Chimpanzees need names and food grunts to follow a human's point
For decades, the standard object-choice test has been a bad day for chimpanzees.
Sep 11, 2026
Deeper reporting,
thinking made visible.
Longer essays and features from Science Blog. Pieces here go through additional research and review.
Space
Mars and Moon have radically different day-night cycles despite similar orbits
A Martian sol closely matches an Earth day, while most lunar sites endure about two weeks of daylight and two weeks of night. Rotation, orbit and atmosphere explain why.
Sep 12, 2026
Antarctic blue ice shows unexpected carbon dioxide levels near surface
Blue ice looks like a shortcut to old air. At the Larsen blue-ice area in northern Victoria Land, East Antarctica, glacial ice…
Sep 11, 2026
South Korea's recycling breakthrough transforms solar waste into valuable ceramic
As solar waste threatens to become a massive problem, one discovery reveals the difference between disposal and profit.
Sep 11, 2026
Bunsen burner sterile zone claim questioned after experiment finds no clear benefit
The claim appears in textbooks, in peer-reviewed publications and on university-affiliated websites, and a commentary asked where its evidence was thirty years ago.
Sep 11, 2026
Pet parrots learned to video call each other and picked up new tricks from their screen friends
Fifteen of the 18 recruited parrots made 147 voluntary calls after training. The behavior was real, but preferred partners and newly learned skills require careful reading.
Sep 11, 2026
Learned helplessness theory got it backward, researchers now say
In 2016, Steven Maier and Martin Seligman published a paper in Psychological Review correcting the theory that had made both of them famous.
Sep 10, 2026
Three million tonnes of London clay from Crossrail tunnels reshaped Essex wetlands
A London infrastructure megaproject's three million tonnes of excavated clay found an unlikely second life: resurrecting a vanished English wetland and creating refuge for millions of migratory birds.
Sep 10, 2026
Cattle parasite rewires fly genes to make infected animals more attractive prey
The gene work was done on wild flies caught in a Kenyan reserve, because this species is so hard to infect in a laboratory.
Sep 10, 2026