The New York Times, August 27, 2025 Link Charles Darwin unveiled his theory of evolution in 1859, in “On the Origin of Species.” But it took him another 12 years to work up the courage to declare that humans evolved, too. In “The Descent of Man,” published in 1871, Darwin argued that humans arose from […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, August 25, 2025 Link The pygmy sea horse is an inch-long fish that lives on corals in the Pacific. The corals, fan-shaped and knobby, are venomous, yet the sea horse can safely wrap its tail around a branch to feed on tiny animals passing by. Some species of pygmy sea horse […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, August 22, 2025 Link For more than 260 years, scientists have consider giraffes a single species. Giraffa camelopardalis, as it was long known, existed across thousands of miles of African grasslands and woodlands. But scientists now see giraffes differently. One species is officially four, the International Union for Conservation of Nature announced […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, August 14, 2025 Link For decades, neuroengineers have dreamed of helping people who have been cut off from the world of language. A disease like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or A.L.S., weakens the muscles in the airway. A stroke can kill neurons that normally relay commands for speaking. Perhaps, by implanting electrodes, […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, August 4, 2025 Link For years, whistle-blowers have warned that fake results are sneaking into the scientific literature at an increasing pace. A new statistical analysis backs up the concern. A team of researchers found evidence of shady organizations churning out fake or low-quality studies on an industrial scale. And their […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, July 31, 2025 Link At the heart of all life is a code. Our cells use it to turn the information in our DNA into proteins. So do maple trees. So do hammerhead sharks. So do shiitake mushrooms. Except for some minor variations, the genetic code is universal. It’s also redundant. […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, July 24, 2025 Link In April, a team of scientists based at the University of Cambridge claimed that a planet orbiting a distant star bore a possible signature of life. The announcement kicked up a fierce debate among astronomers, with many skeptics arguing that the evidence was too ambiguous. Now a NASA-led team has […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, July 23, 2025 Link German paleontologists have discovered a 247-million-year-old fossil of a reptile with a bizarre row of plumes sprouting from its back. The elaborate display is a paradox of evolution. The plumes bear some similarities to feathers, even though the newly discovered reptile was not closely related to birds. Stephan Spiekman, […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, July 9, 2025 Link To prepare for future pandemics, scientists look to the past for clues. Over the last century, a series of new pathogens have swept the world, including H.I.V., Zika virus and SARS-CoV-2. But the further back researchers look, the fuzzier that history becomes. Thucydides chronicled the plague of Athens, […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, July 2, 2025 Link Companies like OpenAI and Meta are in a race to make something they like to call artificial general intelligence. But for all the money being spent on it, A.G.I. has no settled definition. It’s more of an aspiration to create something indistinguishable from the human mind. Artificial intelligence today […]| | Carl Zimmer
The New York Times, June 12, 2025 Link You could be forgiven for assuming that scientists know how many kinds of proteins exist.| Carl Zimmer