December 30, 2025 2 min read Add Us On GoogleAdd SciAm Whooping Cough Deaths Rise in U.S. as Surge in Infections Continues The brutal respiratory infection has infected tens of thousands and killed at least 13 people in the U.S. in 2025 By Meghan Bartels edited by Claire Cameron Peter Dazeley/Getty Images Whooping cough cases…
An image captured by a telescope at the Grasslands Observatory in Arizona. The “x” is where E. E. Barnard saw his mystery star Tim Hunter et al. (2025) A star that was spotted in 1892 by one of the most gifted astronomical observers of all time but then apparently vanished has been found again –…
December 30, 2025 2 min read Add Us On GoogleAdd SciAm NIH Agrees to Evaluate Stalled Scientific Grants Health officials have agreed to assess pending medical research grants after a Trump administration antidiversity purge put them on ice By Dan Vergano edited by Claire Cameron Thomas Fuller/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images The U.S. National Institutes of Health…
A smooth cacio e pepe pasta sauce can be hard to achieve Brent Hofacker/Alamy Scientists’ new recipes for a classic pasta dish and boiled eggs were among the most talked-about science stories of 2025, provoking delight and fury in equal measure. In January, Ivan Di Terlizzi at the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of…
Everything old is new again: These paleontological discoveries of 2025 — from tiny dinosaurs to zombifying fungi — opened up brand-new insights into the distant past. Nanotyrannus grows up A famous fossil known as Dueling Dinosaurs depicts this small tyrannosaur, now identified as an adult Nanotyrannus lancensis. Analyses of its snout (shown) reveal several ways in…
The DNA tape can store vastly more information than a standard cassette Jiankai Li et al. 2025 In a new take on a technology from the 1960s, this year, researchers created a cassette tape that uses DNA instead of iron oxide to encode information on a plastic tape. It can hold a phenomenal amount of…
The James Webb Space Telescope detected an atmosphere on a lava-covered exoplanet, evidence that small planets close to stars can have atmospheres.
On June 11, 2018, seeking relief from chronic pancreatitis pain, Ashley Romero took what she believed to be half a pill of Percocet. Within minutes, she was dead. The pill, which Romero’s boyfriend had acquired on the black market, was packed with fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that can be fatal in doses the size of…
plainpicture/Nordic Life/Terje Rakke As 2025 draws to a close, it is traditional to look back at the year that was and forward to what may come next. Many of us will be considering New Year’s resolutions, such as getting fitter, eating better and boosting our immune system – but how do you know if your…
The mRNA cancer vaccines now in development come with large economic benefits Eugene/Getty Images In August 2025, the US cut half a billion dollars in funding for vaccine development. This put the potential benefits of mRNA cancer vaccines at risk – benefits that could be worth around $75 billion a year in the US alone,…
