60-second Science

Light is a very dangerous, if not so obvious, threat to birds who migrate at night. But researchers are using weather radar to track birds and provide “lights out” forecasts to help keep their paths clear of visual distraction.

Science is turning to machines to unlock the secrets of the vast, mysterious pulse-of-the-planet phenomenon that is nocturnal migration.

If you really want to challenging your bird identification skills, try using them at night, when bird calls are less than 100 milliseconds long.

For thousands of years, no one truly knew how birds migrated—that is, until a few unlikely pioneers sat in an empty field with hundreds of pounds of kludged together recording gear and waited to hear sounds that no one had ever captured.

On any given night, dense clouds of dark, ghostly figures pass over your head as you sleep. Maybe you never knew they were there, but there are people out there who are deciphering all the unseen movement that happens amid the darkness.

Hearing aids may help maintain better brain functions in older people and better health overall.

Apothecaries founded this famous garden—one of the most ancient botanical gardens in Europe—to teach their students which plants poison and which plants cure. 

Here’s how scientists are planning on getting underground fungi data from space using satellites.

Atmospheric carbon is a currency that plants use to “buy” nutrients from fungi in the soil. To find out where this economy will go next, the devil is in the details. And the details are in the dirt.

Like us, plants and fungi have complex economies. By burning fossil fuels, we’ve been devaluing their currency.

Drugs such as Wegovy and Ozempic might help people tackle substance abuse as well as shed pounds.

Scientists used a smoking machine—complete with a 3-D-printed mouthpiece—to figure out how to get the most cannabinoid per puff. 

New AI technology predicts hit songs—by listening to someone’s body. 

Here’s what’s behind the A.I technology that has worried so many actors—including something called “the orb.”

A sleep researcher who studies what dreams can tell us about the possible onset of some mental disorders believes lucid dreamers might hold a lot of answers in their head.

Here’s what a historian who has studied J. Robert Oppenheimer for two decades has to say about the new Christopher Nolan film on the father of the atomic bomb.

Inflammatory bowel disease flare-ups can be traced to mental stress

Here’s how large language models, or LLMs, actually work. 

Very small delays in swing jazz point to our evolution as a supremely auditory species.

New research has discovered that wildfire smoke hurts these primates’ voice—and health.