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Scientists are continually working to improve estimates of just how much methane, a potent greenhouse gas, is being emitted from the Arctic. A new study led by researcher Natalia Shakhova of the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, and the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Far Eastern Branch reports that methane releases from one part of the Arctic Ocean are more than twice what scientists previously thought. Shakhova and her colleagues investigated releases of methane from permafrost underneath a shallow part of the Arctic Ocean called the East Siberian Arctic Shelf, which sits in the ocean north of Siberia and east of the Lena River Delta....

Kwabena Boahen got his first computer in 1982, when he was a teenager living in Accra. “It was a really cool device,” he recalls. He just had to connect up a cassette player for storage and a television set for a monitor, and he could start writing programs. But Boahen wasn’t so impressed when he found out how the guts of his computer worked. “I learned how the central processing unit is constantly shuffling data back and forth....

The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research. On Aug. 31, 2022, the Food and Drug Administration authorized the use of updated COVID-19 booster shots that are specifically tailored to combat the two most recent and contagious omicron subvariants, BA.4 and BA.5. Following the FDA’s emergency use authorization, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is expected to endorse the shots, allowing them to be administered within days....

Some 300 fish took a most unusual trip. Freshly delivered from their winter base camp at a hatchery in southeastern New Mexico earlier this year, the live swimmers—ensconced in aerated coolers—were helicoptered to the base of a dazzling turquoise-blue waterfall in the remote western region of Grand Canyon National Park. The endangered humpback chub (Gila cypha), endemic to the Colorado River, are distinguished by a large bulge on their sleek, olive-colored backs....

Twenty-three duct-taped packages chilled in a refrigerator at Columbia University’s Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y., for months before scientists finally got up the nerve last December to pull them out and peel them open. Neil Pederson’s team had initially chickened out. His tree-ring experts knew that the 200-year-old fragments inside were of interest to more than just their fellow dendrochronologists. That’s because the packages were the precious raw data derived from an unusual discovery last July made by workers at the World Trade Center construction site in New York City....

New technologies appear all the time. Right at this moment scientists are laboring away on the Herculean task of making an artificial cell, a challenge that for the first nine tenths of the 20th century many biologists would have dismissed as an impossibility. Just as important as new invention, though, is the translation of ingenuity into practice. This year’s SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN 50 represents a testament to pragmatism. Many of the reports that have wowed the public on advances in nanotechnology or stems cells, to name just two, have taken a big step from graduate-level research toward becoming items for purchase at Wal-Mart or routine therapies at your local hospital....

Key concepts Sound Physics Music Resonance Introduction Thanksgiving can be a wonderful time of year, with friends and family getting together. The table is full of delicious food—a big feast—and there might even be some fancy dishes and glassware on the table to make the celebration even more special. But did you know that you can make wine glasses sing? Perhaps you have done this many times before, but have you ever wondered why the wine glass makes this sound?...

As recent high school graduates prepare for their migration to college in the fall, one item is sure to top most students’ shopping wish lists: a laptop computer. Laptops are ubiquitous on university campuses, and are viewed by most students as absolute must-have items, right alongside laundry detergent, towels, and coffee pots. Without question, personal laptops can enhance the college experience by facilitating engagement with online course material, providing access to sources for research, maximizing internship searches, and even improving communication with friends and parents....

Like millions of Americans, I suffer from a common, and thankfully mild, heart rhythm problem. Fortunately, it is now possible to diagnose and treat this problem with a high degree of precision and effectiveness. It is easy to imagine how frightening this condition must have been before we had modern medical facilities for monitoring heart rate and for addressing anomalies. How can you effectively treat a condition without the means to understand the nature of the problem or the impact of your treatment?...

The power to resist temptation has been extolled by philosophers, psychologists, teachers, coaches, and mothers. Anyone with advice on how you should live your life has surely spoken to you of its benefits. It is the path to the good life, professional and personal satisfaction, social adjustment and success, performance under pressure, and the best way for any child to avoid a penetrating stare and a cold dinner. Of course, this assumes that our natural urges are a thing to be resisted – that there is a devil inside, luring you to cheat, offend, err, and annoy....

Unsigned and undated, inventory number 779 hangs behind thick glass in the Louvre’s brilliantly lit Salle des États. A few minutes after the stroke of nine each morning, except for Tuesdays when the museum remains closed, Parisians and tourists, art lovers and curiosity seekers begin flooding into the room. As their hushed voices blend into a steady hivelike hum, some crane for the best view; others stretch their arms urgently upward, clicking cell-phone cameras....

By Lisa Rapaport (Reuters Health) - As trampoline parks are becoming more common in the U.S., so are emergency department visits for injuries that happen at these recreational facilities, a new study suggests. “I don’t think trampoline park injuries are increasing because they are especially dangerous compared to home trampolines, but rather because of their growing popularity and the increasing number/availability of these facilities,” said lead study author Dr. Kathryn Kasmire, a researcher at Connecticut Children’s Medical Center in Hartford....

San Francisco— When researchers first demonstrated in 2007 that human skin cells could be reprogrammed to behave like stem cells that can fully differentiate into other cells, scientists and politicians alike rejoiced. All the potential of embryonic stem cells might be harnessed with the new techniques—without the political and moral controversy associated with destroying a fertilized egg. That optimism, however, may be misplaced; these transformed cells, known as induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells), actually present equally troubling ethical quandaries, according to bioethicists who met at the International Society for Stem Cell Research annual meeting in June....

The early years of parenthood involve so many rewarding firsts—when your infant cracks a toothless grin, when he crawls and later walks, and, of course, when he utters a real, nonbabble word. A mother once told me she found it sad that if she were to pass away suddenly, her toddler wouldn’t remember her or these exciting years. It is true that most of us don’t remember much, if anything, from our infancy....

From Ensia (find the original story here); reprinted with permission. November 7, 2016 — What’s keeping solar and wind power from fully taking over the electric grid? For starters, the sun only shines during the day. Wind blows intermittently, is seasonally variable, and is not always blowing when the energy is needed. But what if solar and wind work together? “Wind resource tends to complement solar resource,” says Sarah Kurtz of the U....

As with so many professions, journalism inhabits a small world—and the New York City magazine world in which I worked for most of my career is even smaller. Once you build a solid reputation in the industry, you’re often poached by other publications. Long story short: I haven’t had a real job interview in a dozen years. So imagine my dismay when I realized that my recent yearnings for a career change will no doubt lead to face-to-face meetings with intimidating hiring managers who have no idea who I am....

“New Social Power in China” read one 2004 cover of Economics, a Beijing-based magazine. The reference cited the work of domestic environmental groups that oppose the building of massive dams in the country. These nongovernmental organizations—along with others that militate on environmental, public health and legal issues—have begun to serve as a vital counterpoint to the government’s otherwise unchecked push to propel the nation’s blisteringly fast-paced economic development. The NGOs have become a new force for political activism in China’s post-Tiananmen era....

MALTA—For millions of U.S. pigs, their short lives are going to be full of travel. Born in one state, fattened and slaughtered in another, these hogs get around. And so, too, do their infections. As carriers—and fertile mixing grounds—for influenza A strains that could cause illness or even pandemic in humans, hogs are important subjects for flu researchers. But with such a massive industry across the U.S., scientists are only just starting to get a handle on this continual mingling of various stocks of hogs and viruses, Martha Nelson, a researcher at the Fogarty International Center at the National Institutes of Health, explained earlier this month at the fourth European Working Group on Influenza conference in Malta....

Carbon capture has long divided environmentalists. Now, that fissure is spilling into the debate over the $1.7 trillion reconciliation bill before Congress. It concerns a provision governing 45Q, the tax incentive available to carbon capture and storage projects. In the House version of the bill, also known as the “Build Back Better Act,” a power plant equipped with carbon capture technology would need to catch 75 percent of emissions in order to qualify for the credit, which the bill would increase from a maximum of $50 per ton to $85....

More than 50 percent of the adult population in the U.S. has been fully vaccinated against COVID-19. But the situation is very different in much of the rest of the world. In many low-income nations, less than 1 percent of the population has received a single dose. Addressing this inequity is the mission of COVAX, a collaboration among Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and the World Health Organization (WHO)....