Plants thrive in a complex world by communicating sharing resources and transforming their environments Longleaf pines support one another through mycorrhizae – mutually beneficial relationships between certain fungi and the trees’ roots.Justin Meissen/Flickr, CC BY-SA Beronda L. Montgomery, Michigan State University As a species, humans are wired to collaborate. That’s […]
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How online misinformation spreads
How online misinformation spreads Misinformation is running rampant. To slow this infodemic, researchers are tracking how it spreads on social media. By Marcus Woo 2.11.2021 You may have heard the outlandish claim: Bill Gates is using the Covid-19 vaccine to implant microchips in everyone so he can track where […]
Women used to dominate the beer industry – until the witch accusations started pouring in
Women used to dominate the beer industry – until the witch accusations started pouring in Three women dressed in Middle-Age period garb as alewives. Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis via Getty Images Laken Brooks, University of Florida What do witches have to do with your favorite beer? When I pose this question to […]
How Black Americans used portraits and family photographs to defy stereotypes
How Black Americans used portraits and family photographs to defy stereotypes Janette Greenwood, Clark University Unstable. Criminal. Impoverished. Absentee fathers. Neglectful mothers. “A tangle of pathology,” as the Moynihan Report, a 1965 study on Black poverty, put it. For decades, the Black family has been denigrated as dysfunctional. When mass […]
The puzzle of play
The puzzle of play The purpose of play — for children, monkeys, rats or meerkats — has proved surprisingly hard to pin down. Scientists continue to toss around ideas. By Chris Woolston 3.30.2021 Anyone who has ever chucked a tennis ball in the general vicinity of a border collie knows […]
Yes all this screen time is hurting your eyes
Yes all this screen time is hurting your eyes OPINION: A neuroscientist says that he’s particularly worried about kids, who may have spent much of last year learning online. Some easy hacks can help. By Zhong-Lin Lu 4.9.2021 There’s no way around it: Since the pandemic began, people around the […]
Growing a more resilient global food system
Growing a more resilient global food system Covid-19 has been a stress test for the world’s food supply chains — and a preview of looming threats. That’s making efforts to improve the journey from farm to fork more urgent than ever. By Bob Holmes 3.19.2021 Most of us won’t soon […]
Her Doctor’s Office Moved One Floor Up. Her Bill Was 10 Times Higher.
Her Doctor’s Office Moved One Floor Up. Her Bill Was 10 Times Higher. Kyunghee Lee’s right hand hurts all the time… She spent decades running a family dry-cleaning store outside Cleveland after emigrating from South Korea 40 years ago. She still freelances as a seamstress, although work has slowed amid […]
Bitcoin’s Blowing Up, and That’s Good News for Human Rights. Here’s Why
Bitcoin’s Blowing Up, and That’s Good News for Human Rights. Here’s Why Bitcoin’s value reached an all-time high this week after Tesla announced it had bought $1.5 billion worth of the cryptocurrency. After its launch in early 2009, Bitcoin has gone through a lot of ups and downs. Some of […]
