Science

This week in science: moths' anti-bat signal, fish who count and GMO crops at home

8:37pm February 08, 2024

Short Wave's Regina Barber and Margaret Cirino talk through how moths produce an anti-bat signal, why clownfish could be counting to 3 and the first GMO food crop sold directly to home gardeners.

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A sea otter in the estuarine water of Elkhorn Slough, Monterey Bay, Calif.

California sea otters nearly went extinct. Now they're rescuing their coastal habitat

10:49am February 08, 2024

by Ari Daniel

California sea otter populations have rebounded in recent decades. New research finds that by feasting on shore crabs, these otters are helping to protect their coastal marsh habitat against erosion.

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An octopus named Oktavius swims in Berlin's Sealife aquarium, July 20, 2021, marking his first birthday. The young octopus' tentacles spanned about two meters.

A seafood firm wants to farm octopus. Activists say they're too smart for that

5:13pm February 07, 2024

by Bill Chappell

Octopuses are seen as smart and solitary. A seafood company plans to farm them commercially. Octopus garden? Sure. Octopus farm? No way, say the animal's advocates.

Air pollution has fallen across the U.S. since the Clean Air Act of 1970. But some areas, like Los Angeles, still suffer heavy pollution from soot and smog. New rules on soot pollution from EPA aim to lower that pollution burden further.

EPA tightens rules on some air pollution for the first time in over a decade

9:54am February 07, 2024

by Alejandra Borunda

The new regulations could save thousands of lives from deadly air pollution, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's calculations.

Residents stand along a flooded street in Santa Barbara, California, as a powerful atmospheric river pummels the region. The storm has caused landslides, power outages, and road and airport closures across Southern California.

Another atmospheric river has soaked California. What role has climate change played?

10:03pm February 06, 2024

by Alejandra Borunda

California is in the grips of an atmospheric river that's causing flooding all over the state. Climate change might be intensifying storms like it — but scientists are still working out the details.

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Purple Tomatoes ripening in the Norfolk Plant Sciences test garden.

A genetically modified purple tomato is now available to home gardeners

8:57pm February 06, 2024

by Sasa Woodruff

The plant gets its color — and a boost in antioxidants — from genes from an edible flower. It's the first time gardeners have been able to grow a GMO crop at home.

Long COVID research goes private

5:27pm February 06, 2024

by Will Stone

Advocates say the federal government is no longer viewing long COVID with the urgency it deserves. Private donors are now funding research bringing an unprecedented level of collaboration.

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Rep. Shontel Brown, a Democrat from Ohio, is calling on the FDA to do further investigations into hair straightening products that contain chemicals flagged for health risks.

FDA move to ban formaldehyde in hair straighteners called too little, too late

9:28am February 06, 2024

by Ronnie Cohen

The FDA will soon move to ban formaldehyde in hair-straightening products. It's more than a decade after research raised alarms about health risks and other worrying chemicals remain in the products.

Psilocybin mushrooms jarred and ready for distribution at Uptown Fungus lab in Springfield, Ore. Oregon has decriminalized the use of the psychedelic drug.

As 'magic mushrooms' got more attention, drug busts of the psychedelic drug went up

7:51am February 06, 2024

by Rhitu Chatterjee

Busts of psilocybin mushrooms went way up from 2017 to 2022, a new study finds, even as the psychedelic drug's potential benefits have been explored by scientists.

During a Summer Science Safari demonstration at Texas A&M University in 2022, Dr. Tatiana hits a knife down to make the potato go up. It's not magic, it's inertia.

Science experiments and endless enthusiasm led a physics professor to TikTok stardom

6:06pm February 05, 2024

by Emma Bowman

Videos of Tatiana Erukhimova's enthusiastic teaching style have gone viral on social media. The secret to her success? It didn't happen overnight.