When the next big impact will be, nobody knows.

But the pressure is on to predict—and intercept—its arrival.

“Although we were initially quite skeptical that this planet could exist, as we continued to investigate its orbit and what it would mean for the outer solar system, we become increasingly convinced that it is out there.”
-Konstantin Batygin

The Curiosity Mars Rover is now smart enough to pick its own targets for exploration, according to a new study.

In an intriguing new paper published in the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series, Zimmerman et al. (2017) investigate the controversial topic of ocean acidification, or as they more correctly describe it, ocean carbonation.*

Solar energy is running into a pesky problem: air pollution worldwide.

Whether it’s using AI to help organize a Lego collection or relying on an algorithm to protect our cities, deep learning neural networks seemingly become more impressive and complex each day. Now, however, some scientists are pushing the capabilities of these algorithms to a whole new level – they’re trying to use them to read minds.

With all the talk about CO2 and global warming today, it’s odd that the heating mechanism to blame for this concern – the Greenhouse Effect – is seldom contemplated or discussed. Rather, it’s taken for granted.

In 1981, NASA’s James Hansen showed a Medieval Warm Period – based on temperatures in Greenland, California, and England.

Oklahomans are no strangers to Mother Nature’s whims. From tornadoes and floods to wildfires and winter storms, the state sees more than its share of natural hazards. But prior to 2009, “terra firma” in Oklahoma meant just that—earthquakes rarely shook the state.

Neanderthals treating toothaches?

A discovery of multiple toothpick grooves on teeth and signs of other manipulations by a Neanderthal of 130,000 years ago are evidence of a kind of prehistoric dentistry, according to a new study led by a University of Kansas researcher.

Seven years ago, a cover of The Economist showed Barack Obama, head down on a Louisiana beach in front of an oil rig — the picture of lonely despair. The image perfectly encapsulated the news magazine’s story about the massive pollution caused when BP’s Deepwater Horizon platform exploded, and what the president of the United States could possibly hope to do about it. But Obama was not alone when the picture was taken.

Water is often the focus of NASA’s many Martian scientific missions. It’s true, Mars was once a surprisingly watery world. But it also once featured large amounts of magmatic activity.

In spite all the harm and havoc volcanic eruptions can wreak—even the nonfatal ones—scientists still cannot reliably forecast them. Although they have had success predicting dozens of eruptions, they lack a standard method.

Technology to capture and store carbon dioxide (CO2) is too expensive and will “never be viable,” according to a former World Bank adviser.

Feathered dinosaurs that walked on two legs and had parrot-like beaks shared another characteristic with modern birds—they brooded clutches of eggs at a temperature similar to chickens, a study showed Wednesday.

An artificial network was able to detect rare, super-fast stars through the Milky Way, thanks to an AI that was collecting data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia probe.