from the 7.1 magnitude earthquake on Sept. 19. The official death toll is now 333, and could rise still.What happened a week ago changed the lives...
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How to speak like an aliebn — no, that's not a typo
If an alien landed on Earth, how would it speak?According to Jonathan Sun, a self-described “writer, illustrator and person from Twitter,” an alien would probably sound something like a curious toddler...
View ArticleHow to help Puerto Rico after Maria
It’s been a week since Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico, damaging homes and roads and destroying the island's power grid. The official count puts the number of people killed at 16, but hundreds of...
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For domestic abuse survivors, finding safety amid natural disasters is 'very...
First, it rained bullets. In a town, somewhere in Texas.Ann is describing her husband’s final fit of rage. “My kids' father shot my house up. Tried to kill us,” she says. Ann didn't want to use her...
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The latest victims of extreme weather: grapes and bananas
The nest of the Chilalo bird is sophisticated — nothing like the simple twig constructions of other birds. It’s completely enclosed, has divisions inside akin to rooms, and for farmers in northern...
View ArticleTake two laughs and call me in the morning
Doctors, nurses, and other healthcare providers have to deal daily with subjects considered taboo in polite company.That’s why the medical field has always been a ripe subject for irreverent comedy on...
View ArticleThis is your brain on laughter
Neuroscientist Sophie Scott is fascinated by laughter — and she thinks that cognitive science and psychology are missing out by ignoring it. A neuroscientist at University College London, Scott studies...
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In Oaxaca, thousands of aftershocks mean no one's getting much sleep
On a corner in the city of Juchitán in Oaxaca State, a group of people gathered to look at buildings felled by a strong aftershock on Saturday morning.The buildings, along one edge of the city’s...
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Massachusetts's iconic cranberry bogs leave a legacy of environmental damage
Audrey Schulman was 12 when her dad started talking about buying a farm. “I pictured a horse farm,” she said. “Something scenic, with lots of animals.”Instead, he bought a cranberry bog — basically a...
View ArticleFixing up London's Big Ben is 'more complex' than anybody thought — and way...
The cost of renovating the British parliament's clock tower, which houses Big Ben, has more than doubled to $82 million, authorities said Friday.Work on the Elizabeth Tower, one of the world's most...
View ArticleHere’s what Puerto Rico really needs from Donald Trump
It’s been nine days without electricity for much of Puerto Rico. There are long lines for what little fuel is left.Meanwhile, containers full of aid supplies are sitting in the port of San Juan, unable...
View ArticleThe lab where aging aircraft are dissected for science — and safety
Flying may be stressful for some people, but planes have it much harder: Every takeoff, landing and patch of turbulence adds wear to a plane’s airframe, or body.Planes in the US undergo careful...
View ArticleTrump bashes Puerto Rico's leaders: 'They want everything to be done for them'
US President Donald Trump on Saturday attacked a Puerto Rican mayor over her "poor leadership ability" after she criticized the pace of relief efforts in the wake of devastating Hurricane Maria.Carmen...
View ArticleWhale deaths may be related to warming seas, researchers say
The discovery of 13 right whale carcasses, most of them in Canada’s Gulf of St. Lawrence, is causing alarm among scientists.Only about 500 right whales remain in the North Atlantic, so 13 deaths...
View ArticleHow scientists are piecing together the story of ancient Americans
The Americas were one of the last areas of the world to be settled by modern humans, and we know that one of the first migrant groups, known as the Clovis people, lived here around 13,000 years...
View ArticleDung beetles navigate using the Milky Way and other facts about ‘nature’s...
You may not envy what dung beetles and carrion beetles dine on, but you live in a world that they help keep clean. Think of the insects as “nature’s recyclers,” decomposing waste and returning all...
View ArticleOn the mainland, local officials offer help to Puerto Rico
The slow pace of federal help to Puerto Rico has other officials taking matters into their own hands.In Massachusetts, state Rep. Jeffrey Sánchez, is the honorary vice chairman of the Massachusetts...
View ArticleNobel-winning US astrophysicists bring us closer to the 'birth of the universe'
US astrophysicists Barry Barish, Kip Thorne and Rainer Weiss were awarded the Nobel Physics Prize Tuesday for the discovery of gravitational waves, offering a sneak peek at the universe's very...
View ArticleIn Puerto Rico, Trump praises relief efforts, compares death toll favorably...
President Donald Trump shook hands with storm survivors on Puerto Rico Tuesday, during a trip designed to quiet critics who branded his initial response slow and ham-fisted.Trump and First Lady Melania...
View ArticleMeet the Nobel Laureate who detected ripples in the fabric of space and time
The Nobel committee honored a trio of physicists today for their work on gravitational waves.But Rainer Weiss received top billing. The MIT professor emeritus and his colleagues dreamed up the idea...
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