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By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — A new study that examines how kissing evolved suggests that ape ancestors and early humans like Neanderthals probably locked lips with their friends and sexual partners. The behavior may date back 21 million years. Humanity’s earliest kisses were recorded 4,500 years ago in Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt, but Matilda

By Taylor Nicioli, CNN (CNN) — Upon the open grasslands of what is now Kazakhstan, there once stood a Bronze Age settlement that may have served as a center of exchange and power around 1600 BC. The settlement — called Semiyarka and nicknamed “The City of Seven Ravines” for its location overlooking a network of

By Mindy Weisberger, CNN (CNN) — Scientists say they have for the first time unlocked how a parasitic ant uses chemical warfare to take over the nest of a different species, by tricking workers into an unlikely assassination. The deadly scheme unfolds like a Shakespearean drama. In an ant colony, the queen is dying, under

By Gina Park, CNN (CNN) — Sky-gazers worldwide may get the chance to see a celestial display this week as the annual Leonid meteor shower reaches its peak. The Leonids are set to peak at 1 p.m. ET Monday, according to EarthSky. You may start glimpsing meteors at 11 p.m. Sunday local time, which is

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — For the first time, astronomers say they have spotted a giant explosion released by a star beyond our solar system. The eruption was similar in some ways to those unleashed by our sun, such as the solar storms that graced the night skies with auroras last week on Earth,

By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — Scientists have recovered ancient molecules of RNA from a juvenile mammoth named Yuka, who died 40,000 years ago in what is now Siberia. These biological remnants are providing insight into the last moments of the extinct ice age creature’s life. The RNA was extracted from mummified leg tissue that

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — Iceland’s relatively mild climate is shaped by a crucial network of currents that winds its away around the Atlantic Ocean transporting heat northward — without it, the island would be much icier and stormier. As evidence mounts these currents could be on course for collapse, Iceland’s government has made

By Amarachi Orie, CNN (CNN) — A scientist in Japan has developed a technique that uses brain scans and artificial intelligence to turn a person’s mental images into accurate, descriptive sentences. While there has been progress in using scans of brain activity to translate the words we think into text, turning our complex mental images

By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — Researchers have analyzed a sample of DNA believed to belong to Adolf Hitler, which they say reveals the dictator of Nazi Germany had a genetic marker for a rare disorder that can delay puberty, according to a new documentary. The research, which took more than four years to complete,

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — Blue Origin, the rocket company founded by Amazon multibillionaire Jeff Bezos, launched its towering New Glenn rocket on a mission that marked its first major test. Carrying a pair of satellites that are destined to take a long, winding trip to Mars, New Glenn took flight from Cape Canaveral

By Mindy Weisberger, CNN (CNN) — Scientists have newly described three extraordinary species of tree toad that leapfrog over the egg-to-tadpole stage. The females give birth on land to dozens of toadlets, each measuring just a few millimeters long. Live birth, or skipping the egg-laying and larva stage, is extremely rare in amphibians. Among nearly

By Jacopo Prisco, CNN (CNN) — Asteroids contain large quantities of both precious and common metals, and despite the obvious challenges in reaching them, a few startups say these celestial bodies could offer a sustainable alternative to Earth-based mineral extraction, which is plagued by issues like diminishing supply and environmental damage. The race is on

By Chris Lau, CNN (CNN) — Scientists say they have unearthed Australia’s oldest known crocodile eggshells, a discovery that could shed light on ancient reptiles that may have hunted prey by dropping on them from trees. The eggshells belonged to mekosuchine crocodiles, a prehistoric creature that dominated Australian waters 55 million years ago — a

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — For two nights, dazzling auroras delighted sky-gazers in unexpected places, including in the US as far south as Florida. The cause: dual solar storms unleashed by the sun reaching Earth. A severe storm was initially predicted for Thursday as well, with the potential for the northern tier of the

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — California Gov. Gavin Newsom pulled no punches at the COP30 climate talks in Brazil on Tuesday, calling President Donald Trump an “invasive species” and a “wrecking ball” during discussions about the US absence from global climate action. Newsom, a Democrat widely viewed as a likely presidential candidate in 2028,

By Jack Guy, CNN (CNN) — Bumblebees can process the duration of flashes of light and use the information to decide where to look for food, a new study has found. This is the first evidence of such an ability in insects, according to doctoral student Alex Davidson and his supervisor Elisabetta Versace, a senior

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — The planet’s biggest climate conference, COP30, has kicked off with representatives from more than 190 countries descending on the Brazilian city of Belém. They will spend two weeks deep in negotiations — likely contentious — on how to rein in dangerous global warming. COP30 is supposed to be the

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — A 62-page document written by President Donald Trump’s on-again-off-again pick to run NASA, billionaire Jared Isaacman, outlines a sweeping, ambitious, and at times controversial plan for the space agency. Isaacman, who was tapped to be NASA administrator after Trump was elected in 2024, only to see his nomination retracted

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — Off Brazil’s northeastern coast, where the sediment-heavy water of the vast Amazon River tips out into the Atlantic, are two very different types of treasure. The first is an ecological gem: a 3,600 square-mile deepwater coral reef discovered less than a decade ago. The second treasure puts the first

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — New Glenn, the towering orbital rocket that Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin designed to compete with SpaceX’s dominant Falcon rockets, is back for its second launch ever — this time with a job to send twin spacecraft on a long, winding trip to Mars. The 322-foot (98-meter) rocket was set

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — Twin spacecraft are set to take off on an unprecedented, winding journey to Mars, where they will investigate why the barren red planet began to lose its atmosphere billions of years ago. Called EscaPADE, the mission will aim for an orbital trajectory that has never been attempted before, according

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — Astronomers have spotted the largest and most distant flare ever observed from a supermassive black hole. Nicknamed “Superman,” the flare originated 10 billion light-years from Earth, and at its peak, the light emitted shone with the brightness of 10 trillion suns. The source of the flare is an active

By Taylor Nicioli, CNN (CNN) — How often do you think about the Roman Empire? For a team of international researchers who went all in and mapped the ancient Roman road system, the answer — truly — is every day. And now, anyone can dive into the newly created visualization tool, which includes 100,000 kilometers

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — Lakes in the Amazon became hotter than the maximum temperature recommended for hot tubs as unprecedented heat and drought in 2023 turned them into “shallow, simmering basins,” according to a new study — and it proved a death sentence for endangered dolphins. The world’s lakes are considered sentinels of

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — Ricardo Teixeira has spent the past few weeks freshening up Love Lomas, the “love motel” he owns in the Brazilian port city of Belém. He’s also mulling how to tone down some of the rooms’ more sensual aspects, including erotic chairs and menus of sex toys for sale. It’s

By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — Spotted from an airplane by remote sensing equipment, a vast and ancient Maya complex was hidden from view for millennia by forest and fields before it was made public in 2020. Five years on, archaeologists are spilling more of the monumental structure’s secrets. The artificial plateau made from earth,

By Gina Park, CNN (CNN) — Get ready for a double celestial event this week. November’s full beaver supermoon will peak at 8:19 a.m. ET Wednesday, according to The Old Farmer’s Almanac. But the silvery orb will be below the horizon at that time, so take the time to look outside during the evening hours

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — Paleontologists have long wrestled with how to differentiate between male and female dinosaurs based on their fossils. But new research may bring scientists closer to identifying the sex of one group of dinosaur. Hadrosaurs, also known as duck-billed dinosaurs, were common during the Late Cretaceous Period (100.5 to 66

By Ella Nilsen, Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — Alarm is growing among federal workers at NASA’s iconic Goddard Space Flight Center’s main campus in Greenbelt, Maryland — the nerve center for groundbreaking missions like the Hubble and James Webb space telescopes — as more than a dozen buildings on the campus are being emptied and

By Jack Guy, CNN (CNN) — Scientists working in Mexico have recorded multiple incidents in which a group of orcas hunt young great white sharks and eat their energy-rich livers. While orca pods in South Africa, Australia and California have been recorded engaging in similar behavior, this is the first time that it has been

By Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — The Trump administration does not intend to send a high-level delegation to the COP30 climate summit — or possibly any delegation at all. But that doesn’t mean the country’s influence won’t be felt at the talks. As nations prepare to gather in Belém, Brazil, for the negotiations, which begin

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — An Antarctic glacier shrunk by nearly 50% in just two months, the fastest retreat recorded in modern history, according to a new study — and the way it retreated could have big implications for global sea level rise. The Hektoria Glacier, roughly the size of Philadelphia, is on the

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — A suggestion made last week by acting NASA administrator Sean Duffy that SpaceX could be booted from the agency’s upcoming moon-landing plans has rocked the space industry. Now, behind the scenes, pitches for alternate paths to the lunar surface are quietly starting to take shape. SpaceX currently has a

By Jack Guy, CNN (CNN) — Scientists say they have found a way to test ancient human remains for hormones linked with pregnancy, a breakthrough that may allow archaeologists to determine whether a woman was pregnant or had recently given birth at the time of her death. Researchers found key reproductive hormones estrogen, progesterone and

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — An interstellar comet that originated outside our solar system just made its closest pass of the sun, setting it on an outgoing path — but it’s not leaving our cosmic neighborhood yet. The comet, dubbed 3I/ATLAS, came within about 126 million miles (203 million kilometers) of our star, according

CNN By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — An interstellar comet that originated outside our solar system just made its closest pass of the sun, setting it on an outgoing path — but it’s not leaving our cosmic neighborhood yet. The comet, dubbed 3I/ATLAS, came within about 126 million miles (203 million kilometers) of our star,

By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — A legendary fossil housed at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh features skeletons apparently locked in prehistoric combat — an epic meeting of two of the world’s favorite dinosaurs: Triceratops and Tyrannosaurus rex. Or so paleontologists thought. Researchers who spent the past five years studying the

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — During an expedition to search for a famed shipwreck, researchers discovered something unexpected: striking geometric patterns on the floor of Antarctica’s western Weddell Sea created by fish. The seafloor had once been obscured beneath a thick ice shelf, but that changed in July 2017 when the massive A68 iceberg

By Taylor Nicioli, CNN (CNN) — Glowing bats may sound like Halloween decor, but researchers in Georgia have discovered certain species of North American bats that are capable of the unusual trick. When placed under ultraviolet lighting, six species of the critters were found to emit a green luminescence. It is the first record of

By Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — The water around Jamaica had been simmering all summer. By the time Hurricane Melissa roared ashore Tuesday, that uber-warm Caribbean Sea had helped turn it into a monster: a Category 5 storm with winds reaching 185 miles an hour, tied for the strongest hurricane to strike land in the

CNN By Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — The water around Jamaica had been simmering all summer. By the time Hurricane Melissa roared ashore Tuesday, that uber-warm Caribbean Sea had helped turn it into a monster: a Category 5 storm with winds reaching 185 miles an hour, tied for the strongest hurricane to strike land in

By Mindy Weisberger, CNN (CNN) — Recent analysis of two fossils from Australia, estimated to be about 50,000 years old, suggests that Australia’s First Peoples valued big animals for their fossils as well as for their meat, collecting bones and transporting them over great distances. For decades, scientists viewed cut marks on the fossils as

By Taylor Nicioli, CNN (CNN) — Near the end of his reign, French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte led an army of over half a million men in an invasion of Russia in 1812. Six months later, after the army was forced to retreat, an estimated tens of thousands of his soldiers made it back to France.

By Jacopo Prisco, CNN (CNN) — A type of mosquito that was believed to have evolved in the London Underground has a much older origin in the Mediterranean, according to a new genetic study. The myth originated during World War II when Londoners sheltering from German warplanes in subway stations had to endure bites from

By Amanda Schupak, CNN (CNN) — In the badlands of eastern Wyoming, the Lance Formation is a trove of prehistoric fossils. And one area in particular — a region less than 10 kilometers (6 miles) across — has provided scientists with at least half a dozen remarkably well-preserved dinosaur specimens complete with details of scaly

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — A site in the San Juan Basin of northwestern New Mexico is providing a rare glimpse into the last days of the dinosaurs. Rocks and fossils at the Naashoibito Member site show an ecosystem that was filled with a diverse population of dinosaurs just before they disappeared from Earth.

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — Elkhorn and staghorn corals used to carpet Florida’s reef system, rising like antlers from the seabed — but not anymore. These crucial coral species are now “functionally extinct” in the region after record-breaking ocean temperatures, according to a study published Thursday. The corals, which have been dominant reef builders

By Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — Tropical Storm Melissa is expected to meander the Caribbean at an agonizingly slow pace in the coming days, even as it’s forecast to strengthen into a hurricane, covering as little as 2 miles in an hour. This is slower than an average person’s walking speed. Hurricanes are powerful storms,

By Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — The Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters Database, which the Trump administration “retired” in May, has relaunched outside of the government using the same methodology. In its first update at the new site, the database shows that the first six months of 2025 have been the most expensive first six

By Hadas Gold, Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — Elon Musk lashed out at Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy in a series of insulting posts on his social media platform X on Tuesday, after Duffy suggested NASA may sideline SpaceX from its moon mission. Musk, SpaceX’s CEO, called Duffy “Sean Dummy,” accused him of having a “2

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — Iceland’s frozen, inhospitable winters have long protected it from mosquitoes, but that may be changing. This week, scientists announced the discovery of three mosquitoes — marking the country’s first confirmed finding of these insects in the wild. Mosquitoes are found almost everywhere in the world, with the exception of

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — NASA may sideline SpaceX and choose a different company to land its astronauts on the moon later this decade, acting space agency chief Sean Duffy suggested during TV appearances Monday. Duffy emphasized that he believes SpaceX, which has a $2.9 billion contract to provide the lunar lander astronauts would

By Gina Park, CNN (CNN) — Sky-gazers worldwide will see a brilliant celestial display this week as the Orionid meteor shower peppers the sky in bright trails of light. The meteor shower, which is occasionally known to produce fireballs, is set to peak at 8 p.m. ET Monday, according to EarthSky. The Orionids don’t have

By Laura Paddison, Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — A fierce Trump administration push to stop the global shipping industry from paying for its own climate pollution appeared to have been successful Friday, as efforts to approve the “world’s first global carbon tax” collapsed. It had been widely assumed the tax would be adopted during a

By Rebecca Cairns, CNN (CNN) — Affordable, versatile, incredibly strong and locally available, concrete is the world’s most used manmade material. But it also has a huge carbon footprint, accounting for around 8% of global greenhouse emissions. The concrete and cement sector has been trying to reduce its environmental impact for years through sustainable concrete

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — Few city rats have left their mark on the public consciousness — and the urban landscape — like the one responsible for the famed “Chicago rat hole.” (“Pizza Rat” is a notable exception.) But the Windy City’s “rat hole” may not be what it seems.New research into the identity

By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — The first known hand fossils from an extinct human relative have been unearthed in Kenya, revealing a species with unexpected dexterity and a gorilla-like grip. The hand bones, which were discovered alongside skull and teeth fossils, are leading researchers to believe these early humans may have been able to

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — An unusual double-ring structure spotted in space with the help of citizen scientists has turned out to be a cosmic rarity. The celestial anomaly, captured by a radio telescope, is an odd radio circle, one of the scarcest and most mysterious objects in the universe, said Dr. Ananda Hota,

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — SpaceX’s luck appears to be turning, as the company notched a second straight successful test flight of the Starship launch system — the most powerful rocket ever constructed — on Monday evening. The test mission, which kicked off around 7:23 p.m. ET at SpaceX’s facilities in South Texas, marked

By Ella Nilsen, CNN (CNN) — The Trump administration’s cancellation of the largest solar project in the United States has sparked confusion and concern among Republicans and Democrats alike. Known as the Esmeralda 7, the collection of seven solar projects in rural Nevada was set to generate up to 6.2 gigawatts of energy when complete,

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — The total solar eclipse in North America on April 8, 2024, temporarily reset the biological clocks of some bird species, according to new research. The eclipse created a dramatic spectacle as the moon moved between Earth and the sun, plunging midday into a few moments of total darkness along

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — The planet is grappling with a “new reality” as it reaches the first in a series of catastrophic and potentially irreversible climate tipping points: the widespread death of coral reefs, according to a landmark report produced by 160 scientists across the world. As humans burn fossil fuels and ratchet

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — Calls for the United States to return astronauts to the moon before the end of the decade have been increasingly loud and frequent, emanating from bipartisan lawmakers and science advocates alike. But underlying that drumbeat is a quagmire of epic proportions. NASA plans to use SpaceX’s Starship — the

By Taylor Nicioli, CNN (CNN) — The bearded vulture, a large bird of prey with an unusual diet consisting primarily of bones, has long fascinated ornithologists. But now, a new study has shown why the bone-eating birds could be even more intriguing than once thought. Their carefully crafted nests, serving multiple generations, may also act

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — Planet-heating methane is escaping from cracks in the Antarctic seabed as the region warms, with new seeps being discovered at an “astonishing rate,” scientists have found, raising fears that future global warming predictions may have been underestimated. Huge amounts of methane lie in reservoirs that have formed over millennia

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — Two newly discovered comets are streaking across the sky in a spectacular display as they make their closest approaches to Earth this month. Comets are made of ice, frozen gases and rock, and as they travel near stars such as the sun, heat causes them to release gas and

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — Twenty years’ worth of imagery captured by two orbiters circling Mars has revealed raging winds on the red planet. Wind on the barren planet would be invisible if it weren’t for Mars’ iconic red dust, which was caught in the wind’s vortices, creating a phenomenon known as dust devils.

By Mindy Weisberger, CNN (CNN) — Hovering blue flames that flicker over bogs and marshes have inspired ghostly folktales for centuries. Known as “will-o’-the-wisp,” “jack-o’-lantern,” “corpse candle” and “ignis fatuus” (“foolish fire” in Latin), the global phenomenon has a spine-tingling history. But its origins could now have a scientific explanation: tiny flashes of lightning that

By Gina Park, CNN (CNN) — Two meteor showers are set to captivate sky-gazers as they peak in October, with the Draconids making a brief appearance this week and the Orionids putting on more of a celestial show later this month. The Draconid meteor shower, which is known to produce meteors during the evening rather

By Christian Edwards, Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — A trio of scientists have been awarded the 2025 Nobel Prize in chemistry for developing “metal-organic frameworks,” a form of molecular architecture that packs vast amounts of space into tiny structures – which the committee likened to Hermione Granger’s handbag in the Harry Potter novels. Susumu Kitagawa,

By Ella Nilsen, CNN (CNN) — The Trump administration is eyeing cutting funds for two major climate pollution projects in Texas and Louisiana, including one in House Speaker Mike Johnson’s district, according to a list of potential cuts obtained by CNN. Days after announcing nearly $8 billion in cuts to federal energy funding, the Energy

By Christian Edwards, Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — The 2025 Nobel Prize in physics has been awarded to a trio of scientists – a Briton, a Frenchman and an American – for their ground-breaking discoveries in the field of quantum mechanics. John Clarke, Michel Devoret and John Martinis will share the prize for their discovery

By Mindy Weisberger, CNN (CNN) — “She was doomed, no ship built by human hands could have withstood the strain.” When polar explorer Ernest Shackleton wrote this journal entry on October 27, 1915, his dreams of reaching Antarctica had been famously crushed — along with his ship, HMS Endurance. The vessel had been ice-locked since

By Gina Park, CNN (CNN) — Keep your eyes along the horizon on Monday night to see the first supermoon of the year. October’s full moon, also called the harvest moon, will be visible from Monday night into early Tuesday. The silvery orb will be at its fullest around 11:48 p.m. ET Monday, according to

By Christian Edwards, Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — The 2025 Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine has been awarded to a trio of scientists – two of them American and one Japanese – for unraveling how the immune system protects us from thousands of different microbes trying to invade our bodies. Mary E. Brunkow, Fred

By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — It’s the time of year when leading scientists might not want to let any calls go to voicemail. Prizes in chemistry, physics, and physiology or medicine, established by Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel more than a century ago, will be announced this week, along with prizes in peace and literature.

By Jacopo Prisco, CNN (CNN) — The search for an unknown planet in our solar system has inspired astronomers for more than a century. Now, a recent study suggests a potential new candidate, which the paper’s authors have dubbed Planet Y. The planet has not been detected but merely inferred by the tilted orbits of

By Amarachi Orie, CNN (CNN) — Ice cream, mascarpone and milk-washed cocktails may sound like simple pleasures — but the ones served at a two-Michelin-starred restaurant in Denmark contained a little extra something: ants. Alchemist in Copenhagen, currently ranked No. 5 on The World’s 50 Best Restaurants list, describes itself as “part science lab” and

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — Some 15,000 NASA employees were sent home this week as a government shutdown began, halting work across much of an agency already grappling with budget cuts and widespread job losses. But at least one NASA effort appears to be moving full steam ahead: the Artemis program. With the goal

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — In the early hours of a late September morning, a container ship called the Istanbul Bridge set sail from China, destined for Europe and laden with cargo — everything from batteries to clothing. So far, so standard, but there’s a twist. Instead of navigating south on a journey toward

By Amarachi Orie, CNN (CNN) — Sexual behavior is one reason why female mammals typically live longer than their male counterparts, according to a new study. Researchers from Germany, Denmark, France, Hungary and Belgium analyzed data relating to 528 mammal species and 648 bird species in zoos, in the most comprehensive study to date on

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — Astronomers have observed a planet that in some ways behaves more like a star — including a massive growth spurt unlike anything witnessed before in a free-floating planet. The rogue planet, which does not orbit any star, is called Cha 1107-7626 and is outside of our solar system, 620

By Christopher Lamb, CNN (CNN) — Pope Leo XIV has called for pressure to be placed on governments to protect the environment as he stressed that damaging the natural world is incompatible with the Christian faith in a speech at a climate conference Wednesday. “We cannot love God, whom we cannot see, while despising his

By Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — While the Trump administration wages war against clean energy, it is now vowing to lease millions of acres of public lands at a discount and spend hundreds of millions of dollars to prop up the most polluting source of electricity: coal. This comes as the administration has restricted new

By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — Scientists have used human skin cells to create fertilizable eggs capable of producing early embryos, an advance that could expand possibilities for fertility treatment, according to new research. The proof-of-concept study, published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications, involved taking the nucleus, the part of the cell that contains

By Amanda Schupak (CNN) — What do you get when you cross a blue jay with a green jay? That’s not the start of a joke, but the subject of a new study that aims to describe a hybrid bird never encountered before in the wild. The bigger question scientists are puzzling over, though, is

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — The discovery of a sunken port off the coast of Egypt may offer a puzzle piece in the longstanding search for Cleopatra’s lost tomb and glimpses into the country’s ancient maritime activity, according to researchers. A team of underwater archaeologists, including National Geographic Explorer Kathleen Martínez and National Geographic

By Katie Hunt, CNN (CNN) — A badly crushed cranium unearthed decades ago from a riverbank in central China that once defied classification is now shaking up the human family tree, according to a new analysis. Scientists digitally reconstructed the squashed skull, thought to be 1 million years old, and its features suggest that the

By Ella Nilsen, Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — In a consequential move for the global climate, China committed Wednesday to reduce its planet-warming pollution by 7% to 10% from peak levels over the next decade. China’s new economy-wide goal takes on outsized importance given the country is both the biggest emitter of global warming pollutants

By Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — A new interactive map and groundbreaking database allows people in the world’s largest metropolitan areas to track their air pollution exposure, along with their region’s biggest sources of planet-warming pollution. The tool, which depicts air pollution plumes and their sources, is the work of a nonprofit coalition of scientists,

By Jack Guy, CNN (CNN) — Endangered leopard sharks have been observed mating in the wild for the first time, with scientists witnessing a “threesome” involving two males and a female. The encounter was filmed by Hugo Lassauce, a marine biologist at the University of the Sunshine Coast, Australia, and documented in a research paper

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — Surrounding our solar system is a natural and enigmatic cosmic shield called the heliosphere — and a new mission has launched to help astronomers better understand it. Created by the solar wind, a constant flow of charged particles that stream away from the sun, the heliosphere acts as an

By Amarachi Orie, CNN Day-one fans of Taylor Swift know that the pop superstar has come a long way since launching her music career as a country singer — and that evolution is apparent in her dialect, according to speech scientists. From Tennessee to Pennsylvania to New York, the career of the 14-time Grammy award

By Laura Paddison, CNN (CNN) — Many parts of world are predicted to endure “day-zero droughts,” periods of extreme and unprecedented water scarcity, which could happen as soon as this decade in certain hotspots including parts of North America, the Mediterranean and southern Africa, according to a new study. It’s well known that climate change,

By Jackie Wattles, CNN (CNN) — NASA on Monday introduced the 10 people — selected from a pool of 8,000 applicants — who will join the agency’s astronaut corps as it races to return to the moon before attempting an unprecedented crewed mission to Mars. The group includes six women and four men, whom acting

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — Astronomers are trying to understand what caused a series of gamma ray bursts, or GRBs — the most powerful explosions in the universe. These energetic bursts are typically unleashed by the incendiary death of a star, or when it is shredded by a black hole. The observation of repeating

By Gina Park, CNN (CNN) — Sky-gazers should get ready for a full day of celestial events on Sunday, including a partial solar eclipse in parts of the Southern Hemisphere. The partial solar eclipse will peak, the point at which the moon blocks the largest portion of the sun’s surface, at 3:41 p.m. ET. But

By Ashley Strickland, CNN (CNN) — A violent storm may have sent two baby pterosaurs spiraling to their deaths in a lagoon about 150 million years ago, based on a new analysis of the tiny, astonishingly well-preserved fossils. This latest research also provides fresh clues that may unravel a broader enduring mystery surrounding the site

By Andrew Freedman, CNN (CNN) — A record-breaking and astonishingly expansive marine heat wave is underway in the Pacific Ocean, stretching about 5,000 miles from the water around Japan to the West Coast of the United States. The abnormally warm “blob” of ocean water, which is getting a significant boost from human-caused global warming, is

By Jack Guy, CNN (CNN) — Ever wondered whether painting a cow with zebra stripes might reduce the number of fly bites it gets, or which pizza toppings different kinds of lizards prefer? If so, you’re not alone: There are scientists who have studied these and other unusual topics in great detail. Some of them