A Moment of Science
Episodes
How mosquitoes will be impacted by global warming
16 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists think that as many as a billion people around the world could be newly exposed to the diseases spread by mosquitoes within the next fifty y...
The unique species of the tufted deer
15 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This small species lives throughout southern China, from high eastern Tibetan mountains to low coastal mountains, preferring forests and shrubby habit...
Virtual reality and yawning
12 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a big gap between how we act in virtual reality and how we act in real life, as scientists who did an experiment focused on yawning found ou...
Not all antioxidants are the same
11 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We've heard a lot about how antioxidants can help prevent disease. Does that mean we should eat as many antioxidant-rich foods as possible?
Moths use acoustic camouflage
10 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Most moth species are active at night. It must be really dangerous to be a moth. Luckily, they've developed a few ways to protect themselves.
Why do humans like coffee?
09 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists think that animals evolved the ability to detect bitter tastes in order to avoid things that are harmful or even poisonous. So why do we li...
What makes swatting a fly so hard?
08 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Where most of us are concerned, the question is not whether we would hurt a fly but whether we could.
The mysteries of Oumuamua
05 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In October, 2017 astronomers at Haleakala Observatory in Hawaii discovered something strange. It was an object, moving through the solar system too fa...
Red cone, green cone
04 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Did you know that compared to creatures such as dogs and cats, humans can distinguish millions more shades of color?
Tsunamis in the oceans of Mars
03 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
There's evidence that the northern lowlands of Mars are the basin of a huge ocean that existed more than 3 billion years ago, and covered about a thir...
Fighting back against root rot
02 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Root rot is a condition of indoor and outdoor plants. Root rot may be caused by poorly drained or overwatered soil, or soil-borne pathogens and nemato...
In the atmosphere, microbes are walking on air
01 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Microbes are everywhere, from the deepest ocean to the highest mountaintop. They're also in the air all around, riding the breeze up, up, up into sky.
The ant with moves like a cheetah
29 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
But a cheetah isn’t the fastest animal in the world, even though a lot of people think it is. The animal that can move the fastest is actually a lot...
Background noise and sleep quality
29 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Background white noise can help some peoples’ sleep quality by minimizing the length of time it takes them to get to sleep. So, what exactly is whit...
Different rates of sea level rise
29 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Mid-Atlantic states such as North Carolina, Virginia, and Maryland have been hit particularly hard by rising sea levels
Ant doctors
29 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Do other species have healthcare?
How your attitude affects your body
29 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Our attitudes might affect us more than our genes do.
Can animals tell time?
22 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Does your pet give you the evil eye when they get fed a few minutes late? Its like they know...but do they?
Could The Gulf Stream collapse?
21 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The Gulf Stream is a current of warm water in the North Atlantic Ocean that travels up the Eastern coast of North America. Media reports have raised c...
Ice age plant survived the big chill
20 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Like a science fiction time traveler, an arctic plant of the late Pleistocene age, over 31,000 years old, was resurrected after a long frozen sleep.
Every time you eat a fig, remember a fig wasp lost its wings
19 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Figs have their thousands of individual flowers folded up inside them, so they can't rely on bees or wind to pollinate them with a male fig's pollen. ...
Study links air pollution and a decline in cognitive function
18 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Has your brain been feeling foggy lately? Or maybe, smoggy? If you live somewhere affected by air pollution, there might be a connection.
The jellyfish that never grows old
15 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists once thought that aging and death were the inevitable fate of all complex living things. But then, by accident, they discovered they were w...
The great cilantro debate
14 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
On today's Moment of Science, we'll be sniffing our way through a controversial culinary conundrum: the great cilantro debate.
Elephant grandmothers means more elephant calves
13 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Grandmother elephants are important for the survival of baby calves.
Looks delicious! The connection between appearance and taste
12 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
English is full of phrases that connect appearance to taste. However, scientists have been discovering that the connection between the two runs deeper...
Escaping alive from a frog's stomach
11 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Sometimes, when a frog eats a large insect, you can see it squirming in the frog’s belly, desperate to escape. Lack of air, acids, and digestive enz...
Copy your neighbors, but only when they're successful
08 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists looked at the nestbox choices of pied flycatchers after the birds observed the "success" of nesting great tits.
Why are operating rooms so cold?
07 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Is there a reason operating rooms are always so cold and drafty?
Starfish are all heads, no tails
06 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Colorful or plain, skinny or chubby, big or small, the nearly 2,000 species have it all.
Skeptics think about vaccines differently
05 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Vaccine skeptics might see vaccines the way they do because they tend to overestimate the likelihood of rare negative events.
Walked or swam? An index can answer
04 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How do scientists figure out even basic facts such as whether an animal walked on land or swam in the sea?
Play and the brain
01 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Researchers classify an animal behavior as play when it doesn’t involve an external reward, such as food, seems to serve no purpose, occurs repeated...
What we can learn from ancient climate records
29 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists find clues to how the earth's climate is changing by looking to the past.
Tetrataenite as a solution to the rare earth crisis
28 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Demand for rare earth elements is soaring, and it will continue to grow in the future.
The effects of bismuth in Pepto Bismol
27 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When the bismuth combines with the trace amounts of sulfur in your saliva and in your gastrointestinal tract, it reacts to form a black substance call...
King Tut's dagger from space
26 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
King Tutankhamen of Egypt has fascinated people ever since archeologist Howard Carter discovered his splendid tomb in 1922.
Where does bitterness come from? Ask the sharks
23 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Bitterness, like sweetness or saltiness, is one of the major taste sensations. And while it makes our food flavorful, detecting bitterness can sometim...
Remembering the past, as a baby
22 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What's your earliest memory?
Why are sunrises faster than sunsets?
21 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It takes much less time for the sun to light up the sky at dawn than it does for all the light to disappear after the sun sets at dusk.
The temperature of ice on a hot day
20 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
If you drink a glass of ice water on a hot day, what temperature is the ice?
Do brains differ with biology?
19 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
There are some biological differences between the sexes, but do they extend to the brain?
Mauveine: The first synthetic dye
16 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Where does color come from?
Can plants hear?
15 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In 2019 a team of Israeli scientists published evidence that the evening primrose plant can detect the specific sound vibration frequencies of the buz...
Patient HM: Henry Molaison and the neuroscience of memory
14 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Every student who has ever taken a course in neuroscience or psychology has heard of Patient HM.
Monkeys can be petty, too
13 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We share a lot of genetic material in common with our chimpanzee relatives, and maybe some personal characteristics too.
Snowshoes and physics
12 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
One frosty morning you awake to a blanket of fresh snow. Adventure awaits! Do you go skiing? Skating? Building snowmen? Or you could do some physics!
Dogs can recognize their own species
09 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
French scientists tested dogs to see if they could recognize the faces of other dogs on a computer screen.
Being able to stomach bugs
08 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
While not an ordinary part of the cuisine of the United States, insects are a common food source for millions of people around the world. It might be ...
Are eyes evolving?
07 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In evolutionary theory, an inherited trait is favored by natural selection when it helps an individual to produce more offspring than its competitors.
The proteins in dinosaur feathers
06 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Modern birds are the descendants of dinosaurs. Specifically, paleontologists have shown that birds evolved from a group of two legged dinosaurs called...
UFO attack or meteor fragments?
05 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
June 1969. Not one airliner but two, plus the pilot of an Air National Guard fighter plane, report being harassed by a team of UFOs.
Beans get their flavor from yeast
02 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Coffee and cacao beans are fermented. Similar to wine, the flavor of the beans is determined by the type of yeasts and microorganisms present.
Solving a new problem with an old remedy
01 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From DIY oven cleaner to removing odor from rugs, baking soda, or sodium bicarbonate, has long been known as an essential home cleaning agent.
Think like a penguin: Finding your niche
31 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A "niche" is an organism's special "slot" in an ecosystem that allows it to co-exist with other species.
Going for a spin and getting dizzy
30 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When someone moves, fluid sloshes inside the ears’ semicircular canals. The fluid tugs at tiny strands of hair.
The risk astronauts take with the Sun
29 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The Apollo astronauts were at risk of something many people don't know about. The Sun.
Are you a tick magnet?
26 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We all know someone who goes for a walk in the woods, and comes back with many ticks crawling on them.
What are contrails?
25 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Why do airplanes sometimes leave contrails behind, and what are they exactly?
How does carbon dioxide impact our ability to think?
24 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
At high levels, carbon dioxide can affect the brain to cause impaired thinking.
Dinosaurs may have had malaria
23 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists discovered a type of malaria in a twenty-million-year-old mosquito fossil from the Dominican Republic preserved in amber.
Murphy's breakfast never goes to plan
22 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
If you're eating toast, and you accidentally bump it to the floor, it seems more likely to land buttered side down.
Bacteria feel full, too
19 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
We've been hearing a lot about the importance of gut bacteria. Now it seems that bacteria also have a say in how and when we eat.
How the motor cortex treats words
18 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The instant you decide to move your foot, the part of your brain's motor cortex responsible for sending commands to the foot goes into action. So what...
What a steel!
17 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Have you ever prepared a meal that required lots of garlic and found that after all of that chopping your hands reek of garlic for the rest of the nig...
Cafeteria plate dispensers reveal facts about atoms
16 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
You take a plate off the top of one stack. The other plates in the stack rise from below just far enough to present the next plate at the same height ...
Is it ok to swallow watermelon seeds?
15 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A few seeds from fruits such as watermelons or apples passing through your digestive tract won't hurt you. But they won't help you much either.
What exactly was Little Miss Muffet eating?
12 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Little Miss Muffet, sat on her tuffet, eating her curds and whey. But what even is that?
Vampire bats are good at sharing
11 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It may surprise you to learn that vampire bats are one of the most well-known examples of sharing in the animal kingdom.
Testing your reaction time
10 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
How fast are your reflexes? Test them out with a falling dollar.
Why don't elephants get cancer?
09 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Since elephants are so big, they have way more cells than most animals. Which means more opportunities for elephant cells to go crazy and become cance...
What events actually make us happy?
08 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Major events often make people happy, but does this last very long?
Desert ants navigate with the magnetic field
05 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When ants first leave their nest to begin their jobs as foragers, they first have to make sure they can find their way home.
Life thrives in the seabed of hydrothermal vents
04 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
From stories of giant monsters to little green Martians, we humans can imagine some pretty strange creatures. Life, however, offers plenty of surprise...
Moths are evolving to avoid city lights
03 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Moths are a lot less attracted to artificial light than they used to be. Learn more about what that means with today's A Moment of Science!
Recognizing different relatives
02 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Other animals besides humans learn to recognize their relatives
Jellyfish thrive in cold water, too
01 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Jellyfish, delicate and soft as they may be, thrive even in places you might not go swimming—including the Arctic.
Mona Lisa's smile: now you see it, now you don't
29 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Any list of the world's top ten most famous paintings will surely include da Vinci's "Mona Lisa." Part of the painting's appeal is its mystery.
Rethinking dopamine
28 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Scientists are now considering the role that dopamine plays in our bodies’ response to other stimuli, such as surprising, new, or negative events.
The sensitivity of dog noses
27 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Did you know that dog’s noses can be tens of thousands of times more sensitive than ours?
The curious case of microbial invasion
26 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
‘Biological invasion’ is a phenomenon that occurs when a foreign organism establishes within a community of organisms that it otherwise wouldn’t...
What's the difference between hair and fur?
25 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Hair and fur are practically identical. How can that be?
Bees have figured out some sweet, sweet math
22 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When you think of beehive, your first thought may be of honey oozing out of the iconic hexagonal cells. Remarkable as the honey may be, though, the ce...
Making a new mouth for every meal
21 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Microscopic hydras will trap and paralyze their prey. The next step usually is to stuff their mouths, only hydras usually don't have mouths.
DNA and RNA in a genetic museum
20 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When it comes to researching extinct animals the focus has almost entirely been on DNA because it tends to stand the test of time better, but RNA is t...
How cockroaches get away
19 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The all-too-familiar American cockroach almost seems to know where you're going to strike. What's the tip-off that sends the cockroach running?
Seeing color out of the corner of your eye
18 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
If you look at a green door at the edge of your field of vision, it's still green. Simple right? Not quite.
Tardigrades are even stranger than they appear
15 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Tardigrades look strange, but they're made up of even stranger stuff.
The mermaid, the witch, and climate change?
14 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Some academics have turned to creative sources to translate what existing research tells us about climate problems and policy responses: fairy tale ch...
MRI, CT, and PET scans, oh my!
13 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
What sets MRI, CT, and PET scans apart?
You are what you eat, even for extinct Caribbean rodents
12 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In 2018, scientists from Johns Hopkins and the University of Cincinnati attempted the first study of extinct Hispaniolan rodents using isotopes. What ...
Firefly flashes are mating signals
11 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Male fireflies cruise the evening air, flashing their lanterns in a pattern characteristic of their species, looking for females of their own kind.
The ocean is changing color
08 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
About 56% of the ocean’s surface has changed in color. An expanse larger than Earth’s entire land surface has become slightly greener.
What makes fluorescent colors so bright?
07 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Have you ever wondered why fluorescent colors -- like you see in highlighters or clothing dyes, for instance - seem so much brighter than other colors...
The importance of the magnetic field for life on Earth
06 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
What did the Earth need to become habitable?
Why are dogs such messy drinkers?
05 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Dogs aren't quite as graceful as we humans when it comes to taking a drink. But you might give your pooch more credit if you knew that her lapping met...
Wallabies in England?
04 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Imagine yourself walking through the English countryside. You might expect to come across some squirrels, moles, foxes, and badgers. However, you may ...
Rats stay closer together in colder temperatures
01 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Have you ever watched a bunch of rats hanging out together? You might notice something interesting.
Air pressure and drinking straws
30 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When you sit down to a glass of iced tea with a straw in it, you might say that you are sucking the tea up through the straw. But is this accurate?
Today's sturgeon is a blast from the past
29 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
If you want a piece of living history, where would you look? You could visit California’s giant redwoods, or simply watch the birds, those descendan...