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Does your cat pick up your accent? These researchers want to find out

As any pet owner will tell you, cats are great at manipulating us.

India's Bakey edible spoon does two of my favorite things: limits dishes and plastic waste

India-based company Bakeys has started producing edible spoons to try and fight world-wide plastic waste from disposable cutlery. Not only eco-friendly, but also delicious!

A woman's tweet sparked a much needed discussion about food and waste... but there's a twist

A London-based customer of Whole Foods tweeted a photo of peeled oranges, packed in plastic. Her photo and comments are on point.

Japanese fleet returns with 333 slaughtered whales, most of them pregnant females

The Japanese whaling fleet has returned home with a gruesome catch

The coal industry alone consumes as much water as 1 billion people, report shows

We all know the coal industry's shortcomings and negative impacts - it pollutes, it releases CO2 into the atmosphere and so on.

No safe haven in Africa: African rhinos are being relocated to Australia for protection against poachers

In most parts of Africa, rhinos are hunted to extinction. Out of desperation, authorities have opted for an unlikely solution.

Enjoy your ice cream while you still can - we may be having a vanilla crisis this year

It’s been a bad year for vanilla growers in Madagascar. The African island is the world’s biggest producer of this tasty commodity, and this year’s poor harvest could bring the prices up by 150%, or even create a global vanilla shortage. A while ago, we were telling you about the global chocolate shortage the world […]

After 115 years of history, Scotland closes its very last coal-fired plant

The largest and last coal-fired plant in operation in Scotland was officially shut down, marking an end to an 115-years-long history of burning coal in the country.

Very rare waterfall-climbing fish can walk like a salamander

Found in only eight caves on the border of Thailand and Myanmar, this eyeless fish can walk.

We're dealing with an environmental activist murder ‘epidemic’, U.N. warns

The U.N. urges governments to ensure proper protection for environmentalists, especially in vulnerable areas like Central and South America.

Dogs labeled as 'pit bull' wait three times longer to be adopted

Pit bulls have a really bad rap, being thought of as an aggressive and potentially killer dog breed. These accounts are highly exaggerated, but that doesn't stop many people to discriminate them, as well as those breeds that have the misfortune to marginally resemble pit bulls.

Prairie dogs murder ground squirrels to stave off competition for food

Prairie dogs aren't as innocent as they look. Researchers have documented as the animals slaughter ground squirrels for control over food. This is the first time this sort of behaviour was documented among omnivores.

Donald Trump: 'I am not a great believer in man-made climate change'

GOP Presidential candidate Donald Trump met with the The Washington Post’s editorial board on Monday. For a full hour he spilled all sorts of non-nonsensical gibberish in his typical fashion: dodging questions and roll-out.

Turn Guantánamo Into a Marine Research Station, Scholars Say

When Obama became president, one of his promises was to close the Guantánamo Bay Detention Facility. Now, as he’s nearing the end of his second term, he reiterated that idea, expressing his desire to close it. Two academics have come up with a creative solution to that problem: turning it into a marine research station. The […]

1.8 billion people will face water scarcity by 2025: UN

Less than a decade from now, every one in four people on Earth might be suffering from extreme water scarcity, UN statistics claim. Also, two thirds of the global population will be living in water-stressed conditions.

Europe might lose its ash trees forever

Europe is likely to lose all its ash trees, the largest-ever survey of the species warns. Plagued by both a fungal disease known as ash-dieback and an invasive species of beetle, the emerald ash borer, the tree might be wiped clean off of the continent.

Slow-Life time lapse video gives a beautiful glimpse into the life of corals

If you've ever seen one up close you probably know that corals are insanely beautiful, but not exactly action packed -- these animals live at their own pace, one so slow that to a human being they might seem frozen in time. But what would coral look like if it lived in 'normal' speed?

Climate change is impacting wine grape harvest dates in Switzerland and France, NASA finds

A new collaboration study between NASA and Harvard University found that climate change is breaking an important link between droughts and the grape harvests in France and Switzerland.

More Americans than ever acknowledge climate change is real

On the heels of the warmest winter on record, a Gallup poll found a record number of Americans perceive global warming as a serious threat. It doesn't sound like a coincidence.

Carbon emissions rate unprecedented in the past 66 million years

About 55.8 million years, the rate of carbon emissions grew abruptly, leading to a period of massive warming. But today's rate of emissions is ten times higher.

All of 2015's weather, in a stunning 4K time-lapse video.

The European Meteorological Satellite Organization (EUMETSAT) in collaboration with the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released a time-lapse 4K video of the weather of 2015 -- and it's awesome.

Doubling renewable energy by 2030: not only feasible -- it's expensive not to

The International Renewable Energy Agency claims doubling worldwide renewable energy capacity fifteen years from now would provide savings which far exceed the costs.

Charge nano-map could help scientists turn perovskite into THE solar cell material

Despite solar cells made with perovskite recently crossed the 20 percent efficiency mark, researchers say there's still room to improve if only they knew how charge flows at the nanometer scale. They just had to ask.

Storks stop migrating in the winter because of junk food

. University of East Anglia researchers say storks prefer to live in Spain and Portugal because there's plenty of junk food lying around landfill sites. The latest surveys suggests the birds now live and nest there all year long.

Tesco, world's second largest food retailer, to give all unsold food to charity

If we want to ensure food security for humanity in the future, then curbing out food waste is essential. Tesco is taking steps in the right direction, agreeing to a deal to donate all unsold food from its stores to charity.

More than 13 million Americans could be at risk from sea level rise by 2100

A new study analyzing sea level rise forecasts as well as population growth projections found that we've underestimated just how many people would be impacted by rising waters. Anywhere from 4.3 to 13.1 million people from the US alone will face the risk of inundation by 2100, according to their estimate.

February obliterates global heat records, according to NASA

It's easy to understand why climate change deniers want to cut NASA's climate research funding - because it keeps proving them wrong.

No web, no worries -- spiders also like to eat vegetarian

Spiders' diets aren't limited to juicy insect bits. They spice up their menus with vegetarian courses too, zoologists from the US and UK have found.

Research team grows "dinosaur legs" on a chicken for the first time

Researchers have manipulated the genome of chicken embryos so that they develop dinosaur-like bones in their lower legs.

Evolution selects the most effective genes -- even by a hundredth of a percent

A new study measuring the forces that shape bacterial genomes determined that a difference in efficiency of hundredth of a percent is sufficient to determine the winners and losers in the evolutionary race.

South Africa bans leopard hunt for 2016

It costs $20,000 to shoo a leopard, and foreign hunters flock to South Africa every year to kill leopards for trophy hunting. This year, because leopard numbers remain nuclear, South Africa has decided to ban hunting for the year. The South African National Biodiversity Institute, a government research organisation, recommended the temporary ban because they […]

Active Fault Line Discovered Directly Below Japanese Nuclear Power Plant

New concerns are being voiced in Japan after it was discovered that a significant geological fault line passes right under a nuclear plant - and the fault is active.

First plastic-eating bacteria might one day help solve our trash problems

Japanese researchers have identified a bacteria that eats PET, a kind of plastic widely employed for bottles. This is the first time such an organism has been found, and others like it -- maybe more versatile in their preference for plastic -- might be found.

Asian bats resistant to white-nose syndrome that's killing millions of North American bats

In just 7 years, a disease called white-nose syndrome has killed more than 5 million North American bats, almost wiping out entire colonies across 25 states. In Asia however, bats that are exposed to the same disease-carrying fungus are infected in far lesser numbers.

Dallas Zoo welcomes iconic, adorable new baby lizards

The Dallas Zoo has taken an active role in the protection of Texas Horned Lizards, also known as horny toads. Now, they’ve released adorable pictures of the new hatchlings, which will help ensure the survival of this iconic species. Affectionately called “horny toads”, they are in fact lizards, not moist-skinned toads or frogs. The Texas Horned Lizard, […]

Renewable plastic made from CO2 and waste agriculture

Making bottles to meet America’s demand for bottled water uses more than 17 million barrels of oil annually, enough to fuel 1.3 million cars for a year. Instead of petroleum, Stanford researchers have found a creative way to make plastic for bottles sourced from CO2 and inedible plants like waste agriculture or grasses.

Eight animal species named after celebrities

It's common for species to be named after a person, most often the scientist who first discovered them. Recently, many biologists have resorted to naming new species to science after celebrities to spark interest among laymen, especially if the new species is endangered.

A bird uses syntax to convey meaning, a first among non-human animals

The Japanese great tit, a bird closely related to the more familiar North American chickadee, uses complex calls in different contexts to convey different meaning. These "words" are stringed together to form compound messages -- evidence of a sophisticated communication system based on syntax. This is the first time syntax has been shown to occur in non-human animals.

Too ugly for science? 'Ugly' rodents and bats receive less scientific attention

A study conducted by Australian researchers found that scientific journals discourage the study of ‘ugly’ rodents and bats.

India's big move into solar energy is already paying off

India's massive investment into solar energy is already starting to pay off - much earlier than anticipated.

Is the impact of climate change on agriculture underestimated?

A new paper suggests that we've been overlooking how two key human responses to climate -- the total area farmed and the number of crops planted -- will impact food production in the future.

UK set to unveil the world's largest floating solar array

The largest floating solar array in the world is to be unveiled later this month, on the Queen Elizabeth II reservoir, at Walton-on-Thames. The array is estimated to generate almost 6 million kWh in its maiden year of operations. The energy will be used to power London's water treatment plants.

Oxytocin seals bond between mother and child

Seals from colonies on the North Atlantic island of North Rona that had higher levels of the hormone oxytocin in their blood stay closer to pups. This suggests that the hormone, often called the love hormone because of its role in love and in female reproductive biological functions, is paramount to forming mother-child bond.

This one amoeba could hold the secret to fixing immune deficiencies in humans

These predatory amoebas are usually very good at finding enough to eat by themselves, but when food is short they do something astonishing.

Fungus turns frogs into sex zombies, but then kills off whole species

A new study of Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), a deadly fungus which affects amphibians worldwide, found that it spreads by making males' mating calls more attractive to females. The pathogen alters the reproductive habits of different species of amphibians, explaining why frogs and related species continue to disappear across the globe.

Breeding birds use alligators to protect nests from egg-eaters

Breeding birds and alligators have developed an unlikely partnership, where the birds build their nests on alligator territory for protection.

Leonardo DiCaprio may be a hypocrite, but climate change is still real. Don't get distracted

This week Hollywood actor Leonardo DiCaprio won his very first Academy award for best actor. Of course, he was there and took the stage for his acceptance speech. What happened next didn't surprise those familiar with DiCaprio's concerns outside the movie business: he spoke about the imminent threat of climate change, calling it ‘the most existential crisis our civilization has ever known.’

Shelter dogs were used to retrieve balls during Brazil Open – and it was awesome

Four shelter dogs rescued from the slums around Sao Paulo, Brazil, were trained as “ball dogs” for an exhibition match at the Brazil Tennis Open tournament. Not only was it a heartmelting and emotional moment, but it also went pretty well, as you can see: The dogs seemed to enjoy the task, despite the stressful environment […]

People spend more on climate adaptability to protect capital, not lives

A research team from University College in London has calculated that in the last five years, the ten biggest cities have increased their climate adaptation spending by a quarter. But they also found that it’s capital, not people, that we’re investing the most  to protect. Beyond the moral implications this entails, it also means that poor […]

Eco-certificates do in fact help curb deforestation

Many consumers now choose to exclusively buy products labeled with an eco-certificate which supposedly testifies that manufacturing was made in sustainable manner. Do these actually work? One of the few studies on the subject seems to suggest that the impact is positive, at least in Chile and related to deforestation.