How Mutant Viral Swarms Spread Disease
Viruses exist as “mutant clouds” of closely related individuals, an insight that is helping researchers predict where disease is likely to spread
Quanta Magazine
A Surprise Source of Life's Code
Emerging data suggests the seemingly impossible—that mysterious new genes arise from “junk” DNA
Giant Burst of Tiny Organisms Discovered on Tree of Life
A new technique for finding and characterizing microbes has boosted the number of known bacteria by almost 50 percent, revealing a hidden world all around us.
Decoding the Remarkable Algorithms of Ants
The biologist Deborah Gordon has uncovered how ant colonies search efficiently without central organization, an insight that might improve computer networks
World of Hidden Life Teems below Our Feet
Researchers have begun to catalogue how soil microbes are changing the world
How Dinosaurs Shrank and Became Birds
Modern birds appeared to emerge in a snap of evolutionary time. But new research illuminates the long series of evolutionary changes that made the transformation possible
Roots of Animals' Individuality Revealed with "Groundhog Day" Experiments
Animals raised under the same conditions are creating a biological map of what makes individuals unique
How Structure Arose in the Primordial Soup
Researchers are resurrecting ancient proteins to illuminate Earth’s biological dark ages
Science's Path from Myth to Multiverse
In his latest book Nobel Prize winner Steven Weinberg explores how science made the modern world, and where it might take us from here
Dark Energy Tested on a Tabletop
Is dark energy a cosmic chameleon that can fade into its surroundings? A recent test brings the mysterious antigravitational force down-to-earth
