60-second Science

Princeton University's Jennifer Rexford talks about optimizing the internet for the uses it got drafted into performing.  

Researchers try to figure out why every 20 years a Pakistan glacier moves roughly 1,500 times faster.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Red dwarfs are a popular place to hunt for small exoplanets in the habitable zone—but the stars' radiation bursts might fry chances for life as we know it. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Rather than always making the same call in response to the same stimuli, North Atlantic right whales are capable of changing their vocalizations.

The U.S. Northeast may be more geologically active than was previously thought, according to a seismic sensor network.

Volunteers willing to place riskier bets tended to sport larger amygdalas—a region associated with processing fear. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The jutting midface of Neandertals seems to have evolved to help get large volumes of air into an active body that needed lots of oxygen.  

Photosynthesis actually is an inefficient process, but a biological chemist is trying to crank it up. 

Several feet below a beach in British Columbia, archaeologists discovered soil trampled by human feet—the oldest footprints found so far in North America. Christopher Intagliata reports.

The source of knuckle cracking sounds is much debated—but new mathematical models may reconcile two opposing views. Christopher Intagliata reports.

To learn more about decay and fossilization, researchers conduct unorthodox experiments—like dissecting decomposing animals in the lab. Christopher Intagliata reports.

Ravens produce different types of calls depending on their age and sex—which might help ravens size up other individuals. Jason G. Goldman reports.

A multifactorial analysis finds that the ignition of a flu epidemic stems from a blast of colder weather striking an otherwise warm, humid, urban environment, and driving people indoors into close quarters.  

Upstate New York Congresswoman Louise Slaughter, who worked for decades on issues such as overuse of antibiotics in agriculture and food safety in general, died March 16 at the age of 88.

An analysis of more than six decades of daily temperature and snowfall data linked warmer arctic temperatures to cold snaps at lower latitudes. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The whipworm lives in the human gut, mooching microbes from its host to build its own microbiome. Christopher Intagliata reports.

Counting by drone not only saves time and effort, but yields better data on species numbers—a definite plus in terms of conservation. Karen Hopkin reports.

A protein found in spit prevents bad bugs from binding to intestinal cells in the lab, pointing to a possible way to lower the chances of dysentery. Christopher Intagliata reports.

Exoplanet hunters are moving beyond simply finding new planets into trying to know what they look like and whether there's surface or subsurface activity.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

People who use echolocating mouth clicks to compensate for low vision increase the number and intensity of clicks when objects are harder to detect. Christopher Intagliata reports.