The World from PRX

ES

Elizabeth Shockman

Elizabeth Shockman is a freelance journalist who lives in the Twin Cities. Previously she worked as a staff member and freelancer, reporting primarily from Moscow and around Russia.
A vaquita.
Environment
This is the controversial plan underway to save the endangered whale-like vaquita
Voting booths. Credit: Shutterstock
Election 2016
There’s work to be done to make US elections secure — and it has nothing to do with voter ID
Science
The physics behind the world’s fastest swim strokes
Danny McBride as Neal Gamby in “Vice Principals” (Fred Norris / HBO)
Media
Danny McBride isn’t a jerk — he just plays one on TV
A pair of rats, from Shutterstock
Environment
Why New Zealand is going all out to kill its rats, possums
Technology
Where is modern cloning, 20 years after Dolly?
A freshwater snail
Health
Why snails are one of the world’s deadliest creatures
A Marbled emperor moth
Science
The end of summer is coming. Have you been mothing yet?
A lab
Science
Should the government mandate free access to taxpayer-funded research?
Science
Watch this slow-motion video of attacking electric eels
Margaret Hamilton, lead Apollo flight software designer, inside the Command Module. Credit: NASA
Science
The women who made communication with outer space possible
Viggo Mortensen as Ben in “Captain Fantastic”
Culture
Viggo Mortensen goes off the grid for ‘Captain Fantastic’
A general view of the site of a suicide car bomb attack
Conflict
How math can help us understand terrorist networks
Sophie Scott performing stand up at the Bright Club, an organization through University College London that allows professors to become comedians for a night (Steve Cross )
Culture
This is your brain on laughter
Chris Gethard (Smallz & Raskind / Getty)
Arts
Chris Gethard and the oxymoron of depressed comedians
People in Brazil who earn their living by collecting and sorting garbage and selling them for recycling Marcello Casal Jr./Agência Brasil
Lifestyle
Here are all your burning questions about recycling, answered
Protesters raise their fists during a rally
Health
What does racism do to your health?
The Ghostbusters in the lab.
Media
The real science in the new Ghostbusters
Difference in hue between arterial (brighter) and venous (darker) blood.
Medicine
Does human specimen research always need consent?
A screenshot of the Flyover Country app.
Science
An app that tells you what’s outside your plane window
Sunlight glints off of Titan’s northern seas in this near-infrared color mosaic from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft. Credits: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona/Univeristy of Idaho
Science
This is how radically unrecognizable life might be on other planets
Palm Springs resident Benito Almojuela takes a selfie near a thermometer sign which reads 125 degrees in Palm Springs, California, June 20, 2016.
Health
Will heat waves cause more deaths as the climate warms?
Astronaut Buzz Aldrin levels the Passive Seismic Experiments Package PSEP. Image taken at Tranquility Base during the Apollo 11 Mission. Credit: NASA
Science
Should we be protecting historic sites in space?
Cass Sunstein posing with Harvard students dressed as “Star Wars” characters after a lecture (Lorin Granger )
Books
Obama adviser: Why a Supreme Court decision is like ‘Star Wars’
The Three Soldiers – Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial in Washington DC, from Shutterstock
Health
What we know about how war wounds the brain
A nurse holding a syringe, from Shutterstock
Health
Zika vaccines are ready for testing
An artist’s rendering of Juno approaching Jupiter. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Science
Recent NASA discoveries are changing the way we think about our solar system
When news broke last September that NASA had detected liquid water on Mars, Germick knew the discovery had to be doodled, and fast. “I sent an email that morning to the team, and within 45 minutes, I had two proposals for how to celebrate the discovery,”
Culture
Here are the people who make Google Doodles
the Hubble Space Telescope Image of a Frontier Fields galaxy cluster, Abell 2744 (one of the deepest images taken of any cluster in the universe). Credit: ESA/Hubble, NASA, HST Frontier Fields and J. Lotz, M. Mountain, A. Koekemoer, and the HFF Team (ST
Science
These are some of the darkest mysteries of our universe
Hyperloop passenger transport capsule conceptual design sketch. Credit: Elon Musk
Technology
Once thought of as just a dream — is the hyperloop a real possibility?
Saah Exco was found alone on a beach in Monrovia, Liberia, naked and abandoned.
Media
Is the risk of photojournalism worth it?
A history enthusiast, dressed as a soldier, fights during the re-enactment of Napoleon's famous battle of Austerlitz.
Science
Chicken guns and other bizarre stories of the science of war
Bright Rust and Iron-oxidizing Bacteria (Ari Daniel)
Environment
A new way to clean the environment?
The Black Hills of South Dakota have a glut of mountain lions -- so some of the young males must leave the place of their birth. (Photo: Tambako the Jaguar, Flickr CC BY-ND 2.0)
Environment
The incredible journey of one 3-year-old mountain lion
Forest recovery was seen particularly in mountain regions, including the Min Mountains pictured here, and in areas that had previously been cut down by logging companies. (Photo: Andrés Viña)
Environment
What China’s successful reforestation program means for the rest of the world
Sea-level rise is a major threat to coastal parks including Everglades National Park (Photo: Erik Salard, Flickr CC BY-SA 2.0)
Environment
Climate change is a huge threat to our national parks
The raging wildfire
Environment
What can we do to protect against another Fort McMurray-like super fire?
Eleanor Lambert was a fun-loving publicist who helped create New York's fashion week
Culture
Beyond Paris: How New York Fashion Week created American style
Bumblebee showing the array of hairs on its body. Image courtesy of Gregory Sutton, Dom Clarke, Erica Morley, and Daniel Robert
Science
Flowers give off electrical signals to bees
An elephant feeding
Science
Inside the minds of zoo animals
A solar oven
Science
Try these backyard science projects with your kids this summer
Staphylococcus aureus
Health
Our options for fighting superbugs are dwindling
A seismologist poses for the media
Science
How your phone could help scientists detect and measure an earthquake
A musician in silhouette
Music
How we react to vocal fry in music depends on the gender of the singer
Smoking an e-cigarette. Credit: JohnWilliams/flickr/CC BY-NC 3.0 US
Health
What science says about e-cigarettes
There is marked cortical atrophy in Alzheimer's Disease, associated with loss of gyri and sulci in the temporal lobe and parietal lobe, and parts of the frontal cortex and cingulate gyrus.
Health
Could brain infection set the stage for Alzheimer’s?
Google’s new keyboard, Gboard, via Google
Technology
How much of your personal data do you give up when you use your smartphone?
A GPS satellite. Credit: United States Government
Technology
Did you know GPS used to be controversial? Here’s how it survived.
Richard Russo and Jenny Boylan (Elena Seibert/© 2012 Jennifer Finney Boylan )
Books
Writers Richard Russo and Jenny Boylan talk about friendship that has outlived a gender change
Sylvia Plath’s grave in West Yorkshire, England (Flickr/ UncleBucko )
Arts
There’s so much more to Sylvia Plath’s legacy than suicide and ‘The Bell Jar’
A fleet of RoboBees next to a penny. Credit: Kevin Ma and Pakpong Chirarattananon/Harvard University
Technology
Watch this video of tiny flying RoboBees in action
Rebecca Miller.
Media
Why Rebecca Miller thinks every director should have to do some acting
Since Kepler launched in 2009, 21 planets less than twice the size of Earth have been discovered in the habitable zones of their stars. The light and dark green shaded regions indicate the conservative and optimistic habitable zone.
Science
Confirmed: More planets are capable of hosting life than have ever been previously substantiated
A collection of morel mushrooms. Photo by Christie Taylor
Food
Want to try mushroom hunting? Here are a few tips from a pro.
A bee collects pollen from a flower in Prague.
Environment
Here’s why your new hobby should be bird watching or bee hunting
Fitness guru Jillian Michaels
Culture
What’s the best way to lose weight and keep it off?
rchers planted this camera trap (complete with robotic toy cat) in order to study what local species prey on cats. Here, a great horned owl takes the bait. The cat was found not far away, mostly intact, suggesting that the owl probably discovered the ruse
Environment
The secret life of animals, captured on camera
The Smart Tissue Autonomous Robot (STAR).
Medicine
Would you trust a robot to perform your surgery?
Artist's conception of GPS Block II-F satellite in Earth orbit.
Technology
Do we rely too much on GPS?
Daniela Mack and Matthew Worth as John and Jackie Kennedy in the new opera “JFK” (Nine Photography )
Arts
This opera explores JFK’s last night alive