Let’s learn about glass
Glass is all around us. In our windows and beverage containers. Mirrors and lightbulbs. Car parts and smartphone touchscreens. But what is glass? Glass is generally considered a solid. It feels solid....
View ArticleNo, organic molecules alone don’t point to life on Mars
A chunk of Mars that had landed in Antarctica caused quite a stir in 1996. Scientists reported that this meteorite contained organic compounds. Such carbon-based molecules are the building blocks for...
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Widely used pesticides may threaten Earth’s ozone layer
For more than a century, farmers have protected their crops using copper-based chemicals. These pesticides ward off insects and fungi that would damage the plants, boosting harvests. But there’s a...
View ArticleWhy some icicles become scallops not spikes
Water’s density can have wacky impacts that researchers are still discovering. New experiments show, for instance, that ice columns submerged in liquid water can melt into three distinct shapes. Which...
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New process can transform urban CO2 pollution into a resource
Earth’s warming climate has been behind many recent bouts of extreme weather, from wildfires and floods to droughts and storms. One contributor to that warming is a growing buildup in Earth’s...
View ArticleA disinfectant made from sawdust knocks out deadly microbes
A new disinfectant made from sawdust and water can knock out more than 99 percent of some disease-causing microbes. That makes the sawdust mix a potential alternative to current germ-killing...
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New cloth cools you when you’re hot, warms you when you’re cold
Imagine if the same jacket that warms you up on chilly days would also cool you down on hot ones. Fabrics with “phase-change” properties can do that. And a research team from China now shows that 3-D...
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Reusable plastic bottles release hundreds of pollutants into water
Plastic sports bottles shed hundreds of chemicals into the water they hold, a new study finds. The containers release even more pollutants after being run through a dishwasher. Although some of the...
View ArticleOrb-weaving spiders use their webs like external eardrums
In the story Charlotte’s Web, a spider wrote messages in her web. It now appears some spiders also listen with that silk. One might now think of those webs as ears — replaceable ears. Most animals...
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Lego-like way to snap molecules together wins 2022 chemistry Nobel
Imagine a tool kit for snapping together molecules like Lego building blocks. That’s essentially the development that brought three chemists this year’s Nobel Prize in chemistry. The Royal Swedish...
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Explainer: What are the different states of matter?
Ice, water and vapor are three distinctly different forms — or states — of water. Like other substances, water can take different forms as its surrounding environment changes. Take, for example, an...
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Scientists Say: Fluorescence
Fluorescence (noun, “Flor-ESS-ents”) Fluorescence is a property of some materials to absorb light at one wavelength and then emit it at another. The emitted light is usually a longer wavelength than...
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Does the size of a parachute matter?
Objective: Test different sized parachutes to see how changes in the size of the parachute affect flight. Areas of science: Aerodynamics & Hydrodynamics, Space Exploration Difficulty: Easy...
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How daylight saving time throws off your internal clock
On March 12, nearly every state in the United States will “spring forward” from standard time to daylight saving time, or DST. (Hawaii and most of Arizona don’t observe DST.) That switch shifts an...
View ArticleLet’s learn about frogs
April is National Frog Month. And if you’re not already a fan of frogs, you might be thinking: What’s all the fuss? But there’s a lot to admire about these little amphibians. There are thousands of...
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Sea life may suffer as plastic bits alter metals in water
Once it gets into the environment, plastic trash tends to break into increasingly tinier pieces. These fractured bits have been winding up on mountain tops, in the oceans and everywhere in between....
View ArticleScientists Say: Explosion
Explosion (noun, “Ex-PLOH-zhun”) An explosion happens when some substance undergoes a chemical or nuclear reaction that releases a lot of energy very fast. That energy blasts outward from the source...
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Experiment: Test the effect of temperature on reaction time
Objective: To measure the effect of temperature on the rate of a chemical reaction Areas of science: Chemistry, science with your smartphone Difficulty: Easy intermediate Time required: 2–5 days...
View ArticleEngineers cook up a new way to tackle CO2: Make baking soda
This is another in our series of stories identifying new technologies and actions that can slow climate change, reduce its impacts or help communities cope with a rapidly changing world. Carbon...
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Snail slime + gold could boost the power of sunscreens and more
Two unlikely materials — snail slime and gold — may be the secret to better sunscreens. Suncreens often contain tiny particles that reflect sunlight. Usually those are bits of the metals zinc or...
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