Biology

‘Cow Week’ is even deadlier, awesomer than shark week

Forget sharks. This week, fear the fatal bovine. Over at BoingBoing, io9 pal Maggie Koerth-Baker is serving up a highly entertaining (and highly insightful) series of posts in honor of Cow Week. Here’s what she has to say about that: Cow Week is a tongue-in-cheek look at risk analysis and why we fear the things…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

A male contraceptive pill that doesn’t use hormones

The creation of an effective and reversible male contraceptive method (that isn’t the condom) is currently a hot research topic, as various institutes attempt to come up with a way of stopping sperm without doing any permanent harm. None of these attempts has yet resulted in a male pill, but now scientists have discovered a…

io9 Tim Barribeau

Today’s sexy body hack: eat walnuts to boost sperm health

Two handfuls of walnuts. That’s all it takes. Just two handfuls (around 75 grams/day), and your sperm quality will improve “in terms of concentration, vitality, movement, shape and chromosome abnormalities,” according to a study recounted in the latest issue of the journal Biology of Reproduction. Who here even knew that sperm shape was a thing?…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

Spinning guinea pigs on a turntable for science!

Occasionally you hear of science experiments in which the experiment itself is much more interesting than the result. For example, there is a whole genre of experiments which involve putting animals on turntables and spinning them right round, baby, right round. And yes, it’s actually important. Have you heard that old saying that the journey…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell

How Your Brain Cleans Itself

Your brain needs to clean itself. Not because it’s cluttered with inane thoughts or clogged by your filthy sense of humor, but because—like every other organ—it creates waste products. Now, scientists have worked out how it keeps itself clean. The rest of your body has this thing called the lymphatic system: a series of tubes…

Tech News Jamie Condliffe

The singing mouse gene

The singing mice of Costa Rica, which emit an audible birdlike trill as a mating call, have something unexpected in common with human beings. We share a gene called FOXP2 with these rodents, which is related to vocalization. When humans have damaged FOXP2 genes, it results in speech disorders that can be quite profound. Now…

io9 Annalee Newitz

These anatomical food sculptures are gruesome and lunch-meaty

Russian artist Dimitri Tsykalov has an unsettling knack for sculpting and arranging everyday foodstuffs into forms that would be more at home in a gross anatomy lab than a kitchen. Cauliflower takes on the appearance of undulating folds of grey matter. Lunch meat is transformed into the muscles of the head. A meticulously carved watermelon…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

Butterflies in the Fukushima region plagued by “genetic damage” and “severe abnormalities”

A study of the pale grass blue butterfly in the regions around the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant, site of the 2011 radiation disaster, has revealed that the insects are giving birth to mutants at an alarming rate. Indeed, the butterflies collected from younger generations have more abnormalities than butterflies born directly after the power plant…

io9 Annalee Newitz

Watch intrepid scientists wrestle the biggest Burmese python ever found in Florida

The US Geological Survey (USGS) is full of extremely adventurous scientists. They walk around on volcanoes, hunt down giant mud slides, and — who knew? — wrestle with pythons in the Florida Everglades. USGS communications coordinator Ben Young Landis just emailed io9 to tell us all about this enormous snake: At 17 feet 7 inches…

io9 Annalee Newitz

Why Koalas Have Human Fingerprints

Some accuse evolution of being pretty directionless. After all, the whole process involves random genetic mutations. But if evolution is just a toss of a million-sided die, why do so many animals turn out eerily similar? Nope, it’s not intelligent design. We take a look at the creepy look-alikes brought on by what biologists call…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell

Why truck driving is one of the deadliest jobs in America

What incredibly important profession combines horrible hours, bad pay, and a poor lifestyle? Truck driving. This is a job that destroys so many lives that it could soon become unsustainable. Here’s why. Top image via butlerphotography/Flickr. Lots of Work, Little Pay Truck drivers are expected to drive up to fourteen hours straight a day, receiving…

io9 Keith Veronese

Help us identify this mysterious, Cthulu-esque organism, spotted in Stockholm, Sweden

io9 reader Richard Turner was on a walk in southeast Stockholm when he and his friend made a startling discovery on the side of the road — a small mass of what appeared to be organic matter, roughly the size of a tennis ball and crawling with tentacle-like projections. “It wasn’t attached to the ground…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

“Fat maps” show where the obesity epidemic has hit the United States hardest

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) have released new data on weight gain among people living in the United States. What they discovered, as you can see in the map above, is that people in many regions of the country are more than 30 percent over their ideal BMI, or body mass index. BMIs are…

io9 Annalee Newitz

Why the cat’s purr is one of zoology’s greatest mysteries

It’s probably one of the most comforting sounds in the world if you like cats. A purr feels like the essence of contentment, but it also sounds downright weird. How do cats make this perfect vibration sound for minutes on end? After decades of study, nobody knows for sure. But there are a few things…

io9 Annalee Newitz

These sex-crazy birds don’t have time to sleep

It might be a little irritating when people tell you to fit more sleep into your already overloaded schedule, but they’re not wrong — all across the animal kingdom, less sleep means worse performance. With one rather large, sex-mad exception. The pectoral sandpiper spends most of its time far down in the Southern Hemisphere, then…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

How a three-fingered hand “regrew” its digits after amputation

A woman was born with what’s known as a phocomelic hand, meaning she was missing a finger and thumb on one of her hands. But when that hand was amputated after a car accident, she developed a five-fingered phantom hand. We’re still not 100% sure what causes the sensation of phantom limbs, even though the…

io9 Alasdair Wilkins

The terrifying history of herbal abortion medicines

As long as people have been getting pregnant, they’ve been looking for ways to end their pregnancies. Sometimes these ways have worked. Sometimes they haven’t. We’re going to take a quick look at the history of abortifacient herbs, and be very, very happy we live in the present. One of the best parts of modern…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell

Uncanny photographs capture beautiful birds as they struggle for freedom

It’s true that the subjects of photographer Todd Forsgren‘s photographs are held against their will, but they’re only detained briefly. They are entangled in mist nets, barely perceptible latticeworks of incredibly fine nylon cord, used by ornithologists to capture and study wild birds. According to Time, Forsgren has been teaming up with bird researchers since…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez

Scientists discover stem cells responsible for big brains and higher functions

Neuroscientists from The Scripps Institute have identified a specialized population of stem cells that have an impressive vocational calling: higher brain functioning. It’s an important finding that holds promise for the treatments of serious cognitive disorders — including those that impact on conscious function. And it also reveals how humans and other mammals are able…

io9 George Dvorsky

Want to eat healthier? Use color coding.

In an effort to get staff to eat better, a team of Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) researchers restructured the main hospital cafeteria. They made two small changes, and those made a world of difference. Since 2010, MGH has attached color coded labels to all items: green for the healthiest, yellow for less so, and red…

io9 Tim Barribeau

‘Cow Week’ is even deadlier, awesomer than shark week

A male contraceptive pill that doesn’t use hormones

Today’s sexy body hack: eat walnuts to boost sperm health

Spinning guinea pigs on a turntable for science!

How Your Brain Cleans Itself

The singing mouse gene

These anatomical food sculptures are gruesome and lunch-meaty

Butterflies in the Fukushima region plagued by “genetic damage” and “severe abnormalities”

Watch intrepid scientists wrestle the biggest Burmese python ever found in Florida

Why Koalas Have Human Fingerprints

Why truck driving is one of the deadliest jobs in America

Help us identify this mysterious, Cthulu-esque organism, spotted in Stockholm, Sweden

“Fat maps” show where the obesity epidemic has hit the United States hardest

Why the cat’s purr is one of zoology’s greatest mysteries

These sex-crazy birds don’t have time to sleep

How a three-fingered hand “regrew” its digits after amputation

The terrifying history of herbal abortion medicines

Uncanny photographs capture beautiful birds as they struggle for freedom

Scientists discover stem cells responsible for big brains and higher functions

Want to eat healthier? Use color coding.

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