Scientists are researching how the rodent can become less susceptible to its feline foe.

Smithsonian Secretary Wayne Clough offers personal insights on the realities of climate change and the best ways for society to adapt

So what exactly factors into how we end up being right or left-handed? In this one-minute video, Ask Smithsonian host Eric Schulze breaks down the science of being a southpaw.

The 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP28, begins this week in Dubai. A new topic on the agenda this year is how wildfires are emerging as a serious health risk not just to those in their immediate vicinity, but even to people thousands of miles away. Last summer, smoke from Canadian wildfires drifted not only as far south as the mid-Atlantic region of the United States, but even across the Atlantic Ocean. We speak with John Vaillant, whose book Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World recounts a 2016 wildfire in Fort McMurray, Canada that dislocated tens of thousands of people and caused billions of dollars in damage. That natural disaster seemed like a terrifying outlier when Vaillant began his reporting, but 2023’s unprecedented fire activity suggest that Fort McMurray was merely the shape of things to come. John explains how climate change is making wildfires hotter and harder to contain. Next, we’re joined by photojournalist Andria Hautamaki, who observed a “prescribed burn” in Plumas County, California. Andria shares how these kinds of carefully planned, intentionally set fires can be a useful tool for preventing more destructive blazes. Read an excerpt from John’s book Fire Weather: A True Story From a Hotter World here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-worlds-first-wildfire-tornado-blazed-a-path-of-destruction-through-australia-180982309/) , and learn more about John and his other books here (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/58679/john-vaillant/) . Andria’s reporting for her wildfires story (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/fighting-fire-with-fire-california-180981810/) y from the April/May 2023 issue of Smithsonian was supported by the Institute for Journalism and Natural Resources (https://www.ijnr.org/) . You can learn more about Andria and her work at her website (https://ahowdyphoto.com/About/1) . Andria recommends these resources for anyone seeking more information about prescribed burns: • Your state’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/conservation-basics/conservation-by-state) • The Coalition of Prescribed Fire Councils (https://www.prescribedfire.net/) • The Great Plains Fire Science Exchange (https://gpfirescience.org/) , which can help you find Prescribed Burn Associations in your area • The National Fire Protection Association, aka Firewise USA (https://www.nfpa.org/) • The Cooperative Extension of any universities in your region Find prior episodes of our show here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/podcast/) . There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions. From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly. From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Adriana Rosas Rivera, Genevieve Sponsler, Terence Bernardo, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales. Fact-checking by Stephanie Abramson. Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz. Music by APM Music.

Saber toothed cats, temperature and things that go bump in the night, Eric Schulze explains

Our giant of a host, Eric Schulze, explains why size mattered in prehistory.

A museum in Portland, Oregon highlights the multi-layered path of 3D imagery, from stereoscopes of the American West to blockbuster movies

Humans don't just impact the interconnected web of life—we depend on it.

What is it about junk food that makes it so hard to resist? Find out how this empty-calorie food is designed to keep us wanting more in this one-minute video with Ask Smithsonian host, Eric Schulze.

Use #physnobel on Twitter to submit your questions. The 2014 Nobel Prize in Physics will be announced on Tuesday, October 7. Join guests Charles Day of Physics Today, Andrew Grant of Science News, Jennifer Ouellette of Cocktail Party Physics and Amanda Yoho of Starts With A Bang! as they discuss predictions for possible winners. Who are the best contenders, and who are the potential "dark horse" candidates? Which major physics finds of this year might stand a shot at a win in the future? Victoria Jaggard and Helen Thompson of Smithsonian.com will be your hosts for the event. Tune in on October 2, and submit your questions on Twitter. Charles Day is the Online Editor for Physics Today magazine. Follow him on Twitter @CSRDay Andrew Grant is the physics reporter for Science News magazine. Follow him on Twitter @sci_grant Jennifer Ouellette is a science writer and blogger at Cocktail Party Physics. Follow her on Twitter @JenLucPiquant Amanda Yoho is a graduate student in theoretical and computational cosmology at Case Western Reserve University and a blogger at Starts With A Bang! Follow her on Twitter @mandaYoho Victoria Jaggard is the science editor for Smithsonian.com. Follow her on Twitter @vmjaggard99 Helen Thompson is a science reporter for Smithsonian.com. Follow her on Twitter @wwrfd

The act of dive bombing during World War II was a death defying trial of skill and nerve. You aimed your plane down, four miles above the ocean and plummeted at speeds of up to 275 miles per hour

Erosion, evaporation, and a leaky faucet, our host Eric Schulze breaks it all down.

Experts may not agree on all the specifics, but here's what we do know.

The science behind going belly up

Eclipses have been a subject of fascination throughout human history, and the fact that we now have a clearer understanding of what they actually are—at least in the celestial mechanics sense—than we did in centuries past has not made them any less exciting. With the North American total solar eclipse (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/prepare-for-2024s-solar-eclipse-now-with-these-four-key-steps-180981933/) just days away as we’re releasing this episode, and the next one visible from the contiguous United States not due until 2044, we’ll learn about the eclipses from astronomy obsessive (and Smithsonian science correspondent) Dan Falk and hear from Indigenous astronomer Samantha Doxtator about how the Haudenosaunee people have observed and interpreted these mysterious daylight darkenings of the skies over many centuries. You can read Dan’s Smithsonian story about how ancient civilizations responded to eclipses here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/how-ancient-civilizations-reacted-to-eclipses-180983894/) . Find prior episodes of our show here (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/podcast/) . There’s More to That is a production of Smithsonian magazine and PRX Productions. From the magazine, our team is Chris Klimek, Debra Rosenberg and Brian Wolly. From PRX, our team is Jessica Miller, Adriana Rosas Rivera, Genevieve Sponsler, Rye Dorsey, and Edwin Ochoa. The Executive Producer of PRX Productions is Jocelyn Gonzales. Fact-checking by Stephanie Abramson. Episode artwork by Emily Lankiewicz. Music by APM Music.

Sometimes, in fact, nature is stranger than fiction

It’s a tradition that dates back more than 100 years, but have you ever wondered why? Learn more about why we cast our votes on a seemingly random weekday - and its roots in past customs. --- For more videos from Smithsonian Magazine: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/videos/ Digital Editorial Director: Brian Wolly Supervising Producer & Scriptwriter: Michelle Mehrtens Producer: Nicki Marko Video Editor: Sierra Theobald

Read more at http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/aroundthemall/2008/12/music-of-the-tropics-balinese-drum-troupe-performs-at-the-sackler/ Bells and gongs are the sounds behind Gamelan music, which has different variants from one Indonesian island to the next.

Have you ever wondered why these birds strike this peculiar pose? Find out in this one-minute video, where Ask Smithsonian host Eric Schulze walks us through the reasons behind the majestic bird’s one-legged stance.

Geese have known something for millions of years that humans have only recently figured out for themselves.

Feel a sneeze coming on? Don’t hold it in! In this one-minute video, our Ask Smithsonian host, Eric Schulze, explains why we sneeze.

Reclining and dining in the ancient classical world

Autodesk vice president Brian Mathews talks with the NASA science communicator about the search for life on other planets and why it’s important

Used more for grasping than locomotion, seahorse tails are both flexible and uniquely strong. (Video courtesy Dominique Adriaens, UGent)

Read more at http://www.smithsonianmag.com/specialsections/womens-history/The-Writers-Eye.html Scholars and friends of Eudora Welty discuss how her hobby influenced her later works.

After his start capturing the horrors of the Civil War for Mathew Brady's studio, 19th century photographer Timothy O'Sullivan uncovered the beauty of the great expanses of the American west

Host Eric Schulze opens the floodgates of knowledge to reveal the answer.

The answer has everything to do with falling flat on your face

Eric Schulze delves into little Rover's mind to see what all that racket is about

Female worker bees, which forage for the whole colony, struggle more to detect scents in the heat than males do, per the recent research

On this day in 1690, "Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick" attracted colonial officials' ire by repeating a scandalous rumor and condemning a British alliance with the Mohawk

Earth's highest peak has gained as much as an extra 165 feet in elevation as the planet's crust adjusts due to erosion from a river, according to a new study

Arthur “Jack” Schubarth cloned illegally imported genetic material from the Marco Polo argali to create hybrid sheep that would draw higher prices from hunting preserves

John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton shared the award for their work on artificial neural networks and machine learning

A new exhibition at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History combines satellite observations and historical data to offer a "larger-than-life look" at our planet's climate today

Across the country, revelers are dressing in costumes and gliding across bodies of water on stand-up paddleboards to ring in the spooky season

Authorities have not yet identified the cause of death for the 12.5-foot-long shark, which was named Koala

A new exhibition in New York celebrates Berthe Weill, an often overlooked but visionary figure who jumpstarted the careers of many of modern art's giants

Colossal Biosciences reports it extracted DNA and RNA from the Tasmanian tiger specimen, a key step forward in its effort to create a modern proxy of the extinct species. Other scientists are calling for data to back up the claim

Unlike other birds, which get pigments from their diets, parrots produce their own—but scientists never fully understood the underlying mechanisms, until now

You asked, we answered

A new book charts the history of pet cemeteries and honors the universal experience of grieving an animal companion

Sleep studies in Drosophila melanogaster rely mostly on behavioral read-outs to support molecular or circuit-level investigations in this model. Electrophysiology can provide an additional level of understanding in these studies to, for example, investigate changes in brain activity associated with sleep manipulations. In this protocol, we describe a procedure for performing multichannel local field potential (LFP) recordings in the fruit fly, with a flexible system that can be adapted to different experimental paradigms and situations. The approach uses electrodes containing multiple recording sites (16), allowing the acquisition of large amounts of neuronal activity data from a transect through the brain while flies are still able to sleep. The approach starts by tethering the fly, followed by positioning it on an air-supported ball. A multichannel silicon probe is then inserted laterally into the fly brain via one eye, allowing for recording of electrical signals from the retina through to the central brain. These recordings can be acquired under spontaneous conditions or in the presence of visual stimuli, and the minimal surgery promotes long-term recordings (e.g., overnight). Sleep and wake can be tracked using infrared cameras, which allow for the measurement of locomotive activity as well as microbehaviors such as proboscis extensions during sleep. The protocol has been optimized to promote subject survivability, which is an important factor when performing long-term (~16-h) recordings. The approach described here uses specific recording probes, data acquisition devices, and analysis tools. Although it is expected that some of these items might need to be adapted to the equipment available in different laboratories, the overall aim is to provide an overview on how to record electrical activity across the brain of behaving (and sleeping) flies using this kind of approach and technology.

The insect eggshell is a multifunctional structure with several important roles, including generating an entry point for sperm via the micropyle before oviposition, serving as an oviposition substrate attachment surface, and functioning as a protective layer during embryo development. Eggshell proteins play major roles in eggshell tanning and hardening following oviposition and provide molecular cues that define dorsal–ventral axis formation. Precise eggshell formation during ovarian follicle maturation is critical for normal embryo development and the synthesis of a defective eggshell often gives rise to inviable embryos. Therefore, simple and accurate methods for identifying eggshell proteins will facilitate our understanding of the molecular pathways regulating eggshell formation and the mechanisms underlying normal embryo development. This protocol describes how to isolate and enrich eggshells from mature oocytes of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes and how to extract their eggshell proteins for liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) proteomic analysis. Although this methodology was developed for studying mosquito eggshells, it may be applicable to eggs from a variety of insects. Mosquitoes are ideal model organisms for this study as their ovarian follicle development and eggshell formation are meticulously regulated by blood feeding and their follicles develop synchronously throughout oogenesis in a time-dependent manner.

Fifty years ago, on October 5, 1974, David Kunst completed the first verified circumnavigation of the globe on foot. Along the way, he met Princess Grace of Monaco, raised money for UNICEF and lost a brother to bandits

Hospice Northwest Services is inviting people to visit its third annual photography exhibit, "A Personal Lens on Grief." Here's what the project in Thunder Bay, Ont., entails, and why staff say it's important to find creative ways to express loss.

A man from Queens County has been sentenced to five years and nine months in federal prison for charges including making and transmitting child pornography, voyeurism and intercepting private communications.

Sleep is likely a whole-brain phenomenon, with most of the brain probably benefiting from this state of decreased arousal. Recent advances in our understanding of some potential sleep functions, such as metabolite clearance and synaptic homeostasis, make it evident why the whole brain is likely impacted by sleep: All neurons have synapses, and all neurons produce waste metabolites. Sleep experiments in the fly Drosophila melanogaster suggest that diverse sleep functions appear to be conserved across all animals. Studies of brain activity during sleep in humans typically involve multidimensional data sets, such as those acquired by electroencephalograms (EEGs) or functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), and these whole-brain read-outs often reveal important qualities of different sleep stages, such as changes in frequency dynamics or connectivity. Recently, various techniques have been developed that allow for the recording of neural activity simultaneously across multiple regions of the fly brain. These whole-brain-recording approaches will be important for better understanding sleep physiology and function, as they provide a more comprehensive view of neural dynamics during sleep and wake in a relevant model system. Here, we present a brief summary of some of the findings derived from sleep activity recording studies in sleeping Drosophila flies and discuss the value of electrophysiological versus calcium imaging techniques. Although these involve very different preparations, they both highlight the value of multidimensional data for studying sleep in this model system, like the use of both EEG and fMRI in humans.