Using emotion and humor to combat science misinformation

Misinformation in public debates about scientific issues such as vaccinations and climate change can be found all over the internet, especially on social media. In a new study, Sara K. Yeo, associate professor of communication ...

Ancient ammonoids' shell designs may have aided buoyancy control

Ammonoids, ancestors of today's octopus, squid and cuttlefish, bobbed and jetted their way through the oceans for around 340 million years beginning long before the age of the dinosaurs. If you look at the fossil shells of ...

Why lists of worldwide bird species disagree

How many species of birds are there in the world? It depends on whose count you go by. The number could be as low as 10,000 or as high as 18,000. It's tough to standardize lists of species because the concept of a "species" ...

Organic crystals' ice-forming superpowers

At the heart of clouds are ice crystals. And at the heart of ice crystals, often, are aerosol particles—dust in the atmosphere onto which ice can form more easily than in the open air.

Scientists plumb the depths of the world's tallest geyser

When Steamboat Geyser, the world's tallest, started erupting again in 2018 in Yellowstone National Park after decades of relative silence, it raised a few tantalizing scientific questions. Why is it so tall? Why is it erupting ...

New perovskite LED emits a circularly polarized glow

Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) have revolutionized the displays industry. LEDs use electric current to produce visible light without the excess heat found in traditional light bulbs, a glow called electroluminescence. This ...

Warming climate slows tropical birds' population growth rates

The mountain forests of Tanzania are more than 9,300 miles away from Salt Lake City, Utah. But, as in eastern Africa, the wild places of Utah depend on a diversity of birds to spread seeds, eat pests and clean up carrion. ...

Unusual earthquakes highlight central Utah volcanoes

If you drive south through central Utah on Interstate 15 and look west somewhere around Fillmore, you'll see smooth hills and fields of black rock. The area is, aptly, named the Black Rock Desert. It may not look like much, ...

How outdoor pollution affects indoor air quality

Just when you thought you could head indoors to be safe from the air pollution that plagues the Salt Lake Valley, new research shows that elevated air pollution events, like horror movie villains, claw their way into indoor ...

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