The Environment

a map showing the eastern U.S. with most of the eastern half of the country in orange and red and swaths of the Ohio Valley, mid-Atlantic and Northeast in purple

WeatherJune 29, 2026

This July 4 is going to be dangerously hot for the East Coast. Here’s what to know

A prolonged, intense heat wave will make temperatures feel as hot as 115 degrees Fahrenheit in the eastern U.S. this week

Andrea Thompson

People in bathing suits stand in a large knee-high pool with fountains and the Eiffel Tower in the background.

Climate ChangeJune 25, 2026

France just hit its hottest day ever recorded

Scorching temperatures across France rose to a record-breaking average 30 degrees on Wednesday

Jackie Flynn Mogensen

The Young American Scientists Issue—Read Now

The upper body of a Golden Retriever dog with a confused look on its face.

AnimalsJune 24, 2026

Extreme heat is muddling animals’ brains—and even triggering aggression

As temperatures rise, some creatures pick fights while others struggle to learn

Marta Zaraska, Knowable Magazine

An illustration of 16 ticks of different sizes and shapes, with a pencil and small tweezers for scale.

Public HealthJune 22, 2026

Got a tick bite? Here’s what to do—and what not to do

Knowing what kind of tick bit you and where you got it can help inform next steps

Kate Wong

AnimalsJune 21, 2026

Celebrate Father’s Day with seven whimsical and weird animal dads

From tiny hamsters to giant salamanders, here are some of the most unusual examples of fatherhood across the animal kingdom

Jackie Flynn Mogensen

WaterJune 19, 2026

The Reflecting Pool turned green. Killing the algae may not fix it

The Trump administration wanted the surface of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to be “American flag blue.” A water-treatment expert explains why the pool is still algal green and why the bloom could keep coming back

Emma Gometz

EarthJune 18, 2026

Japan’s 2011 earthquake was so powerful that it shifted the entire country’s location

This “extraordinary” event was likely caused by seismic waves bouncing off Earth’s core, researchers found

Jackie Flynn Mogensen

The entrance of 2514 Eisenhower Avenue, where the National Science Foundation is also located, is seen on July 8, 2025, in Alexandria, Va.

PoliticsJune 18, 2026

Trump administration reverses course on plan to dismantle ocean monitoring network

The effort to pull some 900 ocean-monitoring buoys and sensors from the water drew backlash from scientists and lawmakers

Dan Vergano

A cluster of clouds over the Gulf Coast of Texas, with more scattered clouds visible across the Southeast.

WeatherJune 17, 2026

The first Atlantic tropical storm of 2026 is here—and it used to be a Pacific cyclone

Tropical Storm Arthur is the first named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season and will bring heavy rains and potential flash flooding to the Southeast

Andrea Thompson

GeologyJune 16, 2026

Allie Balter-Kennedy

Exploring ice cores to foresee the effects of climate change

Claire Cameron

Public HealthJune 16, 2026

Colin Carlson

Explaining how climate change affects ecological diversity and human health

K. R. Callaway

Portrait photograph of Adam Bowman, Chee-Huat Linus Eng, Jenny Bergner, Kaiyi Jiang, Christina V. Theodoris, Lvmin Zhang, Steven Chavez and Dmitrii Kochkov.

The SciencesJune 16, 2026

How we chose the 2026 Young American Scientists

Scientific American used expert recommendations and data analysis to identify 28 exceptional early-career researchers

Ari Sen