On the anniversary of its catastrophic 1985 earthquake, Mexico City has been hit by another powerful seismic event. No reports of casualties have been reported, but videos posted to social media suggest that damage is widespread.

Two months ago, an iceberg half the size of Jamaica tore itself loose from Antarctica’s Larsen C Ice Shelf. As it slowly drifts north, this massive berg is exposing an area that’s been covered in ice for the past 120,000 years. An international agreement has now been put in place to protect this emerging area and keep…

From a young age, human children learn that a rattle won’t make a noise until it’s shaken, and that placing fingers on a hot stove is a terrible idea. New research suggests that wolves, like humans, have a knack for identifying these kinds of cause-and-effect relationships, but that domesticated dogs do not. This…

Spiders are typically thought of as solitary creatures that don’t partake in social pleasantries unless it has something to do with mating. But as new research shows, the African velvet spider is an exception to this rule. Mother spiders are assisted by closely-related virgin females who, in addition to engaging in…

Around 36 million years ago, an asteroid smashed into what is now the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. New research suggests that, for a brief time, the temperature at the point of impact exceeded 4,300 degrees F (2,370 C), making it the hottest temperature known to have occurred on Earth.

Well, maybe it’s a face that only a mother could love, but this remarkable recreation of a prolific sea creature that lived over 500 million years ago is offering an entirely new perspective of a particularly well-known species.

It’s been a particularly brutal wildfire season in parts of western North America, as several large blazes continue to cause headaches from California up to British Columbia. As shocking new satellite images show, the smoke from these fires hasn’t been limited to the west coast, or even the North American continent.…

The number zero is something we all take for granted, yet its conceptual origin has eluded archaeologists and historians. An updated analysis of an ancient Indian manuscript is shedding new light on this longstanding mystery, showing that the symbol that would eventually evolve into the number zero emerged at least…

In the classic 1966 American science fiction film Fantastic Voyage, a submarine crew was miniaturized and injected into a body to fix a blood clot in the brain. That’s obviously not how future medical science is going to work, but the notion of creating microscopic machines to perform complex tasks is certainly on…

Over the past few days, NASA’s Curiosity rover has been making a steady climb towards a strange Martian ridge that’s captivated scientists since before the mission even started. Known as Vera Ridge after the pioneering astrophysicist Vera Rubin, the durable outcrop could shed new light on the environment and potential…

A new study shows that Toxoplasma gondii—a brain parasite often transmitted to humans by cats—triggers various changes in the human brain which potentially allow the pathogen to exacerbate several pre-existing neurological conditions. It’s a worrisome finding given that nearly one in ten Americans may be infected with…

To learn more about why some germs seem harder to kill in near-weightless conditions, scientists aboard the ISS recently doused a batch of bacteria with antibiotics—an experiment which resulted in a series of startling physical changes that may be helping the bacteria to survive and thrive in space.

A so-called “fatberg”—a tightly congealed mass of fat, wet wipes, diapers, and condoms—is blocking a section of London’s Victorian-era sewage network. It could take weeks for utility crews to remove the horrific mass, which, if not removed, could cause raw sewage to spill onto London’s streets.

Since early last week, the Sun has belched out a steady stream of solar flares, including the most powerful burst recorded in the star’s current 11-year cycle. It sounds very alarming, but scientists say this is simply what stars do every now and then, and that there’s nothing to be concerned about.

Stories and poems from the Medieval era contain accounts of fearsome female Viking warriors, yet historians and anthropologists have argued that such accounts are based in myth. A DNA analysis of a 10th century skeleton found in an iconic Swedish Viking Age grave suggests there’s some truth to these old tales—and that…