Hydrogen fuel cell cars present a paradox: While the zero emission vehicles don't pollute, most plans to mass-produce clean-burning hydrogen rely on dirty fuels like coal and gas. The recent blackout in the Northeast U.S. and Canada, however, may kick-start other uses of hydrogen fuel cells.
Tonight's full moon, also known as the harvest moon, will flood the twilight sky with natural light just after sunset, providing folks a few extra hours to complete outside shores. Artificial lighting long ago reduced the importance of the moon to farmers and gardeners, but the name has stuck.
Since the mid-19th century, scientists have been vexed to explain a simple question about bee reproduction: Why do unfertilized bee eggs become male, while fertilized eggs produce female worker or queen offspring? The answer, according to new research, is a unique genetic system.
In Alaska, the locals call it devil's club—a spiky plant mostly known for spoiling hikes and crowding out blueberry patches. So why are ecologists growing more of the stuff? Devil's club may find a use as a treatment for tuberculosis adapted from Native American folk medicine.
The Canadian lynx (Lynx canadensis) may creep for miles through dense, debris-strewn forest for the chance to pounce on a scarce snowshoe hare (Lepus americanus), but the stealthy feline is apparently seldom bothered to weather a crossing of the Rocky Mountains to find a mate.
A study of skulls excavated from the tip of Baja California in Mexico suggests that the first Americans may not have been the ancestors of today's Amerindians, but another people who came from Southeast Asia and the southern Pacific area.
"Normal brains" are in demand at the Harvard Brain Bank—the largest bank of its kind worldwide. Here fresh brains are received, analyzed, and farmed out to researchers investigating devastating diseases like Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, and schizophrenia. This story airs tonight on our U.S. cable television program National Geographic Today.
A flood of interstellar dust is breaching the sun's weakened magnetic shield and drifting into the solar system, according to European astronomers. The tide of dust may chip away at spacecraft solar panels and knock particles off asteroids, increasing the number of shooting stars observed on Earth.
In 1958 Eugene Parker discovered that a stiff wind blows incessantly from the sun, filling local interstellar space with ionized gas. The discovery forever changed how scientists perceive space and helped explain many phenomena, from geomagnetic storms that knock out power grids on Earth to the formation of distant stars.
Stargazers in a frenzy by the spectacle of Mars' closest approach to Earth in nearly 60,000 years Wednesday may be compelled to snap a photo of the once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon. They'll need some patience and a little luck, but it can be done. This story includes the latest image of Mars made by the Hubble telescope.
A lack of calcium isn't good for the bones, especially when you've got antlers to grow. So to compensate for their mineral-deficient diet, over the next few weeks deer living on a remote Scottish island will be filling up on live seabird chicks.
An elephant never forgets—or does it? Scientists have long believed that animals do not have so-called episodic memory—the kind that allows humans to remember past events. But recent experiments with scrub jays, chimpanzees, and gorillas have led to rethinking of the nature of memory in animals.
Sharks have survived some 400 million years on Earth. Could their longevity be due in part to an extraordinary resistance to cancer and other diseases? If so, humans might someday benefit from shark secrets—but leading researchers caution that today's popular shark cartilage "cancer cures" aren't part of the solution.
