By Matt Kaplan The world is split up into continents, there are seven in all. And if you get the gist, we’re going to make a list, From biggest to small … Your kids may have come home from school singing this infectious ditty, or another like it. But are there really seven continents? Anyone with a map can see that Asia and Europe are connected. They are often called Eurasia for that reason. The divide is pretty arbitrary, more culturally than scientifically defined. So, is i

By Asher Elbein A dog-size reptile slipped through fern-choked forests 237 million years ago in what is today Paraíso do Sul, Brazil. The animal had the body of a greyhound, a long neck and tail, and a small, nipping beak. Running on four, upright legs, the reptile looked remarkably like an early dinosaur. Yet it lived almost 10 million years before any other known dinosaurs. A study published last month in the journal Gondwana Research argues that this animal, Gondwanax para

By Alan Yuhas East of the town of Dos Lagunas, past the major highway cutting through Mexico’s south, the forest rises up in a dense wall of grasping roots, spindly branches and veils of brown and green. Beyond it lies the ruins of an old Maya city, barely a 15-minute walk from the busy roadway but until now unknown to archaeologists, its secrets cloaked over the centuries by unchecked foliage. “It’s humbling,” said Marcello Canuto, an archaeologist at Tulane University and o

By Knvul Sheikh A growing number of American adults have weakened immune systems, which can leave them vulnerable to severe illnesses....

By Jen Murphy We’ve all heard that sitting too long is bad for you. We’re not evolved to do it, it can undermine our exercise gains, it...

By Teddy Rosenbluth When scientists win the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine, they typically thank family and colleagues, maybe their universities or whoever funded their research. This year, as molecular biologist Gary Ruvkun accepted the most prestigious award of his career, he spent a few minutes lauding his experimental subject: a tiny worm named Caenorhabditis elegans, which he called “badass.” “No one ever thought to use that term for a worm,” he said during a news

By Louisa Kamps Susan Hirsch was visiting her father in the hospital where he was recuperating after a fall and was shocked to find him —...

By Alyssa Ages The first time I approached the weight room at my local gym, over a decade ago, I froze with fear in the doorway. The maze...

By Alan Yuhas Archaeologists in Peru have excavated a monumental chamber featuring elaborate murals of snakes, and a pillared hall with a worn throne, which they say bears clues suggesting a powerful woman ruled there more than 1,300 years ago. The site, Pañamarca, was a religious and political center for the ancient Moche culture, which flourished for centuries in northern Peru, building grand structures and irrigating deserts long before the Inca rose and conquered the Ande

By Nina Agrawal More than 1 in 3 adults in the United States has prediabetes, higher-than-normal blood sugar levels that can lead to...