2026

Meet Kaia Minn, the 13-year-old Massachusetts inventor who turned discarded orange peels into biodegradable seed pods for reforestation |

Santanu1 week ago05 mins

Kaia Minn at the National Academy of Inventors conference. Image Credit: kaiaminn.com A discarded citrus peel is not the sort of thing most people would associate with restoring forests. But for 13-year-old Massachusetts inventor ‘Kaia Minn,’ it became the starting point for a simple idea with potentially far-reaching environmental uses. Minn has developed a ‘biodegradable…

He began studying the Amazon in the 1970s; 50 years later, Philip Fearnside’s research has calculated the costs of losing the Amazon on account of deforestation, dams and highways

Santanu1 week ago05 mins

Philip Fearnside’s research has calculated the costs of losing the Amazon on account of deforestation, dams and highways The Amazon rainforest has been described in terms of its enormous size, biodiversity and importance to the global climate. But for Philip Fearnside, understanding the forest has also meant asking a more practical question: what does it…

In 1945, an Arizona professor started hunting glowing scorpions at night; decades later his laboratory had become a major centre for venom research |

Santanu1 week ago03 mins

Representative Image of fluorescent scorpions glowing across a desert landscape after dark (AI-generated image) In 1945, an Arizona State University professor began wandering the desert at night, hunting scorpions that glowed under his black light, and few people around him understood why. That professor, Herbert L Stahnke, was already the nation’s leading authority on scorpions…

In 2001, scientists began adding 5 to 6 nanograms per litre of synthetic estrogen to an Ontario lake; after 2 seasons its minnow population collapsed

Santanu1 week ago04 mins

Representative Image (AI-generated) A tiny concentration of a synthetic hormone was enough to trigger a dramatic ecological change in a remote Ontario lake. In 2001, scientists began adding the synthetic estrogen 17α-ethynylestradiol (EE2) to Lake 260 in northwestern Ontario, maintaining concentrations of about 5 to 6 nanograms per litre. The experiment continued for seven years,…

Scientists covered an Amazon rainforest plot with 6,000 panels to block half its rain; large trees died and biomass fell by a third |

Santanu1 week ago04 mins

Deep in the Caxiuanã National Forest in northern Brazil, a patch of rainforest the size of a football pitch tells the story of what a drier Amazon might look like. Since 2002, scientists have suspended nearly 6,000 transparent plastic panels above one hectare of pristine forest, diverting roughly half the rainfall away from the soil…

In 2010, US scientists released dye into Montana’s Missouri River and tracked it across 41.2 miles; one reservoir held the plume for 8.2 hours, helping predict chemical-spill timing

Santanu1 week ago04 mins

Representative Image (AI-generated) A river can carry a contaminant far beyond the point where it enters the water, but predicting exactly how quickly that material will travel is not always straightforward. In 2010, scientists with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), working with the Montana Department of Environmental Quality, conducted a dye-tracing experiment on a 41.2-mile…

Scientists rediscover a ‘ghost’ green mamba hidden in a Polish museum for decades after its 1885 discovery |

Santanu1 week ago04 mins

A green mamba specimen from São Tomé Island that dates back to 1885 has been found after decades of being regarded as lost, which gives scientists a rare opportunity to revisit the identity of one of the Gulf of Guinea’s most mysterious snakes. Adolfo Möller found the specimen during an expedition to the island, after…

Quote of the day by Marie Curie: “I have no dress except the one I wear every day. If you are going to be kind enough to…” – a timeless lesson on choosing purpose over appearance |

Santanu1 week ago07 mins

Quote of the Day by Marie Curie Marie Curie is remembered as one of the most important scientists in modern history, yet a single letter from 1895 offers a genuinely striking glimpse into her real priorities. Ahead of her marriage to Pierre Curie in July that year, someone had offered to give her a wedding…

2,800+ wolves killed, nearly $10 million spent and 15 caribou herds still at risk: Why scientists say British Columbia is targeting the wrong problem

Santanu1 week ago09 mins

Since 2015, British Columbia has killed 200-300 wolves annually to help endangered caribou populations recover. Recently, the provincial government has proposed extending its decade-long wolf cull program by five more years in areas that are home to 15 declining woodland caribou herds. But according to scientists, the deforestation, not the wolves, is the main driver…

In 2003, crews began removing non-native fish from the Grand Canyon; by 2006 rainbow trout’s share of the catch had fallen from about 90% to under 10%

Santanu1 week ago04 mins

In the depths of the Grand Canyon, scientists were trying to give native fish a better chance of survival, by taking other fish out of the Colorado River. A four-year fish-removal experiment conducted between 2003 and 2006 dramatically changed the composition of fish being caught in one section of the river. According to a 2011…

Underwater sensors caught a rare event off Cornwall: one porpoise became trapped in a net while two animals exchanged possible distress calls

Sea otters returned to a polluted California estuary in 1984; eelgrass expanded 600%, while marsh-edge erosion later slowed by 69% on average

Brazil restored a former cattle landscape with native trees; decades later, lowland tapirs returned after disappearing for 100 years |

Quote of the day by Isaac Newton: “Truth is ever to be found in simplicity, and not in the multiplicity and confusion of things” |

A Scottish river project set out to revive oysters that once covered an area the size of Edinburgh; now, 60,000 have been returned |

In 2015, Canada sank a 113-metre retired warship off British Columbia; five years later, monitoring had recorded more than 170 marine species on the wreck

Human hair, receipts, fishing nets, and eggshells were among 17 waste materials tested to create stronger, lower-carbon cement building products |

Meet Franklin Howley-Dumit Serulle, the amateur naturalist whose online insect photo helped reveal a new hoverfly species |

Meet Naidely Valeria Vidaurre-Quesada, the scientist who helped uncover a ghost shark species hiding in Costa Rica’s dark waters |

From 2012 to 2022, nearly 30,000 commercial vessel arrivals brought 430 sq km of submerged hull surface to Alaska; biofouling habitat grew 50%, increasing invasive-species risk

Meet Kaia Minn, the 13-year-old Massachusetts inventor who turned discarded orange peels into biodegradable seed pods for reforestation |

He began studying the Amazon in the 1970s; 50 years later, Philip Fearnside’s research has calculated the costs of losing the Amazon on account of deforestation, dams and highways

In 1945, an Arizona professor started hunting glowing scorpions at night; decades later his laboratory had become a major centre for venom research |

In 2001, scientists began adding 5 to 6 nanograms per litre of synthetic estrogen to an Ontario lake; after 2 seasons its minnow population collapsed

Scientists covered an Amazon rainforest plot with 6,000 panels to block half its rain; large trees died and biomass fell by a third |

In 2010, US scientists released dye into Montana’s Missouri River and tracked it across 41.2 miles; one reservoir held the plume for 8.2 hours, helping predict chemical-spill timing

Scientists rediscover a ‘ghost’ green mamba hidden in a Polish museum for decades after its 1885 discovery |

Quote of the day by Marie Curie: “I have no dress except the one I wear every day. If you are going to be kind enough to…” – a timeless lesson on choosing purpose over appearance |

2,800+ wolves killed, nearly $10 million spent and 15 caribou herds still at risk: Why scientists say British Columbia is targeting the wrong problem

In 2003, crews began removing non-native fish from the Grand Canyon; by 2006 rainbow trout’s share of the catch had fallen from about 90% to under 10%