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Dec 31, 2011

Underwater City A Life Saver or Titanic Failure?

When the idea emerged in 2008, environmentalists balked. So did reasonable people everywhere. Dutch architect Moshé Zwarts suggested draining Amsterdam's canals, building an enormous parking and entertainment complex under the city, and then refilling the canals. Presto! More space! Granted, Amsterdam did -- and does -- have little space to...

Dec 31, 2011

Belief in Evolution Boils Down to a Gut Feeling

Gut feelings may trump good old-fashioned facts, and even religious beliefs, when it comes to accepting the theory of evolution, new research suggests. The whole idea behind acceptance of evolutionhas been the assumption that if people understood it, if they really knew it, they would see the logic and accept...

Dec 31, 2011

GPS Uncovers Possible Southwest Quake Risk

The U.S. Southwest isn't particularly known for its seismic activity, but the Rio Grande Rift, a series of faults and basins that runs from central Colorado south through New Mexico, is alive and stretching, new research shows. Scientists had suspected the rift might be dead, but measurements of its movement...

Dec 31, 2011

January Seeing Above-Average Tornado Action

If the numbers hold up, this month could be the third-busiest January since tornado record-keeping began in 1950. So far this month, weather watchers have filed 70 tornado reports to the nation's Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla. When it comes to counting tornadoes, there are a number of caveats,...

Nov 30, 2013

New Wizard Tool Maps the Climate Future (Op-Ed)

Evan Girvetz is a senior climate scientist for the Nature Conservancy. This Op-Ed was adapted from a post to the Nature Conservancy blog Planet Change. He contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. People often hear broad statements about how climate change will affect society and nature...

Nov 30, 2013

World's E-Waste to Grow 33% by 2017, Says Global Report

By 2017, the global volume of discarded refrigerators, TVs, cellphones, computers, monitors and other electronic waste will weigh almost as much as 200 Empire State Buildings, a new report predicts. The forecast, based on data gathered by United Nations organizations, governments, and nongovernment and science organizations in a partnership known...

Nov 30, 2013

Greenland's Snow Hides 100 Billion Tons of Water

Big surprises still hide beneath the frozen surface of snowy Greenland. Despite decades of poking and prodding by scientists, only now has the massive ice island revealed a hidden aquifer. In southeast Greenland, more than 100 billion tons of liquid water soaks a slushy snow layer buried anywhere from 15...

Nov 30, 2013

Holiday Snapshots: Seasonal Cells

Nestled snug while visions of ... cells danced in their heads? (Image credit: Erkin Kuru, Indiana University.)What's red and green all over? While this time of the year may have you guessing a poinsettia, holiday garland or even a sunburned elf, another answer is: snapshots of cells. Scientists use imaging...

Nov 30, 2013

What We Learned About Human Origins in 2013

The existence of a mysterious ancient human lineage and the possibility that the earliest humans were actually all one species were among the human-evolution-related discoveries of 2013. Other breakthroughs include the sequencing of the oldest human DNA yet. Here's a look at what scientists learned about humanity and human origins...

Nov 30, 2013

California to End Year as Driest on Record

This article was provided by AccuWeather.com. With 2013 quickly coming to a close, it's shaping up to be one of the driest calendar years on record for many places in California. Almost all of the Golden State is under either a severe or extreme drought with no end in sight...

Nov 30, 2013

One-Third of Americans Don't Believe in Human Evolution

Nearly two-thirds of Americans believe in evolution, while a third say that humans and other life forms have existed in their current states since the beginning of time, according to a new poll. The new findings come from to the Pew Research Religion & Public Life Project, which surveyed a...

Oct 31, 2013

To Cut Carbon, a Decade is Too Long to Wait (Op-Ed)

Jeffrey Rissman, policy analyst at Energy Innovation: Policy and Technology, contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. While there is a global consensus to cut greenhouse gasses, many approaches look to solve the crisis over decades — but, there are critical reasons that even ten years is...

Oct 31, 2013

Grit Your Teeth: Toothbrush Holder Yields New Germ (Op-Ed)

Robert Donofrio is director of NSF International's Applied Research Center. He contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. Recently, my colleagues and I at NSF International's Applied Research Center (ARC) discovered a new bacterium, Klebsiella michiganensis, lurking on a toothbrush holder. This unique coliform bacterium is a...

Oct 31, 2013

Wild 'Roll Cloud' Tumbles Across Texas Sky

An other-worldly roll cloud stretching from horizon to horizon appears to tumble across the Texas sky in a new video. The cloud video, taken by a couple in Timbercreek Canyon, south of Amarillo, Texas, shows a low, tubular cloud spinning horizontally like an upended tornado. As bizarre as this sight...

Oct 31, 2013

Something Is Rotten at the New York Times (Op-Ed)

Michael Mann is Distinguished Professor of Meteorology at Penn State University and was recognized in 2007, with other IPCC authors, for contributing to the award of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his work as a lead author on the Observed Climate Variability and Change chapter of the Intergovernmental Panel...