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Protecting health after earthquakes: learning from a community-centred approach in Türkiye
In the hours and days after an earthquake, communities face devastating loss, displacement and profound disruption of daily life. In the weeks and months that follow, new health risks can quickly emerge that compound the immediate impacts. These continue to evolve over time.
Microbiology DNA and Chemistry for Health Insights Tops Research Schedule
Microbiology dominated the research schedule aboard the International Space Station on Thursday helping doctors protect health on Earth and in space. The Expedition 74 crew also tested a new spacesuit, packed a U.S. cargo spacecraft, and kept up lab maintenance throughout the orbital outpost.
Scientists Measure Earth’s Vast Underground Fungal Webs
With machine learning and a high-resolution imaging robot, scientists measured and mapped the extent of Earth’s carbon circulatory system.
621 trillion miles of fungi networks crisscross the planet
A new map explores the vast underground world supporting all life on Earth.
The largest scorpion to walk the Earth was the size of a baseball bat
Scientists describe a baseball bat-size scorpion — the world’s largest — and suggest that the 400 million-year-old creature was also amphibious.
Scientists discover a deep whale graveyard that is teeming with life
Scientists have unearthed marine communities thriving on a millions-year-old whale graveyard
Scientists discover a deep whale graveyard that is teeming with life
Scientists have unearthed communities of marine life — including jellyfish, tubeworms and brittle stars — thriving on a millions-year-old whale graveyard. A whale's sheer size and the unique chemistr...
Scientists Found a Continent-Sized Geological Structure Hiding Beneath Antarctica
A team led by a geophysicist in Italy now believes that about 90% of Earth’s fresh water ice may not be on solid ground after all.
Oops, Scientists May Have Severely Miscalculated How Many Humans Are on Earth
While most estimates place the current human population at around 8.2 billion, a study suggests we might be vastly underrepresenting rural areas.
🗞️ Julián Álvarez's NO to Florentino makes Wednesday's headlines
This Wednesday morning will go down as a genuine earthquake at Spanish newsstands. The front pages of the country’s main sports newspapers offer a crystal-clear reflection of the polarization, irony...
Could Bill Pulte be a FISA-shaped problem for the Trump Administration?
By tapping an underqualified ally for one of the most sensitive intelligence jobs on Earth, the president is risking a major legislative miss.
New Honolulu art exhibit to explore nature’s patterns in art and science
Honolulu artist Taiji Terasaki’s “Hawaiian Landscapes: Earth Within Us” opens June 16 at American Savings Bank, running through Oct. 2.
Earth's first animals barely evolved until sex changed everything
Earth’s earliest animals may have held evolution back because they reproduced asexually, creating low-competition communities that changed very little over time. When environmental pressures pushed them toward sexual reproduction, biodiversity exploded and evolution accelerated dramatically.
Scientists discover a 3.5-billion-year-old asteroid impact on the moon
The first few billion years of Earth's history saw the rise of life, the atmosphere and the oceans. Still, that time is shrouded in mystery: Not many rocks remain that preserve a record of those early ...
Sex jumpstarted Earth’s animal biodiversity
Many species didn’t have much sex for millions of years. They didn’t need it.
Citizen Science Can Benefit Wetland Restoration
Citizen science can greatly expand the scale and coverage of data collection, highly benefiting wetland restoration across Europe.
Scientists Say All Life on Earth May Follow the Same Temperature Rule
Despite its incredible diversity, there is a universal tie between all life on Earth, regardless of species. This unifying trend is found throughout different species and even across kingdoms, whether...
Two NAU environmental science and policy master’s students receive national conservation scholarships
Northern Arizona University’s School of Earth and Sustainability and the Wyss Foundation have named environmental science and policy graduate students Taylor Hartness and Tia Hatton as 2026-2027 Wyss Conservation Scholars. The prestigious program supports innovative graduate-level education to advance a new generation of leaders in U.S. land conservation. Scholars are chosen for their commitment to conservation and their leadership qualities. They are pursuing interdisciplinary graduate studies to develop effective new approaches to today’s most…
ORNL scientist: How AI helps scientists predict Earth's future
Oak Ridge scientist Forrest Hoffman explains how AI and supercomputers help predict Earth's complex climate systems.
Planetarium show explores the science of the sun and moon
A live presentation at Samford University’s Christenberry Planetarium will examine how Earth’s closest celestial neighbors continue to shape life on our planet.
NYU Launches Earth Systems Institute
Interdisciplinary science and tech hub aims to develop pioneering solutions for a changing planet
Scientists Reveal the Terrifying Truth Behind Earth’s Most Powerful Eruption - Futura-Sciences
Scientists Raise the Alarm This time, the University of Oxford has taken on the task, announcing that super volcanic eruptions—far more frequent than previously believed—could threaten our entire civilisation. Let’s not beat around the bush, because this is just about the worst natural disaster imaginable. An explosive display of such...
Why did measuring Earth’s true shape matter for science?
The extraordinary challenge of determining the true shape of Earth reveals the deep value of measurement to scientific progress
Scientists confirm more than two dozen new marine species off Brazilian coast within days
"The largest habitat on Earth, the midwater, is filled with incredible animals we are only just starting to understand."
World Ocean Day: From risk to prosperity
The ocean is central to life on Earth. As World Ocean Day is marked on 8 June, a new Forum report says a regenerative blue economy can protect ecosystems and livelihoods.
Science 4 Everyone: How far away is Earth compared to other planets and the sun?
What is planetary conjunction? Storm Team4 meteorologist Ryan Miller explains how big planets are and how close they actually are to each other.
NASA’s Artemis II Moon Mission Research Continues on Earth
Since NASA’s Artemis II crew safely splashed down on April 10, science teams have been busy collecting data and combing through observations.
NASA Satellites Uncover Large-Scale Ocean Nutrient Stress
As Earth’s oceans warm, microscopic marine organisms are experiencing increasing stress due to a lack of vital nutrients. A new study
A whiff of weather, can you smell the rain? Science says yes
Have you ever stepped outside after a summer rain and immediately thought, Wow, it smells amazing out here? That earthy, fresh, almost nostalgic scent has a name: petrichor.
SpaceX IPO: Why Starship Could End Overnight Business Travel
Why some investors see SpaceX’s future in challenging Boeing and Airbus — as well as the airline industry — by flying Starship point-to-point across Earth.
James Webb telescope detects most distant dormant black hole, invisible in all wavelengths and weighing as much as 6 billion suns
JWST found a black hole hiding in a galaxy more than 10 billion light-years away from Earth, and used a cosmic magnifying glass to determine its mass.
World Cup 2026: Top 🔟 contenders for the title
With the 2026 World Cup set to take place in the United States, Canada and Mexico, excitement is already building around the biggest sporting occasion on earth.Recent form, squad depth, tournament ped...
A Moonlit Earth as Seen From Artemis II
An astronaut’s photo, taken en route to the Moon, reveals our planet and its place in space in a novel way.
Human Research, Biotechnology for Advanced Health Fill Station Research Schedule
Wednesday’s science schedule aboard the International Space Station encompassed human research, microbial analysis, and 3D bioprinting to advance health on and off the Earth. The Expedition 74 crew members also worked on spacesuit maintenance and cargo spacecraft duties throughout the day rounding out their shift.
- NASA Science
A new version of Eyes on the Earth was released on May 11, 2026, that has a share/embed feature prominently placed on the home screen. It also has a new SWOT
New book offers tips to translate climate science into political gains
At a time when climate politics in the United States and globally remain deeply polarized, Will Hackman, a climate advocate and political operative, argues that the climate movement needs a new language — one rooted less in doom, guilt and abstract planetary crisis, and more in people’s everyday lives, health, safety, costs and communities. In […]
New book offers tips to translate climate science into political gains
At a time when climate politics in the United States and globally remain deeply polarized, Will Hackman, a climate advocate and political operative, argues that the climate movement needs a new language — one rooted less in doom, guilt and abstract planetary crisis, and more in people’s everyday lives, health, safety, costs and communities. In […]
How Science Works
The 2nd Weather and Climate Livestream is now underway. It is organized by a group of early-career researchers concerned about declining funding for the field and eager to demonstrate how weather and climate research makes a difference in our lives. Last year’s event was a great success, drawing terrific press coverage including a piece in the NY Times. This year features a strong lineup of talks aimed at a general audience — I highly recommend tuning in. Share I gave a talk yesterday about How Science Works in Three Steps. You can see the short presentation here (I’ve appended a transcript below): And please tune into the livestream here. It runs through tomorrow at 6 pm ET. Thanks for reading The Climate Brink! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support our work. Subscribe Cleaned up transcript: Thank you, and thanks to everyone tuning in. I want to talk about something I think a lot of people don’t really understand: how science actually works. Arguments over any scientific topic — climate change, vaccines, you name it — revolve around competing claims. For climate change, the claims are: Is the Earth warming? Are humans to blame? What will the impacts be? Over the last 150 years, the scientific community has developed a remarkably robust method for sorting out which claims are true and which aren’t. That method is what I want to walk through. So how does science generate knowledge? If you ask a high schooler, they’ll give you the version they learned in ninth grade: an individual scientist forms a hypothesis, runs an experiment, and draws a conclusion. That’s more or less what happens at the individual level, though in practice it’s more iterative — you design, test, and refine all at once, landing on a slightly different idea each time until you reach a conclusion about whatever hypothesis you’ve ended up with. But this isn’t science. It’s only step one. Any individual scientist can make mistakes — scientists are human. Maybe there’s a bug in the code, maybe there’s an error in the experiment. Just because someone ran an experiment and reached a conclusion doesn’t mean it’s right, and scientists don’t treat a single result as settled truth. Step two is peer review, the first layer of quality control. The scientist writes up what they did and submits it to a journal, which sends the paper to other experts in the field. Those experts judge whether the methods are sound, whether it properly references prior work, and whether the conclusions actually follow from the data. Ask any scientist and they’ll tell you peer review is miserable — the comments come back brutal, often harsh, and you have to revise and resubmit, sometimes multiple times, before an editor finally accepts the paper. Peer review catches an immense amount of bad science, but it can’t catch all of it. Reviewers get sloppy or overworked, they miss obvious mistakes, and they can’t catch hidden errors — a bug in the code, a misread instrument. So a peer-reviewed paper making it into a journal doesn’t mean the paper is right. Nobody treats a single paper as the final word. That’s where step three comes in: the crucible of science. Important results get retested by the broader community. If you publish something interesting, it gets dissected. Sometimes people try to reproduce your work directly but more often they test its implications. If someone claims X is true, and that implies that Y is also true, then scientists will go check Y. If a claim survives this gauntlet long enough, it becomes accepted. That’s how we generate knowledge. Let me give an example: the ozone hole. In 1985 — and I doubt many people watching were around then, but I remember it well — Joe Farman and his colleagues published observations from Antarctica showing that a huge chunk of ozone was disappearing every year. This was shocking because most atmospheric chemists had expected ozone loss to occur at mid-latitudes and high altitudes, not over the South Pole. When scientists see something they don’t understand, they rush to explain it, and several competing hypotheses quickly appeared in the peer-reviewed literature. One pointed to chlorine chemistry from chlorofluorocarbons. A second blamed nitrogen chemistry, possibly driven by solar proton events — meaning the sun was responsible. A third argued it wasn’t chemistry at all but dynamics: winds were carrying naturally low-ozone air from the lower atmosphere up into the stratosphere. Then the community went to work testing which theory could survive the crucible. Aircraft flew into the ozone hole and found no nitrogen, ruling out the nitrogen theory. Measurements showed the air in the polar vortex was descending, not rising — which would bring high-ozone air down, eliminating the dynamics theory. Meanwhile, those same flights measured enormous amounts of chlorine, strongly correlated with exactly the regions where ozone was being destroyed. That became known as the “smoking gun” paper, and it established that chlorine chemistry was the cause. Through this process, a consensus emerged. And it’s worth being clear that this consensus is organic. There’s no vote, no poll, no meeting where it gets decided. Scientists go to conferences, talk to one another, and independently arrived at the same answer. It’s the ultimate free market of ideas. After the consensus was established, the peer-reviewed literature doesn’t even mention the rival theories — it simply takes chlorine chemistry as given. That’s what a consensus looks like. It doesn’t mean every single scientist agrees, but it does mean there’s no longer any legitimate debate. So where can you see what scientists actually think? It’s all in the peer-reviewed literature, which contains the entire historical record of the argument: the discovery, the competing theories, the debate, the testing, and finally the community coalescing around one answer. But there’s a lot of room for misrepresentation. You can dig up an old paper claiming the ozone hole was caused by dynamics and wave it around as if there still was a debate about the cause of the ozone hole — without mentioning that the idea was disproven long ago and that even its own authors no longer believe it. There’s a bigger problem, though: the peer-reviewed literature is written in a language I call “nerd.” It’s extremely hard to read — honestly, some of it is hard for me to follow. It takes graduate students years to work through the literature in a single field, so we can’t expect policymakers or ordinary people to do it. This is where scientific assessments come in. The most famous is the IPCC — the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The job of an assessment is to read and summarize the peer-reviewed literature, synthesizing what’s settled, what’s been disproven, and what remains genuinely debated. To ensure the assessments accurately summarize the peer-reviewed literature, assessments are written by large teams, which are far less prone to bias than individuals and which dilute the influence of any one scientist with an axe to grind. The teams are deliberately assembled to avoid stacking the deck, and the reports themselves go through multiple rounds of peer review. That rigorous process is exactly why you can trust them and why people consider the IPCC to be the gold standard of what we know about the climate system. An assessment produced through a different process may well not be credible. You can even watch the consensus evolve across assessments. Take the attribution of warming. The 1990 IPCC report said the observed warming was broadly consistent with model predictions but also comparable to natural variability — in other words, we don’t know whether humans are responsible. By 1995, it concluded that the balance of evidence suggested a discernible human influence — a sentence only a committee could write, and one that barely commits to anything. By 2001, most of the warming over the previous 50 years was judged “likely” due to greenhouse gases; by 2007, “very likely”; by 2013, “extremely likely.” The 2023 report says essentially the same as 2013 — there’s not much stronger language available. So, to wrap up: science is our ultimate tool for deciphering the universe — the most successful method we’ve ever developed for determining what’s true and what isn’t. Our understanding is written into the peer-reviewed literature, so if you want to know what scientists think, that’s where to look. And for those of us who don’t speak nerd, scientific assessments are the Rosetta Stone — they translate nerd into English. Let me open the floor to questions. Thank you.
175 Years Ago, He Set Out to Prove the Earth Was Spinning. His Experiment Took the World By Storm.
Foucault’s pendulum experiment led to an increase in the public’s interest in both real-life science and science fiction.
Scientists Think a Cosmic Particle Accelerator Shot a Mystery Particle Right at Earth
A gigantic "blazar" may have fired a beam of light-speed particles at our planet, creating a 2023 "ghost particle" detection.
The wasting disease threatening US science and ‘Patient Earth’
Ignorance is a wasting disease, a death of a thousand cuts. A gradual “falling behind” the rest of the world, not only in the ability to advance basic science, but also in the ability to educate, innovate, and retain the best and the brightest minds.
Scientists stunned: a hidden Earth mechanism may reveal how continents were born - Futura-Sciences
The Great Puzzle of Plate Tectonics Our planet’s lithosphere—the robust outer shell—hasn’t led a quiet life. Broken into multiple rigid plates, these vast rafts of rock incessantly jostle and drift, thanks to two mighty geological engines: subduction and oceanic accretion. At mid-ocean ridges, plates pull apart, creating new lithosphere from...
Veolia Completes Clean Earth Deal, Doubling Its U.S. Hazardous Waste Business and Expanding Its Growth Platform
PARIS, June 01, 2026--Veolia Completes Clean Earth Deal, Doubling Its U.S. Hazardous Waste Business and Expanding Its Growth Platform
Veolia Completes Clean Earth Deal, Doubling Its U.S. Hazardous Waste Business and Expanding Its Growth Platform
BOSTON, June 01, 2026--Veolia, a leader in environmental services, has completed the financial close of its acquisition of Clean Earth, a hazardous waste management firm operating in a sector that has become increasingly critical for industrial competitiveness, public health and environmental security in the United States and worldwide.
A Chemical Production Loophole Could Delay the Recovery of Earth’s Ozone Layer by Up to 11 Years
A new study reveals that if left unchecked, unaccounted-for emissions of ozone-harming substances could delay the layer’s full recovery by almost a decade.
DNA had one rule. Bacteria didn’t get the memo
Every cell in every organism on Earth copies DNA the same way. Except one bacterial protein — quietly doing something scientists had never seen before.
A bachelor’s in rare earths? In China, there are schools for that
China's dominance of rare earth refining is built on its sprawling research and teaching ecosystem. The West is now investing heavily in hopes of breaking that monopoly.
Urgent alert: a mysterious asteroid forces surprise action from astronomers - Futura-Sciences
The Asteroid with (Almost) No Bite The talk of the space community lately is 2024 YR4, a near-Earth asteroid discovered late last December. As it turns out, its orbit crosses that of our home planet—yes, a classic ‘potentially hazardous asteroid.’ But before you start updating your end-of-the-world playlist, here’s the...
Giant Study Reveals The Secret to Heart Health Isn't Low-Carb or Low-Fat
There's another factor that may matter more.
Giant Study Reveals The Secret to Heart Health Isn't Low-Carb or Low-Fat
There's another factor that may matter more.
Salting the earth for US science
Sometimes it feels like scientists in the US are trapped in a burning building and no one is even trying to put out the fire. So few people even seem to recognize that the fire is there.
On Lou Gehrig Day in baseball and the politics of medical research in 2026 [column]
“For the past two weeks you have been reading about a bad break. Yet today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.”
Blue Moon 2026: An extremely rare micromoon rises tonight
A rare Blue Moon, the second full moon in May, will also be a "micromoon" near its farthest point from Earth.
Looking For Sports Gems in the Antiques Capital of the Country
Tony looks to unearth sports valuables in Lancaster County
Two NASA Scientists Receive USGS, NASA 2025 William T. Pecora Award
Award: The William T. Pecora Award recognizes outstanding scientific contributions toward a better understanding of Earth through satellite or aerial remote
Scientists used a method from ecology to identify whether icy moons could hold conditions for life
Future missions may be able to take only a small, damaged sample from space back to Earth. A simple analysis tool could help determine whether its contents suggest the presence of life.
Mirror life: Scientists clash over threat of lab-engineered bacteria
Bacteria created using mirror images of natural biomolecules would pose a grave threat to life on Earth, some researchers warn, but a new study suggests they would struggle to survive in the wild
🗞️ Araujo, Julián Álvarez, Gordon... Today’s front pages
Today’s newspaper front pages in Spain are dominated by a full-blown earthquake in the transfer market, with FC Barcelona at the epicenter, along with a strong human and mental health angle surround...
Scientists say evolution may work differently than we thought
A major research study is challenging one of evolution’s most influential ideas: that most genetic changes that become permanent are essentially neutral. Researchers at the University of Michigan found that beneficial mutations are actually far more common than scientists have long assumed. The puzzle is that these advantageous mutations rarely spread through entire populations. Their answer? Nature keeps changing the rules.
Antarctica’s ice sheet hit a climate tipping point 1 million years ago
A new study suggests Antarctica’s ice sheet hit a climate tipping point about one million years ago, making it far more reactive to temperature and CO2 changes. Researchers warn this surprising sensitivity could offer clues about how the continent may respond to today’s warming world.
Think it's hot now? The next five years will smash records, UN says
In the next five years, the Earth is overwhelmingly likely to surge again and again past the international climate threshold set as safe and shatter its hottest-year record along the way, according to new United Nations climate projections.
New Landsat Science Team Holds First In-Person Meeting
From May 5 to 7, the Landsat Science Team meeting convened at the Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center in Sioux Falls, SD. Co-moderated by Landsat 8, 9, and 10 Project Scientist Chris Neigh, the three-day event officially introduced the new 2026–2030 Science Team members.
Birds navigate using ‘gut feeling’, scientists find
The liver’s iron-rich immune cells act as an internal compass that helps pigeons detect Earth’s magnetic field
Homing pigeons may use a surprising navigation mechanism
How animals navigate by Earth's magnetic field is hotly debated. New research in pigeons points to iron-laden liver immune cells as the compass.
Pigeons use their livers to sense Earth’s magnetic field
Special immune cells may be one piece of their internal compass.
Escaping the Heat? The Politics and Problems of Orbital Data Centers
What happens when digital systems outgrow the Earth that sustains them? Computing has always consumed energy and water, but the growing ambitions of the AI industry are pushing demand to an unprecedented scale. As pressures mount, data centers in orbit around the Earth have been pitched as a solution. But space is no escape, and what is framed as a technical fix risks entrenching digital dependence in an increasingly militarized, fragile, and crisis-prone environment. Orbital data centers simply relocate critical infrastructure into an already contested domain where the boundaries between civilian and military systems blur, satellites become strategic targets, and systemic disruption becomes a tool of coercion.
Why the business of orbit is entering a new phase
Space is becoming a bigger part of everyday business, from communications and Earth observation to defense and predictive analytics. Voyager Technologies CEO Dylan Taylor and Muon Space President Gregory Smirin explain how cheaper launches, more satellite constellations and advances in AI are pushing the space economy into a new phase. Watch more from the CNBC CONVERGE LIVE conversation in Singapore to hear how the business of orbit is moving from exploration to infrastructure.
How do pigeons sense Earth's magnetic field? Scientists just solved the mystery.
New research suggests that pigeons use magnetic sensors in their livers.
Earth’s orbital wobble triggered rapid climate chaos during the dinosaur age
New research suggests Earth’s climate can swing wildly on surprisingly short timescales — even during hot, ice-free greenhouse periods. By studying ancient sediments from the Late Cretaceous, scientists uncovered repeating climate shifts tied to tiny changes in Earth’s orbital wobble. These cycles may have repeatedly pushed the planet between humid and arid states every few thousand years.
31 hours with the spit-shined Mina the Hollower (and 34 with the four games that came before it)
To truly appreciate Mina The Hollower, an extraordinary new throwback of a game, I sent myself to Yacht Club University. That’s not a real institution of higher learning, but it’s the best way I can explain much of the past several weeks as I prepared to play Mina by playing the four biggest game previously made by studio Yacht Club Games. I had expected Mina the Hollower, in development for six years for PC and consoles, to potentially be something special. A demo I tried in March had felt great. Mina the Hollower had an old-school premise: a singular move for its hero that felt so good to control and so rich with possibilities that, in the hands of skilled designers, it could be riffed on in various ways for the length of a full game. Mina’s core maneuver, her hollowing, made her sort of an upside down Super Mario. Nintendo’s hero jumps through the air, discovering power-ups at the apex of his jump by bonking overhead blocks, then defeating enemies by landing on them. Mina essentially jumps into the ground, digging (“hollowing”) into the earth to fetch buried treasure, then burrows for a short distance to emerge on the other side of a wall that hides treasure or an enemy that needs some battering. I wanted to understand how good Yacht Club was at making games. I wanted to see how far they’d come. If Mina was terrific—as I predicted it might be—I wanted to feel how they got there, one button press at a time. On May 6, 21 days before the writing of this review, I checked with Yacht Club Games co-founder and programmer David D’Angelo, to ask which of the studio’s games I should play to truly appreciate the new one’s design. “Hmmm all of them?” he wrote back. “Starting with Shovel Knight definitely is helpful,” he continued, referring to Yacht Club’s first game. He gave me a link to a spreadsheet of over 400 cheat codes that could help me out, if I found the game too tough.1 “Most folks say Specter of Torment is the least difficult and quickest to finish in terms of playtime, and [it] refines much of Shovel Knight,” he told me. “King of Cards is a big celebration of everything we did in [the Shovel Knight compilation] Treasure Trove— might work for you better if you’re a fan of shorter, Mario-style courses. And it’s probably the closest to Mina in terms of polish.” So that was that. Four games, none of which were required. Mina is a whole new game in a whole new world, best I can tell. I’d barely played that first Shovel Knight before and never the other three. I just thought it’d help. It did. It turns out that playing a game studios major works before their latest is very illuminating.
Could aliens ever visit Earth? An aerospace scientist unpacks the challenges of interstellar spaceflight.
The universe is vast and teeming with stars – but if intelligent life exists, it may not be able to visit Earth.
Ebola, chemical plants and health, hantavirus, common colds, heat and more
As they say, bugs have ears. Public health has had a relentless May. Chemical plant (near) explosions, Ebola, hantavirus, and that's before you even get to the usual suspects: common colds, heat, and ticks. Here’s an attempt to keep you up to speed and, more importantly, what it means for you and your community. But first, an announcement: World Cup The World Cup starts in 15 days (not like anyone is counting down), and we are hanging TVs in the Health Security Operations Center. It’s going to be a gorgeous, chaotic celebration of basically every culture on earth. And it’s going to take a team effort—from communities to individuals, from public health to health care—to keep people healthy. That’s where you come in. If you’re going to the games or live within 30 miles of a stadium, we would love to hear from you. Sign up for a weekly survey here. Thanks to the more than 1,280 people who have already signed up…you will be hearing from us soon!! Global disease “weather report” Hantavirus: Two more cases The global count of cruise ship passengers with hantavirus has now increased to 13 cases (11 confirmed), with three deaths. The two new cases are overseas and among people who were already quarantining: A crew member in the Netherlands. A Spanish national passenger who was quarantining at home tested positive through daily monitoring. They are now in a biocontainment unit. In the U.S., everyone remains negative. There may be more cases, given that the incubation period of hantavirus (the time from exposure to infection) is 45 days. But this week, we will reach a major milestone: the median incubation window is 18 days, and that will pass on May 29. What this means for you: Your risk from this cruise ship outbreak remains essentially nil at this point. Ebola rages on in Central Africa Big thanks to Dr. Craig Spencer, a humanitarian physician who has treated and survived Ebola, for jumping in to provide the YLE community with an update. Craig, take it from here… The combined confirmed and suspected Ebola cases in DRC are now more than 1,000. All signs are pointing to a very long and catastrophic outbreak in Central Africa: This is a vast undercount. We know this because the test positivity rate is hovering around 50%, only 20% of contacts are being traced (and in some areas, no contacts at all), and more cases keep popping up with no known connection. This all points to widespread and undetected community transmission. This is in only a week of detection. Compared to previous outbreaks, the growth is very fast, as the huge West Africa outbreak in 2016 was first detected at 49 cases and rose to 208 cases a month later. It took four months for that outbreak to reach the size of the current one in the DR Congo. The cases are spread out across 16 health zones. There are now multiple epicenters, making containment very difficult. Next door in Uganda, the case count is seven. While this number is low compared to DRC, a concerning development is that two health care workers recently tested positive with uncertain exposure histories. If they weren’t treating known Ebola cases, this means it’s spreading undetected in Uganda as well. On the ground, backlash, including the burning of health centers, has emerged, a pattern seen in nearly every outbreak and rooted in deep community distrust. It often stems from outside actors working in communities without fully understanding or addressing local priorities. Affected populations may recognize the severity of Ebola while still holding other concerns as more pressing, such as where their loved ones are buried. Community trust is essential to an effective response, but difficult to build during an active emergency. It is best established long before a crisis begins. U.S. priorities are made clear, and may backfire. The U.S. Administration has shown that its first priority is keeping Ebola out, with helping end the outbreak in the DRC a secondary concern. That's meant travel restrictions broader than anything we've imposed before — covering travelers from across the region, and reportedly some green card holders and permanent residents as well. For example, just these past two days, news broke that high-risk American travelers will be subject to a mandatory quarantine in Kenya before they are allowed to return. If an American is infected, the U.S. government plans to send them to a hospital it is standing up from scratch in Kenya. (Currently, Americans who were in the area are allowed to return but are diverted to three airports—Houston, Atlanta, and DC—for further screening.) Past administrations have used travel notices and stepped-up screening; this goes much further. At first blush, these strict precautions may sound prudent. But this approach could backfire in three ways: Restrictions this blunt give people every reason to hide where they’ve been and whom they’ve been near — making the people we most need to find harder to track, not easier. They also breed a false sense that this is someone else’s problem. But diseases are humbling. They find the small cracks in even the most impenetrable-seeming defenses. Lives lost. There is no treatment for this Ebola strain, which means survival depends heavily on the quality of the health system. We have that system in the States, but we are choosing not to use it for infected Americans. This is unbelievable and infuriating. (See a deeper dive from me here.) The only real way to lower the risk to Americans — and everyone else — is to end the outbreak in the DRC and across the region. What this means for you: If you have travel plans to this region, it’s time to cancel them. This is a high-risk situation in Central Africa, and CDC released a Level 4 Travel Advisory. There is also great uncertainty if and when the Administration will let you back in. To the general public in the U.S., your risk remains very, very low right now. U.S. disease “weather report” Ticks: past peak season? Good news, especially for people in the Northeast and Midwest: tick numbers continue to decline. Though we are at the peak of the season, this unusually early year is trending favorably. Heat-related illnesses in the North Heat risk is certainly not blanketing the entire country yet, but this week it will be moderate in the Midwest and the Southeast. What this means for you: Be sure to check the CDC HeatRisk tool. A red day isn’t the best day for that soccer game for a kid with asthma, and a stretch of orange days is a great time to check on your elderly neighbor. Common colds surging As far as respiratory viruses go, the only thing really going around right now is the common cold. It is higher this year than last year, but should peak very soon before returning this fall. Spotlight: Chemical plants Over the weekend, YLE California covered the serious situation that unfolded around a chemical plant in Orange County, California. Thankfully, the worst-case scenario (a chemical explosion) was mitigated, but only through luck. The health implications in a densely populated area could have been catastrophic. As the situation was winding down, another chemical explosion struck Washington State. This one was fatal. Health officials say the risk to surrounding residents from chemicals in the air and ground remains low, though the community deserves far greater clarity. Clean air and clean water consistently rank as Americans’ top public health concerns — yet when chemical disasters strike, communities are too often met with reassurances rather than transparency and accountability. Residents near the 2023 East Palestine, Ohio train derailment, for example, are still waiting to understand the long-term impact on their health, with few clear answers. What this means for you: Many are wondering if facilities processing potentially dangerous materials are in their neighborhoods. This interactive map allows you to enter your ZIP code and see all facilities monitored by the EPA, including any violations. Good news Ebola vaccines and treatment for the Bundibugyo species are in development. Two vaccine platforms are being explored, at least one of which may be deployable in as little as 2 months. One vaccine is being developed by Oxford, and the other uses the same biotechnology as the FDA-approved Zaire species of Ebola. (It may provide cross-protection, but it’s unclear at this point.) On the treatment side, two promising monoclonal antibody cocktails are likely to be deployed, though doses are limited and logistical hurdles remain significant challenges. Anni over at The Biotech Tea had a great explainer about the Ebola vaccine gap, if you want to read more. [ The Biotech Tea The Ebola vaccine gap, reading vessel damage, & the Makary exit 🗝️ Paid subscribers get the Biotech Term of the Week at $30/year (~$2.50/month). I try to keep it intentionally accessible, but if cost is ever a barrier, send me a message. A few people asked about expensing your subscription, so I put together a short email template… Read more 6 days ago · 10 likes · Annicka Evans, PhD ](https://www.thebiotechtea.com/p/the-ebola-vaccine-gap-reading-vessel?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web) Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) has been officially renamed polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome (PMOS), following more than a decade of debate and input from roughly 22,000 clinicians, researchers, and patients worldwide. This is good because the old name was medically misleading, leading to patients without visible cysts being dismissed or overlooked entirely. The WHO estimates that 70% of people with the condition remain undiagnosed. A more accurate name should improve recognition, reduce stigma, and ultimately help the millions of people living with this condition get diagnosed and treated sooner. Poll Loading... Bottom line Public health situations are everywhere right now. Staying healthy takes public health professionals and systems working tirelessly behind the scenes and each of us showing up for our neighbors and communities. Love, YLE Big thanks to Ed Nirenberg for staying on top of the Ebola vaccines, Hannah Totte for all the figures, Dr. Craig Spencer for the Ebola insight, and Dr. Matt Willis for covering the chemical situation in CA. Your Local Epidemiologist (YLE) comprises a team of experts, ranging from physicians to immunologists to epidemiologists to nutritionists, working together with one goal: to “Translate” ever-evolving public health science so that people are well-equipped to make evidence-based decisions. YLE suite of newsletters reaches over 475,000 people across more than 132 countries. This newsletter is free to everyone, thanks to the generous support of fellow YLE community members. To support the effort, subscribe or upgrade below: Subscribe
Scientists have scrapped the worst-case climate scenario – because action is making a difference
Removing the worst-case climate future for Earth isn’t failed science, as climate sceptic Donald Trump claims. It’s a sign climate action has made a difference.
What could alien life look like? These Earthlings offer clues.
Scientists are listening in on sperm whale conversations and studying Earth's strangest microbes to prepare humanity for first contact with extraterrestrial life.
Humanity has already exceeded Earth’s limits, study warns
Humanity may already be living far beyond what Earth can sustainably support, according to a sweeping new study analyzing more than 200 years of population and environmental data. Researchers found that while population growth once fueled innovation and expansion, the trend shifted decades ago as the planet’s resources became increasingly strained.
Scientists discover ancient single-celled ancestors still live on in your blood
Scientists uncovered evidence that human blood cells may trace their origins back to single-celled ancestors that lived 700 million years ago. By rebuilding the evolutionary family tree of blood cells, the team revealed how today’s immune system grew from some of Earth’s earliest life forms.
Meet the 2026–2027 Dhablania and Kim Family Global Medicine and Health Fellows
Seven students and trainees have been awarded 2026–2027 Dhablania and Kim Family Global Medicine and Health Fellowships through the Department of Population and Public Health Sciences at the Keck School of Medicine of USC. Thanks to generous support from the Dhablania and Kim Family, this year’s cohort will pursue research and clinical projects in India, Cambodia, South Korea, Peru and Uganda, engaging in cross-cultural learning while gaining firsthand experience with global health issues.
Correction to B.3 Living With a Star Science
B.3 Living With a Star Science (LWS) emphasizes the science necessary to understand those aspects of the coupled Sun-Earth system that affect life and
Scientists Discovered Remains of the Earliest Animals on Earth. They May Have Made a Big Mistake.
They looked like traces left behind by tiny creatures, but were most likely microbes.
Scientists Discovered Remains of the Earliest Animals on Earth. They May Have Made a Big Mistake.
They looked like traces left behind by tiny creatures, but were most likely microbes.
Scientists create global treasure map pointing to hidden rare earth deposits
Scientists have created a global “treasure map” for rare earth elements by uncovering where the strange volcanic rocks that contain them are most likely to form. By combining thousands of rock samples with seismic images of Earth’s deep interior, the team discovered that these metal-rich rocks tend to appear along the ancient, thick roots of continents. These unusual rocks, once seen as geological oddities, are now incredibly important because they hold many of the materials used in smartphones, electric vehicles, and wind turbines.
A Full Moon Checkup
Once a month during the full Moon, Landsat 9 turns from Earth to image the lunar surface, helping keep the spacecraft's data accurate and consistent.
Store Update 1.30.0
ARC Raiders is a multiplayer extraction adventure, set in a lethal future earth, ravaged by a mysterious mechanized threat known as ARC.
Advancing high-threat pathogen preparedness in WHO South-East Asia Region: 2025 in review
Effective preparedness for high-threat pathogens demands more than technical tools — it requires a coherent strategy, sustained country engagement, and the institutional infrastructure to translate evidence into action. In 2025, the Pandemic and Epidemic Management (PEM) Unit advanced all three, working across the full spectrum of high threat pathogen (HTP) preparedness: from methodology development and evidence generation to country-level technical support, emergency response, and regional workforce strengthening.At the core of the PEM unit's work is building the regional evidence and policy architecture needed to prioritize and respond to HTPs systematically. A major milestone was the development of the HTP Prioritization Methodology — a structured, multi-criteria approach to ranking pathogens by epidemic potential, severity, and national context — and its national pilot in Bangladesh, where SARS-CoV-2, Nipah, dengue, and cholera emerged as the highest-priority threats, informing the PEM unit's contribution to 2026–27 biennium prioritization and workplan development (Access link here).Underpinning this work, the PEM unit advanced the peer-reviewed evidence base for HTP preparedness in the South-East Asia Region (SEAR), with three publications in international journals in 2025: Development of a zoonotic influenza distribution assessment and ranking system (ZIDAR): Technical application in Nepal to support cross-sectoral risk-based surveillance in One Health; Implications for influenza A virus surveillance in Southeast Asian Region countries: a scoping review of approaches for the surveillance of swine influenza viruses at human-swine interfaces in BMJ Public Health; and Operationalizing multisector partnerships: a Theory of Action and Reflection tool for zoonotic influenzas in Health Policy and Planning. Together, these contributions move the Region’s HTP preparedness agenda from practice to science — generating the transferable methodological foundations that will inform evidence-based capacity strengthening in Member States.Country-level engagement in 2025 reflected the breadth of contexts in which HTP preparedness must function. Technical support was provided for Mpox and cholera events across the Region, including coordination of cholera and acute watery diarrhea prevention and control in Myanmar in the wake of the March 2025 earthquake. In Myanmar, the PEM unit contributed technical leadership to the earthquake emergency response — one of the most complex humanitarian emergencies in the SEAR — as Health Operations and Technical Support lead within the Incident Management Support Team. This included strengthening emergency response planning, supporting operational and after-action reviews, and providing monitoring and evaluation support for both acute and protracted crisis response. The breadth of HTP support provided to emergency operations across the SEAR was documented in the PEM unit’s contribution to the regional report for the Health Security Interface Technical Advisory Group.In Sri Lanka, technical collaboration with the WHO Country Office and the Ministry of Health laid the groundwork for the National Steering Committee's 2026 annual meeting, development of Standard Operating Procedures for specialized emergency response, and a national training programme — all structured around evidence-based risk assessment for specialized hazards including HTPs.Across the SEAR, the unit contributed to strengthening the workforce architecture that underpins HTP response. Technical inputs shaped the WHO South-East Asia Regional Health Emergency Workforce Strategy 2025–2030, and the PEM unit supported conceptual development of the health emergency workforce framework for the Pandemic Fund Round 3 proposal.Alongside this, the unit's sustained engagement on the meningitis agenda culminated in the launch of the Regional Implementation Framework to Defeat Meningitis in South-East Asia by 2030 at the Seventy-eighth Session of the Regional Committee, ensuring the Region's priorities were reflected in the Global Technical Task Force and expanding the unit's HTP engagement beyond outbreak-prone zoonotic pathogens (Regional Implementation Framework to Defeat Meningitis in South-East Asia by 2030).Taken together, 2025 demonstrated that meaningful HTP preparedness is built incrementally — through methodology, engagement, and the steady accumulation of institutional capacity across Member States.Bangladesh piloted the HTP Prioritization Methodology and identified the highest-priority pathogens in the country context (Photo credit: WHO Country Office, Bangladesh).
Earth’s outer core reversed direction in 2010 and scientists may finally know why
Deep beneath the Pacific near the equator, Earth’s outer core now flows east instead of west. Dynamics deeper within our planet’s core may help explain the change and what to expect in the near future.
🚨 BREAKING | Allegri at Milan, sacking close! 😱
The earthquake at Milan now seems close to shaking the Rossoneri bench as well. After last night’s heavy debacle against Cagliari, according to Matteo Moretto, Massimiliano Allegri’s future is ha...
This prehistoric fish may explain how animals first walked on Earth
Scientists have peered inside the skull of a 380-million-year-old Antarctic fish that was closely related to the first animals to walk on land, revealing surprising clues about how life began its move out of the water. Using advanced neutron imaging, researchers discovered that Koharalepis jarviki had features suited for living near the water’s surface, including openings in its skull that may have helped it gulp air and a light-sensitive organ linked to day-night rhythms.
Scientists trace 'super El Niño' to Earth's deadliest die-off as new event threatens record heat
"The Great Dying" nearly wiped out life on Earth about 252 million years ago.
Something ‘unprecedented’ is now happening to Earth’s rotation, scientists say | BBC Science Focus Magazine
Climate change is slowing Earth’s spin – and there’s nothing quite like it in 3.6 million years
Scientists Warn The Sun Could Be About To Produce A ‘Superflare’
Scientists studying 50 years of solar data warn Earth may be entering a heightened risk period for rare “superflares” capable of disrupting technology worldwide.
Scientists may have found the source of the most powerful neutrino ever detected
A mysterious particle from deep space has scientists buzzing after the most energetic neutrino ever detected slammed through the Mediterranean Sea. Now, researchers think they may have identified the cosmic “culprits” behind it: blazars — supermassive black holes blasting jets of matter straight toward Earth.
Mysterious Earthquakes Strike Like Clockwork – We May Finally Know Why
The secrets of predictable faults.
Heartland Food Products Group to Acquire Whole Earth Brands' Americas Business
/PRNewswire/ -- Heartland Food Products Group, owner and manufacturer of the Splenda® Brand, SlimFast®, and Java House®, today announced it has entered into a...
Learning to teach, learning to discover
Nik Sandu, an MIT materials science and engineering major and student teacher, combines research in earth sciences and magnetic materials with classroom teaching and community involvement as she prepares for a PhD.
James Webb discovers a rare giant planet with surprisingly Earth-like temperatures
Astronomers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope have uncovered a rare world unlike anything in our solar system — a giant planet about the size of Saturn with surprisingly Earth-like temperatures and an atmosphere packed with methane. The planet, TOI-199b, sits more than 330 light-years away and is one of the first known “temperate” gas giants ever studied in detail.