Science Quickly

Reseachers have started to examine the genetic traces of the movement of some six million African-Americans from the south to the north and west between 1910 and 1970. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A housefly relative appears to be key to the reproductive success of a hardy tundra shrub. But the insect is threatened by the warming climate. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A protein from microscopic creatures called tardigrades keeps their DNA protected—and could someday shield humans from radiation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When the sun, moon and Earth are aligned, high tidal stress may increase the chances that an earthquake will grow bigger than it otherwise might have been. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

An ant walking in the desert can gauge distance by footsteps and the sun's position, but an ant being carried can estimate distance by visual information perceived as it passed by. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Researchers used high-tech visualization techniques to peer inside an ancient scroll too fragile to unwrap. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The branches of birch trees in Europe sagged by as much as four inches at night compared with daytime. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A chromosomal rearrangement may cause one mosquito species to be lured to cows instead of humans for a blood meal. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Drinkers surrounded by even more inebriated people feel less drunk than a breathalyzer test indicates they actually are. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fabric dyed with indigo just found in Peru is some 1,600 years older than indigo-dyed fabrics that have been found in the Middle East. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

By playing road noise where there was no road, researchers were able to gauge the effect of the noise on bird behavior without having to deal with the effect of the road itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

South America and central Africa lost the most wilderness in a decline since the 1990s that saw the planet's wild areas down by a tenth Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The chip uses pulses of laser light to generate truly random numbers, the basis of encryption. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Researchers determined that the variation of a couple hundred proteins in a person's hair could be enough to single her out from one million individuals. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Sharks can accumulate both methylmercury and a toxin called BMAA, which can have synergistic effects on human consumers. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Teenage girls who cared for infant dolls, an intervention meant to prevent pregnancy, actually had a higher risk of getting pregnant by age 20. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Bearded dragons modify their colors for camouflage or to maintain body temperature, or to communicate with other dragons. Jason G. Goldman reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Using an artificial stream system, researchers found that amphetamine residues altered insect and microbial life in aquatic ecosystems. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In 12 hours Dracaena plants removed nearly all the acetone from an airtight chamber, suggesting they might be put to use as air filters in nail salons. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Badgers were far more frightened by the sounds of humans than by their traditional predators, such as bears or wolves. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A survey during the 2012 election found that bus tours and visits to greasy spoons didn't do much to change voter opinions. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Upending the belief that residents of ancient Central America did not practice animal husbandry, new evidence shows that people in Teotihuacán raised and bred rabbits and hares. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A black hole analogue, which traps sound instead of light, generates "Hawking radiation," a key prediction by the theoretical physicist. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In neighborhoods where kids have an increased chance of exposure to toxic lead, pigeons also have higher blood lead levels—making the birds potential proxies for risk assessment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Researchers found that a bad actor could cheaply and easily clone a remote keyless entry system to gain entry. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Individual Greenland sharks appear to live perhaps a century longer than any other vertebrate, and might have life spans approaching 500 years. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Yao people of Mozambique vocally signal honeyguide birds to show them the location of hives, which the people harvest and share with the birds. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Environmental concentrations of certain insecticides slashed honeybee drones' living sperm counts. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Reintroducing mountain lions to the eastern U.S. could save human lives and reduce injuries by lowering deer populations and preventing car–deer collisions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A 2,000-year-old latrine in China provides the first hard evidence that people carried diseases long distances along the ancient trading route. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Inbred canaries sang songs with less pure tones, and at slightly different pitches, than their outbred cousins—and female canaries seemed to be able to tell the difference. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A thermal spike linked to the solar system’s largest storm explains weather on gas-giant planets Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Fish flourished in creeks in which human engineers helped shore up beaver dams made weak by poor timber availability. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Great frigate birds may stay aloft for up to two months, eating and sleeping on the wing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Biologists have identified a third species—a yeast—in some lichens, shaking up what's always been known as a two-party system. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The smell of a chicken wards off one species of malaria-spreading mosquito—meaning the scent compounds, or the birds themselves, might help deter disease. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

As was widely reported on social media, the U.S. is indeed going to use aerial drones to spread vaccine-laced pellets among prairie dogs to save endangered ferrets, although, contrary to some reports, no M&Ms will be involved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A newer type of fuel injection offers better fuel economy, but paradoxically increases black carbon emissions—meaning a pollution trade-off. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A model of the dolphin vocal apparatus shows that they need a coating of mucus to produce their distinctive sounds. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The discerning insects returned to flowers with sweetened pollen, but avoided revisiting flowers with bitter pollen. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A genetic analysis of leftovers from an exotic dinner in 1951 reveals that the diners got less than they were promised. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The National Center for Science Education's annual Colorado River trip through the Grand Canyon highlights the differences between the scientific and creationist outlooks. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new study suggests the best predictor of wildlife abundance in public lands is not human activity, but factors like forest connectivity and nearby housing density. Jason G. Goldman reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

New research suggests that our feline companions understand the principle of cause and effect. Jason G. Goldman reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

An aquaculturist used selective breeding to create strains of farmed fish that fatten up fast on cheap, plentiful feeds such as soybeans and corn. Emily Schwing reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

By analyzing the vocal patterns of couples in therapy, an algorithm was able to predict whether a relationship would get worse or improve. Erika Beras reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A new theory suggests the Red Planet once had a spectacular lunar system. Lee Billings reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Listeners can tell the difference between CD-quality music and better-than-CD quality—but only if they train their ears first. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The call of the tufted titmouse conveys important information about the presence of potential predators. But only if other birds can hear it. Karen Hopkin reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Urban light pollution in the U.K. is pushing tree springtime behavior a full week earlier than usual. Christopher Intagliata reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices