Don't Bogart My Blog: Science Times: Milk Is Not Just for Mammals

Plus: A.I. Shows Promise as a Physician Assistant —

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Monday, February 11, 2019

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Marcos Chin

Everywhere in the Animal Kingdom, Followers of the Milky Way

By NATALIE ANGIER

As scientists learn more about milk's evolution and compositional variations, they are redefining what used to be a signature characteristic of mammals.

A rehabilitated pangolin in a park in Vietnam. Pangolins are critically endangered, their meat a delicacy in southern China and their scales a prized ingredient in traditional Chinese medicine.

Suzi Eszterhas/Minden Pictures

Hong Kong, Crossroads of the Criminal Wildlife Trade

By CHARLES HOMANS

Despite reforms, the territory is a linchpin in the global traffic in illegal animal parts.

Doctors competed against A.I. computers to recognize illnesses on magnetic resonance images of a human brain during a competition in Beijing last year. The human doctors lost.

Mark Schiefelbein/Associated Press

A.I. Shows Promise as a Physician Assistant

By CADE METZ

A neural network analyzed the medical records of 600,000 hospital patients in China, and diagnosed their conditions as accurately as doctors did in some cases.

Melati, a female Sumatran tiger, was killed by a potential mate when the two animals were introduced for the first time at London Zoo.

Kirsty Wigglesworth/Associated Press

A First Date for Two Rare Tigers Ends in Death at London Zoo

By YONETTE JOSEPH

London Zoo's female Sumatran tiger, Melati, was fatally mauled by Asim, a male brought from Denmark as a potential mate.

• Could the London Zoo Tiger Death Have Been Avoided?

Jay Amster, Sea Education Association | Sea Semester

A Young Island on Earth May Reveal Clues to How Water Shaped Mars

By NIRAJ CHOKSHI

NASA has closely studied the island, created four years ago by a volcanic eruption in the Pacific. Recently, one of its scientists was able to travel there to take on-the-ground measurements.

A cardinal that appears to be half male and half female roosts in a backyard in Erie, Pa.

Shirley Caldwell

A Rare Bird Indeed: A Cardinal That's Half Male, Half Female

By KAREN WEINTRAUB

In a backyard in Erie, Pa., an unusual cardinal has appeared, displaying both male and female traits. Scientists say it may be a so-called gynandromorph.

Rebecca Bliege Bird

Aboriginal Hunters' Fires Help Restore an Australian Desert

By JOANNA KLEIN

A study of how the Martu shaped their land presents an example where humans seem to benefit an environment perceived as wilderness.

Scientists have revised the timing of the impending collision between the Milky Way and the Andromeda Galaxy; it will occur 600 million years later than previously thought.

JPL/NASA

Andromeda Is Coming for Our Milky Way Galaxy, Eventually

By DENNIS OVERBYE

Traveling at 68 miles per second, a nearby galaxy is still coming to consume us, just 600 million years later than expected.

The Steamboat Geyser, emitting a relatively small jet of steam in Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming in May. At full power, its plumes can reach heights of more than 300 feet.

Rachel Leathe/Bozeman Daily Chronicle, via Associated Press

Yellowstone's Steamboat Geyser Is Gushing at a Record Pace

By JIM ROBBINS

It's the talk of the national park these days, erupting a record 32 times last year and keeping up its showstopping pace this winter.

The cancerous leg bone of a 240-million-year-old Pappochelys, a shell-less ancestor of turtles, is the oldest known case of cancer in an amniote, a group that includes reptiles, birds and mammals.

Brian Engh

The Patient Had Bone Cancer. The Diagnosis Arrived 240 Million Years Too Late.

By ASHER ELBEIN

The fossil of an ancient animal teaches a sad lesson: Cancer has been around for a very, very long time.

The Dolmen di Sa Coveccada, an ancient megalithic grave, in Sardinia, Italy.

Bettina Schulz Paulsson

Ancient European Stone Monuments Said to Originate in Northwest France

By JAMES GORMAN

Research on Stone Age tombs throughout Europe offers a new answer to an old debate on where and when the iconic stone works were first built.

A Snares crested penguin on Enderby Island, off the southern coast of New Zealand. A subspecies of crested penguin on the Chatham Islands, east of New Zealand, was probably eaten to extinction by humans.

Islands Helped Penguins Evolve. Then Hungry Humans Showed Up.

By WILLIAM DICKE

Q&A

What keeps squirrels from gaining huge amounts of weight as they gorge on acorns and nuts each fall?

By C. CLAIBORNE RAY

GIVE US A PIECE OF YOUR UNIVERSE

We welcome your comments and suggestions at sciencenewsletter@nytimes.com.

Climate Change

Wind turbines in southern California. The state has set a deadline to get 100 percent of its electricity from zero-carbon sources by 2045.

Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times, via Getty Images

A 'Green New Deal' Is Far From Reality, but Climate Action Is Picking Up in the States

By BRAD PLUMER

The midterm elections brought in a new wave of governors with aggressive plans to cut emissions and expand low-carbon energy. Now, those plans are being implemented.

Commuters in Chicago on Jan. 29, when the temperature dipped to negative 10 degrees.

Joshua Lott for The New York Times

For a Climate Reporter, a Dreaded Question: 'Then Why Is It So Cold?'

By KENDRA PIERRE-LOUIS

When temperatures dip, we hear it over and over. Here's the answer — and why it matters.

Health

Once ingested, a tiny device called Soma positions itself against the stomach wall and injects insulin into the bloodstream.

Frankel Traverso

A High-Tech Pill to End Drug Injections

By GINA KOLATA

Engineers have developed a tiny robotic capsule that injects insulin once it lands in the stomach.

Gracia Lam

Personal Health

A New Treatment for a Painful Penis Curvature

By JANE E. BRODY

Encouraging men to seek help for Peyronie's disease, a condition that can make sex difficult.

iStock

Sometimes, Parenting Is Boring

By PERRI KLASS, M.D.

Taking care of a young child can be the most fascinating thing in the world, but there are times, let's face it, when it is not.

Mark Abramson for The New York Times

What Is Late-Term Abortion? Trump Got It Wrong

By PAM BELLUCK

In his State of the Union address, he used scary imagery that scientists say is incorrect.

Doris L. Wethers performed a dissection in an anatomy class at Yale Medical School in 1948. She went on to open sickle cell anemia programs at three hospitals, conduct research and help draft landmark legislation in New York to require screening of infants for the disorder.

via Wethers Family

Dr. Doris Wethers, 91, on Front Lines Against Sickle Cell, Dies

By SAM ROBERTS

Breaking racial barriers in New York's medical world, she earned renown for research and advocacy that led to mandatory testing for sickle cell anemia.

Earl Wilson/The New York Times

Can You Get Too Much Exercise? What the Heart Tells Us

By GRETCHEN REYNOLDS

Men who exercised the most tended to have more arterial plaque and higher calcium scores. But they were less likely to die prematurely from a heart attack.