Environment Don’t be surprised if extreme heat makes breaking Olympic records impossible Rising heat takes a toll on athletes’ physiology and makes sports more dangerous.
Biology Nude parades and testosterone: The Olympics's obsession with sex and gender Rose Eveleth and Tested deep dive on the long history of excluding women and genital examinations at the Olympics
Engineering The drugs of the future are in the animals of the past The genomes of extinct creatures like mammoths and giant sloths code for natural antibiotics we’ve never seen. So, now what?
Policy Call a spade a spade Trying to do something, anything, about racism and fascism in the 21st century
Biology The surprising link between drug trafficking and bird conservation Forget Cocaine Bear, it’s cocaine-impacted birds we need to worry about.
Books A scientific case for an Earth alive "Becoming Earth" author Ferris Jabr on his new book and how life emerged as an extension of the planet’s surface.
Members only Books Inside a reporter's notebook: Pleistocene beasts Read an unpublished diary entry from Ferris Jabr's trip to Russia's Pleistocene Park while writing Becoming Earth.
Members only Engineering This nature-inspired robot moves at a snail’s pace The contraption uses water to act as lubricant and glue, just like snail mucus.
Members only Health An emotional public hearing on MDMA: ‘Today you will vote on whether my friends live or die’
Members only Environment The biggest threat to biodiversity you’ve never heard of As a fungus pushes dozens of amphibians into extinction, researchers search for whatever hope they can grab.
Members only Health Next up in science’s quest to treat depression: extreme temperatures A few words about the hottest and coldest frontiers in psychiatric research.
Environment Plastics production alone will doom climate goals Manufacturing plastics is a highly emissive process. The world needs to shrink production rapidly to stay within the 1.5 °C global temperature rise.
Members only Environment Is climate resilience possible in a world of borders? We govern deforestation, agriculture, and biodiversity within our own borders. But unchecked sovereignty may be a mistake.
Biology When stories speak more truth than dog DNA analysis Researchers turned to an unlikely source in a doggy DNA study. Here's why their technique should be used more often.