Sarah Lewin Frasier

Interstellar Meteors Are Probably Hitting Earth All the Time, Scientists Say Astronomers think small space rocks from beyond our solar system routinely strike Earth—but proving it isn’t easy

Now on @sciam.bsky.social, from @philplait.bsky.social:

The sky is falling—from another star.

There's no "Chicken Little" nonsense here, though—this is legit: Some fraction of the meteors that streak thru Earth's skies are from beyond the solar system!

www.scientificamerican.com/article/inte...

How Logical Are You? Test Your Skills With These Problems from the New International Logic Olympiad In only its second year, the International Logic Olympiad is already booming as logic becomes more and more crucial in our ever changing world

Feel like breaking your brain a little? The latest from @dodecalemma.bsky.social: www.scientificamerican.com/article/try-... - try the puzzles reliable sources say it's "too 'after 4pm' for"!

worms worms worms worms WORMS WORMS WORMS WORMS

YouTube video by Scientific American What is Scientific American?

We finally made it to Bluesky—just a few billion years after the Big Bang, and only slightly late to the party ✨🌌

We’re sharing some of our best stories from the year so far to kick off our Bluesky journey!

Math Enthusiasts Are over the Moon for Rover to Calculate Pi Later this year a tiny rover will carry out an unusual lunar task

I can't quite pinpoint why, but a certain book by @scalzi.com is going through my head as I contemplate this headline...

Here’s Your Cheat Sheet for Vaccine Recommendations Backed by Science These graphics will guide you through science-based vaccine guidelines for children and adults

Vaccination schedules on the CDC website have already started changing under RFK Jr. So we published a guide to the evidence-based vaccine recommendations in place *before* all 17 members of the advisory panel were abruptly dismissed by the new admin. www.scientificamerican.com/article/see-... 🧪

Inside the Secret Meeting Where Mathematicians Struggled to Outsmart AI The world's leading mathematicians were stunned by how adept artificial intelligence is at doing their jobs

Mathematicians are jittery after AI proves shockingly good at outsmarting them www.scientificamerican.com/article/insi...

Pretty sure Apple TV shows drop at 9pm the night before! At least for the Friday timeslot.

The Geological Heart of Venus Still Beats Today, New Study Suggests A reappraisal of decades-old data suggests that strange circular formations on Venus could be volcanic “rings of fire” created by ongoing geological activity

Venus is alive! ... sort of. No aliens this time, just rocks.

There are weird circle-y volcanic on Venus called coronae, and now scientists think that they're itty bitty baby circular subduction zones! How cool is that? 🧪🔭

Me for @sciam.bsky.social:

www.scientificamerican.com/article/stra...

Prepare for ‘Sex, Drugs and Zombies’—Brood XIV Cicadas Are Coming As 17-year cicadas emerge this spring, a zombifying fungus is waiting for them

It's a cicada sex party! Wait, who invited the zombies?

Periodical cicadas in Brood XIV are starting to appear, and so is the fungus Massospora cicadina, which infects and zombifies the cicadas. I wrote about what scientists hope to learn from Brood XIV cicada zombies, for @sciam.bsky.social 🧪

Carnivorous ‘Bone Collector’ Caterpillars Wear Corpses as Camouflage Nicknamed the “bone collector,” this newly confirmed caterpillar in Hawaii secretly scrounges off a spider landlord by covering itself with dead insect body parts

This caterpillar is metal as hell 🤘

🧪

This one is truly baffling to me. Will send it along, as always. (BTW, I personally spell "schlep" with a c!)

Scientific American Curiosities: Seeing Double Feeling curious? Fill in the missing words from some of our strangest science stories!

“After 13 years of staring at the heads of twin and singleton babies, [Marjolaine Willems and her colleagues’] paper on the association between global hemisphere and _____ won the 2024 IgNobel prize in anatomy.”

a. follicle density; b. scalp pointiness; c. hair whorl formation; d. bad hair days

Widening Highways Doesn’t Fix Traffic. Here’s What Can Highway widening projects usually don’t solve congestion, but less expensive toll programs known as congestion pricing can. Here’s why

www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-...
"Congestion gets better for a little bit, and then we’re back to where we were. And then somebody says, ‘Oh, we’ve got to widen again.' ... So how far is it going to go?”

Why Private Forecasting Companies Can’t Replace the National Weather Service NOAA and the NWS provide public weather data that private companies cannot recreate

This is a really nice, simple distillation of the vital role NOAA and the NWS play and how private companies cannot replace what they do.

Twitter post screenshot of the San Miguel Sheriff account. 5 years ago they posted about a boulder on the road but referred to it as "Large boulder the size of a small boulder".

Happy 5th "Large boulder the size of a small boulder" anniversary! #Geology ⚒️

Here’s What Caused the Rare, Record Florida Snow A perfect confluence of an Arctic air outbreak and a low-pressure system that pulled in moisture from the Gulf of Mexico brought rare, record snow to the Gulf Coast

Why the heck did it snow so much on the Gulf Coast? Basically a perfect confluence of events. 🧪

Tech glitch this morning for people without SciAm logins but our developers worked it out! (Also, I took up "muons" with management, since we should definitely have that word.)

This week we have both a mini-crossword and Spellements :)

Just hang in there 'til Friday!

This is just an experiment! We're looking at the data to figure out how often these different games should run.

Mini-Crossword: January 6, 2025 Your favorite word game with a science twist. Play now.

This week at SciAm, check out new science mini-crosswords Monday-Thursday! www.scientificamerican.com/game/mini-cr... Spellements will be back on Friday; it's a good time to catch up on the back catalogue... www.scientificamerican.com/games/spelle...

We're trying out mini-crosswords this week instead from Monday to Thursday, but Spellements will be back on Friday! Sorry to break up any streaks

a photo of two grapes suggestively positioned on either side of a stripped optical fiber. a vertical straight copper wire is equidistant from each grape

they did quantum physics on a grape!
(credit: Fawaz, Nair, Volz)
journals.aps.org/prapplied/ab...

Worth the login to watch a bee sucker punch an ant

Generative AI is good for a few things, but it's been clear for a while now that search is not one of them!

What do you love when you fall for AI? Inside the surprisingly meaningful, unexpectedly heartbreaking, and deeply confusing reality of AI relationships.

This was published while I was at the National Assembly so I never really got a chance to promote it, which is kind of insane? It's one of the best features that The Verge has ever published. When I first read the draft I went "what the fuck did I just read??????" www.theverge.com/c/24300623/a...

One of the things I'm most excited about is our new monthly crosswords tied to Scientific American issues—soon to be in print as well as online! Here's the latest.

Here's a why and here is a how:

bsky.app/profile/drem...