Elephant trunk whiskers exhibit material intelligence, revealing the secret behind an amazing sense of touch

The researchers think an unusual stiffness gradient helps elephants know precisely where contact occurs along each of their 1,000 trunk whiskers so they can perform feats like picking up a tortilla chip without breaking it or precisely grabbing a peanut.

== yjc
Why Aristotle would hate Valentine’s Day, and his five steps to love

Why do so many of us feel such pressure to offer grand gestures, buy pricey gifts, and go through elaborate displays of affection? Presumably, to prove our love. Valentine’s Day is a showy, one-day-a-year demonstration that promises to do just that.

Only humans have chins: Study shows it’s an evolutionary accident

Humans, it turns out, have a unique capacity to “take it on the chin” because we’re uniquely in possession of that physical feature. That exclusive nature makes the chin well suited for identifying Homo sapiens in the fossil record.

How a tiny shrimp could hold the clue to better armor

Snapping shrimp produce shock waves with their snapping claws, and while their targets may be stunned, these tiny crustaceans do not suffer the same trauma.

The origin of magic numbers: Why some atomic nuclei are unusually stable

While every chemical element is defined by a fixed number of protons in its atomic nucleus, the number of neutrons it contains is far less constrained. For almost every known element, there are at least two different nuclear configurations, or isotopes, which vary only in their number of neutrons.

NOvA maps neutrino oscillations over 500 miles with 10 years of data

Neutrinos are very small, neutral subatomic particles that rarely interact with ordinary matter and are thus sometimes referred to as ghost particles. There are three known types (i.e., flavors) of neutrinos, dubbed muon, electron and tau neutrinos.

== paywall?, also lengthy
An Asteroid Ended the Age of the Dinosaurs. But How Did Their Reign Begin?

Researchers are uncovering the evolutionary steps that set the stage for dinosaurs to rule the planet.

== yjc, couldn’t resist
Meet the unbearably cute patients at this one-of-a-kind hospital for bats

Australia is famously a place with some of the world’s most dangerous and frightening animals. Venomous spiders. Deadly snakes. Jellyfish with fatal stings. But it is also home to one of the world’s cutest: the flying fox, also known as the giant fruit bat.

== yjc, I have a lot more CDs than vinyl (though a fair bit of the latter as well)
Are CDs Making a Comeback? A Statistical Analysis

Every change in music distribution begets a benefit in buyer experience.When CDs first came on the scene, they offered greater storage (more songs per album), increased durability (less wear and tear), and the ability to skip between songs (rather than guessing when a track would end).

== paywall?, lengthy in typical MIT style
What’s next for Chinese open-source AI

Chinese open-source models are leading not just in download volume but also in variety. Alibaba’s Qwen has become one of the most diversified open model families in circulation, offering a wide range of variants optimized for different uses. The lineup ranges from lightweight models that can run on a single laptop to large, multi-hundred-billion-parameter systems designed for data-center deployment.

A hellish ‘hothouse Earth’ getting closer, scientists say

Continued global heating could trigger climate tipping points, leading to a cascade of further tipping points and feedback loops. This would lock the world into a new and hellish “hothouse Earth” climate far worse than the 2-3C temperature rise the world is on track to reach.

Oldest known sewn hide and other artifacts from Oregon caves shed light on early clothing in harsh climates

The Cougar Mountain Cave (CMC) and Paisley Caves in central Oregon are Late Pleistocene archaeological sites with two of the most extensive assemblages of rare perishable artifacts. Perishable artifacts are rarely preserved due to their organic nature, but the desert-like conditions in central Oregon enabled preservation for very long periods.

Experiment relies on pulsars to probe dark matter waves

One hypothesis is that dark matter is made up of axionlike particles with an extremely low mass, broadly referred to as ultralight axionlike dark matter (ALDM). As these particles are exceedingly light, predictions suggest that they would behave more like waves than individual particles on a galactic scale.

Iceland is Planning For the Possibility That Its Climate Could Become Uninhabitable

Sometime over the next 100 years, human-driven warming could disrupt a vital ocean current that carries heat northward from the tropics. After this breach, most of the world would keep getting hotter — but northern Europe would cool substantially, with Iceland at the center of a deep freeze.

Lost Soviet Moon Lander May Have Been Found

Humanity’s first successful lunar lander is missing. Sixty years ago the Soviet Luna 9 became the first human-made object to achieve a soft landing on the moon—or, for that matter, any celestial body. Yet today its exact location remains a mystery.

Overlooked group of gut bacteria appears key to good health, global study finds

In a huge global study a single group of bacteria—named CAG-170—has repeatedly shown up in high numbers in the gut microbiomes of healthy people.

Looking for advanced aliens? Search for exoplanets with large coal deposits

Without access to coal, our own civilization would never have been able to harness deep deposits of oil and gas and in turn generate enough heat and electricity to melt steel.

Why only a small number of planets are suitable for life

For life to develop on a planet, certain chemical elements are needed in sufficient quantities. Phosphorus and nitrogen are essential.

== I attended Queen’s for a year back in the early 70s
Light-based Ising computer runs at room temperature and stays stable for hours

The Queen’s system uses pulses of light that act like the magnets in an Ising model—but instead of a binary system of up or down, there is either a light pulse, or the absence of one. The pulses move through a loop, interact, and gradually settle into a configuration that represents a good solution, much like a group reaching a consensus after many quick exchanges.

2 To 3 Cups of Coffee a Day May Reduce Dementia Risk. But Not if It’s Decaf.

Coffee and tea contain bioactive ingredients like polyphenols and caffeine, which have emerged as possible neuroprotective factors that reduce inflammation and cellular damage while protecting against cognitive decline. Though promising, findings about the relationship between coffee and dementia have been inconsistent.

== have had similar article(s) before, paywall?
Your BMI can’t tell you much about your health – here’s what can

People classed as “overweight” according to BMI can be perfectly healthy. But there are better measures of fat, and physicians are finally using them.

The first signs of burnout are coming from the people who embrace AI the most

The most seductive narrative in American work culture right now isn’t that AI will take your job. It’s that AI will save you from it.

Ancient people had nautical tech, know-how to cross hazardous Arctic channel

The Paleo-Inuit archeological site was found in Kitsissut, a rocky cluster of cliff-edged islands between Greenland and Ellesmere Island. As it did thousands of years ago, getting there today by boat is a journey of at least 53 kilometres from the nearest shore in harsh, High Arctic sea conditions.

Deep-sea explorers film massive animal drifting through darkness in South Atlantic Ocean

Scientists from the Schmidt Ocean Institute have uncovered an array of remarkable finds off the coast of Argentina.

== yjc, given the fair amount of raw fish in the pieces, I’d likely eat one
The Art of “Shoe-Shi"

Sushi chef and illustrator Yujia Hu is the man behind the shoe-shaped delicacies. A sports lover and foodie, he transforms tiny strands of black seaweed nori and smooth slips of pink fish to give each rice-based shoe-shi its designer features.

== US perspective
Carmakers Rush To Remove Chinese Code Under New US Rules

Modern cars are packed with internet-connected widgets, many of them containing Chinese technology. Now, the car industry is scrambling to root out that tech ahead of a looming deadline.

== yjc
Inside Ferrari’s Luce EV

Since Apple finally put its mysterious and long-suffering Project Titan out to pasture, we’ve wondered what a Jony Ive-designed Apple Car might have looked like. Today, we might have a clue.

Scientists Explored an Island Cave and Found 1 Million-Year-Old Remnants of a Lost World

Up to 50 percent of species—which included 12 bird species and 4 frog species—on Aotearoa’s North Island went extinct before humans arrived.

Cyber-Espionage Group Breached Systems in 37 Nations, Security Researchers Say

An Asian cyber-espionage group has spent the past year breaking into computer systems belonging to governments and critical infrastructure organizations in more than 37 countries, according to the cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks, Inc.

== seen similar articles before
Have We Been Thinking About Exercise Wrong for Half a Century?

Public health messaging has convinced us that the only way to work out is “exercising.” Yet, for most of human history, of course, living was exercise. Humans got most — if not all — of the physical activity needed to stay healthy through natural movement in their daily lives.

The World’s First Sodium-Ion Battery in Commercial EVs

It’s a meaningful step forward for the technology that’s rapidly emerging as an alternative to lithium-iron phosphate (LFP) batteries, which currently dominate China’s EV market.

The body processes good fats and bad fats differently, study finds

Dietary fat is essential to survival, and humans have evolved to process it very efficiently. Bile acids are detergent molecules that help break fat into small droplets in the intestine, allowing fats to be efficiently absorbed into systemic circulation.

Good news: We saved the bees. Bad news: We saved the wrong ones.

For years, Americans have heard urgent pleas to save the honeybees. Honeybees were never in existential trouble. And well-meaning efforts to boost their numbers have accelerated the decline of native bees that actually are.

Claude Code is the Inflection Point

What it is, how we use it, industry repercussions, microsoft’s dilemma, why anthropic is winning.

A 3D-printed delivery system enhances vaccine delivery via microneedle array patch

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted an urgent need for efficient, durable, and widely accessible vaccines. This prompted several important innovations in vaccine technology, and researchers continue to explore new and creative ways to make effective vaccines rapidly available to the greatest number of people.

When the interaction between fungi and bacteria becomes a dangerous alliance

Rivals or allies—how do bacteria and fungi interact in our bodies? Until now, bacteria on our mucous membranes were primarily considered to be antagonists of fungi, as they can inhibit their growth.

New study uses Neanderthals to demonstrate gap between generative AI and scholarly knowledge

Whether someone asks their device where dinosaurs lived or how accelerated their pulse is, AI can get the information quicker than technology has ever been able to do. Accuracy, on the other hand, is still in question.

The evolutionary trap that keeps rove beetles alive

Rove beetles have evolved a neat trick to survive. They cloak themselves in ant pheromones, allowing them to enter and remain undetected within ant colonies. But it comes with a catch.

Extreme plasma acceleration in monster shocks offers new explanation for fast radio bursts

Magnetars are young neutron stars with extremely strong magnetic fields, reaching up to 1015 Gauss on their surfaces. These cosmic powerhouses produce prolific X-ray activity and have emerged as candidates for explaining FRBs, mysterious millisecond-duration radio bursts detected from across the cosmos.