You open a social-media app to check one headline. A war update leads to a natural disaster, which leads to political outrage, an economic warning and a frightening health story. Twenty minutes later, you are still scrolling. You feel worse...
Read article
A solitary desert locust can spend its life trying to avoid other locusts. Put enough of them together, however, and something extraordinary begins to happen. The insects become more active,...
Read
Your passport knows exactly how old you are. Your cells are a more complicated matter. Two people born on the same day can reach middle age with very different cardiovascular health, physica...
Read
Few sights make the Moon seem more theatrical than an early-autumn moonrise. A huge amber disk appears behind trees, rooftops or distant hills, looking far larger than the Moon we see later...
Read
For many Americans, Labor Day means a three-day weekend, backyard cookouts, crowded beaches, college football and the unofficial end of summer. Retailers turn it into a sales event, swimming...
Read
For decades, coffee has occupied an awkward place in conversations about heart health. It contains caffeine, a stimulant that can temporarily raise blood pressure and make some people feel t...
Read
A mosquito bite is usually an itchy annoyance that disappears within a few days. During summer and early autumn in the United States, however, one particular mosquito-borne infection repeate...
Read
Few numbers can transform an ordinary convenience-store counter into a national obsession as quickly as a giant lottery jackpot. Once Powerball or Mega Millions climbs into the hundreds of m...
Read
On an autumn Sunday in the United States, a peculiar national clock starts ticking shortly before 1 p.m. Eastern Time. Televisions switch on. Fantasy lineups receive one last nervous inspect...
Read
There is ordinary tiredness—the heavy-eyed feeling after a late night, a long flight or an exhausting week—and then there is the more puzzling question: Why am I tired all the time? You slee...
Read