Phonetic Clues Hint Language Is Africa-Born
By NICHOLAS WADE
An analysis implies that modern language originated only once, in southern Africa, a surprising finding.
A breathless wait for the first results of an experiment to detect dark matter, and then a verdict: “Spectacular” — no matter that there was very little to see.
An analysis implies that modern language originated only once, in southern Africa, a surprising finding.
A report estimates that poorly fitted air-conditioners cost buildings in New York City $130 million to $180 million a year in extra fuel consumption.
Shuttles that have been carrying astronauts for 30 years were assigned to their final destinations: Florida; Los Angeles; Washington, D.C.; and Manhattan.
The cuckoo finch’s habit of laying its eggs in other birds’ nests provokes a variety of defense mechanisms in three species of warblers in Zambia, researchers say.
For the second consecutive year, the United States finished fifth in the World Economic Forum’s look at computing and communications technology.
Scientists want to know how sauropods thrived for 140 million years, and ate enough to grow so hefty.
How the regional ecosystem has responded will keep scientists busy analyzing data for years and help them understand the effects of environmental disasters.
Conferences with 3-D avatars are nigh, because consumer technology has caught up with the work going on in a pioneering virtual-reality laboratory.
Lice are expert evolvers, and a new family tree of lice stretches so far back that the host of the first louse would have been a dinosaur.
Doctors say people are experiencing phantom quakes as well as other symptoms of “earthquake sickness.”
The farmland scourge of soil erosion, once on the decline, is again a threat, scientists and environmentalists say.
Environmental groups said a budget measure dictating that wolves in Montana and Idaho be taken off the list sets an unnerving precedent.
Democrats and Republicans debate the Environmental Protection Agency’s role in regulating toxic chemicals in the waste created by hydraulic fracking.
A reservoir in southeastern Oklahoma is at the center of a dispute between the Choctaw and Chickasaw tribes and the state over the rights to its water.
Researchers have found that methane from natural gas is leaking in higher quantities than previously thought.
The Government Accountability Office found that the F.D.A. is continuing to approve dozens of high-risk medical devices annually with little review.
Pressure to marry young and be all things to all people contributes to a problem, rabbinic leaders say, and a stigma against mental health problems complicates treatment.
NASA’s Messenger spacecraft sent back the first of what is expected to be 75,000 photographs during a yearlong investigation of Mercury.
Some notable selections from “The Cloud Collector’s Handbook” by Gavin Pretor-Pinney, with comments from the author.
Photos and stories of pets that were viewed differently by family members.
Test your strategy against the computer in this rock-paper-scissors game illustrating basic artificial intelligence.
After completing an excavation in Ceibal, Guatemala, archaeologists examine how political, social and environmental problems may have contributed to the Maya collapse.
On the 50th anniversary of human space flight, a look at Yuri Gagarin and his extraordinary journey.
Rapidly melting sea ice may not be the why the Adélie penguin population in Antarctica has declined by 50 percent in recent years.
The monkeys seemed to notice a fertility signal in the females they knew, but not in ones they didn’t, scientists find.
The sweet potato whitefly is infected with a bacterium, and both seem to benefit.
There are several reasons why snow may melt in rings around trees and shrubs.
Medical groups are working hard to make patients more aware of distracted driving and its high toll.
A wave of emerging research suggests that seasonal allergies can be psychologically harmful.
A scientist-turned-filmmaker offers a sermon on the importance of moving from talking about climate change communication to communicating about climate.
Sporting contests sometimes turn on a math problem that referees must solve instantly with only their eyes and brains: projecting where a ball's interrupted flight would have taken it.