Nell Greenfieldboyce

Nell Greenfieldboyce appears in the following:

Fossil footprints mistakenly attributed to bears were made by early humans

Tuesday, April 12, 2022

A new look at some fossilized footprints shows that more than one species of human was walking upright around 3.6 million years ago. (This story originally aired on ATC on Dec. 2, 2021.)

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A worrisome new bird flu is spreading in American birds and may be here to stay

Saturday, April 09, 2022

Scientists are tracking a deadly bird flu outbreak that has infected wild birds in more than 30 states. Purging the nation's poultry supply may not be enough to keep the virus from sticking around.

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The light from this star that astronomers just spotted is 12.9 billion years old

Wednesday, March 30, 2022

Scientists using the Hubble Space Telescope have spotted light from what appears to be the most distant star ever seen. It offers a glimpse into an early moment in the history of the universe.

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This trick keeps snakes from suffocating as they squeeze and swallow their prey

Thursday, March 24, 2022

How do boa constrictors breathe while constricting their victims? A new study finds that snakes can switch which set of ribs they use to draw in air as they crush their meal before devouring it.

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Astronomy's contribution to climate change rivals the emissions from some countries

Monday, March 21, 2022

Building and operating telescopes can generate a lot of greenhouse gases. In fact, it's as if each astronomer in the world was driving more than 100,000 miles per year, a new study finds.

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The James Webb Space Telescope is working as well as astronomers dreamed it would

Wednesday, March 16, 2022

Picture perfect: Mission managers say the telescope's mirror segments have been aligned and have focused on single stars, a critical milestone, and the telescope is working flawlessly.

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The first images from NASA's new space telescope show how it's coming into focus

Friday, February 11, 2022

The James Webb Space Telescope has seen its first starlight, but its 18 mirror segments aren't yet perfectly aligned. As a result, the pictures it's sending back now aren't exactly cosmic eye candy.

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Encore: Freshly made plutonium from outer space found on ocean floor

Thursday, January 27, 2022

Common chemical elements are created in stars like our sun. But heavy elements, like iron, are thought to form in massive stars that explode and spew material — though it might be more complicated.

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The NIH is 'largely finished' moving its former research chimps to a sanctuary

Thursday, January 27, 2022

All chimps managed by the National Institutes of Health that are currently eligible to go to a sanctuary have been moved there, but animal welfare advocates say more should be allowed to go.

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Even babies and toddlers know that swapping saliva is a sure sign of love

Thursday, January 20, 2022

For infants, toddlers, and children, one sign of an especially close relationship is if two people do something that involves exchanging saliva, like taking bites from the same piece of food.

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Encore: Ancient footprints mistakenly attributed to bears were made by early humans

Tuesday, January 18, 2022

A new look at nearly 3.7 million-year-old fossil footprints uncovered in Tanzania shows that multiple species of early humans lived together at the same time.

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Scientists think they've found a big, weird moon in a far-off star system

Thursday, January 13, 2022

Scientists have found many planets orbiting distant stars, but so far no proof that any have moons. Now, researchers have detected signs of a large exomoon orbiting a Jupiter-like world.

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Who gets to use NASA's James Webb Space Telescope? Astronomers work to fight bias

Tuesday, January 11, 2022

With the James Webb Space Telescope safely deployed, many scientists want to use it. To minimize the effect of unconscious biases, they go through a process developed for the Hubble Space Telescope.

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NASA just launched the most powerful space telescope ever. Watch it here

Saturday, December 25, 2021

The James Webb Space Telescope blasted off from French Guinea at 7:20 a.m. ET on Saturday, Dec. 25. The NASA mission was decades in the making and should reveal the earliest galaxies in the universe.

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The calorie intake of a Baleen whale is mind-boggling

Friday, December 24, 2021

A study shows how much prey whales eat. It reveals how the global loss of whales changed ocean life in ways that may make it harder for them to rebound. (Story first aired on ATC on Nov. 11, 2021.)

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Why some astronomers once feared NASA's James Webb Space Telescope would never launch

Wednesday, December 22, 2021

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope is waiting at its launch site, after years of repeated delays and cost overruns. At one point, the giant new observatory was threatened with cancellation.

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Christmas Eve telescope launch has astronomers hoping for good tidings of great joy

Monday, December 20, 2021

As they count down the hours to the highly anticipated launch of NASA's powerful, $10 billion James Webb Space Telescope, astronomers hope for the best while fearing the worst.

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This new space telescope should show us what the universe looked like as a baby

Friday, December 17, 2021

The upcoming launch of NASA's powerful James Webb Space Telescope should let astronomers see what some of the universe's first stars and galaxies looked like soon after the Big Bang.

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NASA is about to launch the most powerful space telescope ever

Thursday, December 16, 2021

The James Webb Space Telescope will let astronomers peer farther into space than ever before, to see what galaxies looked like when the universe was newly born.

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Astronomers find a new planet that's mostly made of iron

Thursday, December 02, 2021

NASA's TESS telescope finds a small, iron-rich planet which could help explain the origins of Mercury, the innermost planet in our solar system

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