Know Thy Enemy

Notes from my first in-person mega-conference in two years

Cracking the mystery of fungal infections in India, the Sabatini controversy, addressing Ebola, and more

COVID-19 has challenged the progress of Big Science. Here are the lessons learned.

As we continue to transition out of the print era of scientific publishing, funders and institutions are paying a steep price to have trustworthy publishers certify research outcomes.

These social animals keep tabs on aggressive members of the group and groom them less after fights to punish them.

A handful of new studies moves the needle toward a consensus on the long-disputed question of whether insect wings evolved from legs or from the body wall, but the devil is in the details.

Once thought to be silent, fish turn out to produce a range of vocalizations—so polluting the oceans with noise could pose a danger to them.

Nearly all mouse sperm have hooks on their heads. But new research suggests the structures slow them down—so what exactly is their purpose?

The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne evolutionary neurobiologist is using Drosophila to investigate how organisms adapt to novel environments.

The University of Guelph neuroscientist is scoping out the brain regions and genes that change as a consequence of pain that lasts for months or even years.

A new technique reveals cells’ precise locations and functions in the brain. Its developers have already used it to identify a previously unknown neuron type.

Nanoparticle-coated bacteria can capture tumor antigens and deliver them to immune cells, triggering a response that improved survival rates in mice.

People who had cognitive functions depleted by noninvasive brain stimulation or a mentally demanding task could subconsciously recognize individual words in a made-up language more easily than controls, researchers find.

The virus’s ability to slip directly from one cell to another may help it avoid some of the body’s immune responses.

Researchers tracked the movements of endangered caribou and sequenced a portion of their genomes to determine which genes may influence migratory behavior.

Researchers determine that a primate’s tooth root, and not just its crown, can yield reliable information about body size, but the relationship between root surface area and diet isn’t as clear.

As the pandemic has underscored the importance—and benefits—of communicating science to the general public, it’s also highlighted the challenges that researchers can face in speaking with journalists.

Researchers are revealing the complexity of the microbial community living on the body—and paving the way for new bacteria-targeting treatments for acne and other dermatological conditions.

Do members of Homo floresiensis still inhabit the Indonesian island where their fossils helped identify a new human species fewer than 20 years ago?

The land’s first known singer may have sounded like a raspier version of today’s familiar insect fiddlers.

A series of rodent experiments showed that even with abundant food and water, personal space is essential to prevent societal collapse, but Universe 25's relevance to humans remains disputed.

Nan Songer, a spider expert living in California, played an integral part in the Allies’ success in World War II by supplying silk for bombsights.

Known as SLiMs, these stretches of up to 10 amino acids play notable roles in cell biology, including responses to viral invasion.

Scientists have pinpointed several pathways through which the immune system could disrupt neuronal functioning and thereby lead to psychotic symptoms.

Some studies suggest that associations between the health of children and the experiences of their parents or grandparents may be due to epigenetic mechanisms, but confounding factors challenge this interpretation.

Diverse lines of evidence point to humans’ presence in the New World long before the dawn of Clovis culture. But rewriting this chapter of human history raises many questions about how these early people came to inhabit these continents.

A new methodology combines existing techniques to reveal the specific function and location of multiple types of neurons at once.

Nanoparticle-coated bacteria carry cancer-derived proteins to dendritic cells, enabling the immune system to launch a response in a mouse model.