Ethan Siegel, Forbes
We're always on the lookout for the next big thing, and even our best guesswork is often terrible at anticipating exactly where it will come from. In the 19th century, we were arguing over whether combustion or gravitation powered the Sun, never suspecting the process of nuclear fusion was at play.
Charlotte Huff, Knowable Magazine
The suicide rate in the United States continues to spiral upward, with seemingly no end in sight. More than 45,000 Americans take their own lives each year, 33 percent more than did so in 1999, according to the most recent federal data.
Alexandra Witze, Nature
NASA's identical-twin astronauts, Scott and Mark Kelly, are back to being nearly identical. That's the verdict of a study that tracked how Scott's body changed during a nearly year-long spaceflight in 2015-16, while Mark stayed on Earth. Many of the genetic, biochemical and other changes that had affected Scott mostly disappeared once he returned from space, researchers reported on 11 April in Science.
Jennifer Ouellette, Ars
During the 1950s and 1960s, US spy planes made regular flights across Europe, Central Asia, and the Middle East, photographing the terrain to track military targets. A chunk of the Middle Eastern photographs were declassified in 1997, and now those airborne images are helping archaeologists track changing features in the landscape that in many cases are no longer visible today, according to a new paper published in Advances in Archaeological Practice.
Beth Mole, Ars Tech
A decade-long observational study of more than 30,000 people finds that certain vitamins and minerals may help extend your life and keep you from dying of cardiovascular diseasebut only if you get those beneficial nutrients from foods, not supplements.
George Dvorsky, Gizmodo
New research based on experiments done on the International Space Station shows that mice adapt quickly to microgravity conditions. Unexpectedly, however, some of the mice began to exhibit a rather curious circling behavior, zipping around the walls of their metal cage with reckless abandon.