Stories by The Conversation US

Beach sand is beautiful—and even more so when you understand the story it tells about our planet

Popcorn might be more than 6,000 years old, an anthropologist explains

The EEG has shaped researchers’ understanding of cognition for everything from perception to memory

The Supreme Court kicked two cases challenging social media moderation laws in Florida and Texas back to lower courts

Vaccines are a cornerstone of a healthy immune system—and a healthy life

Older people are increasingly becoming the targets of fraudsters. Here’s how to stay safe and what to do if you think you’ve been scammed

Wind shear and atmospheric instability have combined to create a brutal tornado season this year

Each year in the U.S. lightning strikes 37 million times and kills 21 people on average. Here’s how to stay safe during lightning storms

Education and enforcement can only go so far in reducing crashes when badly designed roads are filled with large cars

Lucy, a 3.2-million-year-old fossilized hominin, may have been much less hairy than we imagine—a perhaps shocking revelation for our modern sense of nakedness

Lynn Conway, a trans woman and advocate for LGBTQ rights, was underappreciated and often underrecognized for her work in chip design

Sizzling summer days can be a dangerous time to be outside. Here’s what to think about before heading into the heat and how to stay safe

Employees are working remotely, and office buildings are standing empty, inspiring some cities to work through the challenges of converting these structures into new apartments

Breakdancing will hit the global stage at the 2024 Summer Olympic Games in Paris, and this physicist is excited to break down the science

From hiking to barbecuing and gardening to swimming, the opportunities for summer fun can also pose health risks. Here’s how to stay safe this summer

Massive blobs of sargassum seaweed are taking over Caribbean beaches. The seaweed explosion is fueled by pollution washing into the ocean from rivers in the Americas and Africa

Prospective memory is a skill that can be practiced, making it more likely that someone can remember an appointment or meet a deadline

Most pregnant people take prenatal supplements, but weak regulation means these products don’t necessarily provide the needed nutrients

Cuckoos are “nest pirates” that lay their eggs in other birds’ nests, setting off an evolutionary arms race that leads to the development of new species

Avocados are marketed as a superfood, but growing them for an expanding world market has turned a rural Mexican state into an unsustainable monoculture

Retroviruses, some of which predate the human species, are tied to a genetic susceptibility to major psychiatric disorders

The National Hurricane Center’s hurricane season outlook for the Atlantic Ocean forecasts 17 to 25 named storms in 2024 because of an expected combination of warm ocean temperatures and a La Niña climate pattern

An atmospheric scientist explains what wind shear is and how it influences hurricanes

The pasteurization process was invented in the 1860s and continues to keep people safe from a range of foodborne illnesses