Category: 9. Sci/Tech

The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine.

If you want to solve a tricky problem, it often helps to get organized. You might, for example, break the problem into pieces and tackle the easiest pieces first. But this kind of…

Around the world, women outlive men by an average of around 5.4 years. A distinction in life expectancy between sexes is surprisingly common among other mammals, too, though it’s not fully understood why.

An international research team has now…

That annoying flicker in your eyelid? It’s usually nothing to worry about. Known as myokymia, this harmless twitch is linked to tiredness, stress, caffeine or screen time. 

Sometimes women wonder if it’s hormonal, but while hormonal shifts…

For decades, small grooves on ancient human teeth were thought to be evidence of deliberate tool use – people cleaning their teeth with sticks or fibres, or easing gum pain with makeshift “toothpicks”. Some researchers even called it the…

Key Takeaways on How Eggs Get Salmonella

• Eggs can get Salmonella from feces or contaminated bedding that move to a chicken’s reproductive tract. The bacteria can colonize where the egg white and shell are formed, contaminating the egg….

“[The clutch] is like 1950s technology—it’s really boring,” Westerman said (“boring,” for grid operators, is the highest form of praise). ​“The marginal cost of putting this in is like nothing compared to the cost of…