Don't Bogart My Blog: Science Times: Saving the Bats, One Cave at a Time

Plus: Searching Tardigrades for Lifesaving Secrets —

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Tuesday, February 19, 2019

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A Western small-footed bat being wrested from its torpor and collected for study. Kim Raff for The New York Times

Saving the Bats, One Cave at a Time

By JIM ROBBINS

Biologists are searching caves and abandoned mines in the West, hoping to spare many species of the winged creatures from the devastating fungus, white-nose syndrome.

Tardigrades have special proteins that scientists believe help them achieve suspended animation.

Steve Gschmeissner/Science Source

Searching Tardigrades for Lifesaving Secrets

By STEPH YIN

Researchers are drawing inspiration from the proteins that they think let hearty water bears cheat time by decelerating their biology.

A chemistry laboratory at the Sorbonne, in Paris, around 1900. Psychologists have found that people generate more ideas when working alone or in smaller groups.

ND/Roger Viollet, via Getty Images

Can Big Science Be Too Big?

By BENEDICT CAREY

A new study finds that small teams of researchers do more innovative work than large teams do.

Edray Goins frequently asked himself whether he was right to factor race into the challenges he faced:

Jared Soares for The New York Times

For a Black Mathematician, What It's Like to Be the 'Only One'

By AMY HARMON

Fewer than 1 percent of doctorates in math are awarded to African-Americans. Edray Goins, who earned one of them, found the upper reaches of the math world a challenging place.

Gracia Lam

Personal Health

The Case Against Cough Medicine

By JANE E. BRODY

Evidence is sorely lacking for the value of any over-the-counter remedy to treat most coughs.

Yin Bogua/Xinhua, via Getty Images

In Science, as in Sports, the Sidelines Matter

By DENNIS OVERBYE

Tomorrow's Nobel prizes are won today off-season and in the back office.

Kephra Beckett

Inside the Spittlebug's Bubble Home

By JAMES GORMAN

Those foamy eruptions on garden plants protect a slow and steady sap drinker that is growing into a froghopper. But it has to stick its hind end out to breathe.

Drumlins, sedimentary rock formations made by fast-moving ice floes in Namibia.

West Virginia University

An Icy Superhighway Once Carried Glaciers From Namibia to Brazil

By ROBIN GEORGE ANDREWS

Researchers matched up a jigsaw puzzle of ice that once flowed between two landmasses now separated by an ocean.

A C.T. scan of the foot of a 99 million-year-old bird whose feathers, not visible on the scan, were preserved in amber.

Lida Xing et al.

Birds of a Feather May Stick Together, but This Bird's Foot Got Stuck in Amber

By NICHOLAS ST. FLEUR

Researchers say the feathered specimen known as "Ugly Foot" or "Hobbit Foot" offers long-sought clues to the evolutionary path of birds.

A young female black leopard was spotted in the Laikipia Wilderness Camp in Kenya. She appeared five times in footage from February to April 2018.

Will Burrard-Lucas/Camtraptions

Africa's Black Panthers Emerge From a Century in the Shadows

By ILIANA MAGRA

The last documented sighting of the animals on the continent was in Ethiopia in 1909. But now they've been spotted in Kenya.

Nina Burleigh, the author, dives near the Pink Beach snorkel site off the coast of Bonaire. The Caribbean island offers a beacon of hope for coral reefs.

Erik Freeland for The New York Times

Bonaire: Where Coral and Cactus Thrive, and the Sea Soothes the Soul

By NINA BURLEIGH

In a dying reef world, the writer explores the underwater bliss of a little Caribbean island that is showing the world just how to save coral.

What's Pink and Pinstriped and Digests Wood? This New Shipworm

By VERONIQUE GREENWOOD

A custodian in Death Valley National Park, which would gain 40,000 acres under the measure.

Senate Passes a Sweeping Land Conservation Bill

By CORAL DAVENPORT

Manfred Eigen during a lecture in 1979. His research helped chemists gain a much greater understanding of enzymes, among other things.

Manfred Eigen, 91, Nobel Winner Who Put a Clock to Chemicals, Dies

By DANIEL E. SLOTNIK

Q&A

At my uncle's farm, many years ago, there was a plum tree growing near the outhouse. The family never ate that fruit. Was that precaution necessary?

By C. CLAIBORNE RAY

GIVE US A PIECE OF YOUR UNIVERSE

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

Climate Change

How to Cut U.S. Emissions Faster? Do What These Countries Are Doing.

By BRAD PLUMER AND BLACKI MIGLIOZZI

How the United States could cut emissions in half, using policies that other countries already have in place.

Greta Thunberg, center, skips school on Fridays to demonstrate for climate action at the Swedish Parliament in Stockholm.

Elisabeth Ubbe for The New York Times

Becoming Greta: 'Invisible Girl' to Global Climate Activist, With Bumps Along the Way

By SOMINI SENGUPTA

A Swedish girl's solitary act of civil disobedience has turned her into a symbol for climate action. But her path hasn't been easy.

Health

Danielle Teuscher and her daughter, Zoe Fordney. With widespread genetic testing, sperm donor anonymity

Moriah Ratner for The New York Times

A Mother Learns the Identity of Her Child's Grandmother. A Sperm Bank Threatens to Sue.

By JACQUELINE MROZ

The results of a consumer genetic test identified the mother of the man whose donated sperm was used to conceive Danielle Teuscher's daughter. Legal warnings soon followed.

Monika Broecker gave birth to her daughter, Emilia, using a donated embryo.

Katrina Britney Davis for The New York Times

Embryo 'Adoption' Is Growing, but It's Getting Tangled in the Abortion Debate

By CAROLINE LESTER

Many agencies that offer donated embryos, including most of those supported by federal grants, are affiliated with Christian or anti-abortion rights organizations.

Kinsa Health

They've Taken America's Temperature — and It's Running High

By DONALD G. MCNEIL JR.

Data from Kinsa, which makes internet-connected smart thermometers, indicates it's a bad year for colds, but not the flu.

The new drug is a nasal spray that delivers the active ingredients of ketamine, widely used as an anesthetic.

Teresa Crawford/Associated Press

F.D.A. Panel Recommends New Depression Treatment

By BENEDICT CAREY

The active ingredients of ketamine, a popular club drug, show promise in battling deep despair.

Mark Abramson for The New York Times

What You and Your Family Need to Know About Maternal Depression

By PAM BELLUCK

A government panel's new recommendations could bring hope to many women at risk for the condition. Here is what the group said and how you can use the information.