Gemma Conroy – Science journalist

Graveyards Are Surprising Hotspots for Biodiversity

Two weeks after the spring equinox, farmers in China’s Hebei province pay a visit to deceased loved ones in tiny graveyards among the vast wheat fields to mark Qingming Jie,…

Hakai Magazine

Can a Cold Water Bath Save the Great Barrier Reef?

In early 2020, Australia was in the grip of its second hottest summer on record. As catastrophic bush fires turned the sky black, sea temperatures on the Great Barrier Reef…

Nature Index

Rise of the zombie ants

When Jean-François Doherty first dipped into research papers on parasitic host-manipulation five years ago, he felt as though he was reading science fiction. The technical jargon was peppered with colourful…

Nature Index

Post-pandemic, fieldwork faces a remote future

When Richard Primack, a biologist at Boston University in Massachusetts, realised that many of his students would be unable to learn new fieldwork skills this year, he switched to teaching…

Nature Index

These two geochemists have one of the largest publishing networks in science

Geochemists Larry Edwards and Hai Cheng want to reconstruct the last half a million years on Earth in more detail than ever before. After a chance meeting at a lab…

Nature Index

This scientific ‘power couple’ has one of the largest publishing networks in biology

Structural biologists Jan Steyaert and Els Pardon have developed protein-imaging techniques using nanobodies. Biologists Jan Steyaert and Els Pardon are using miniature versions of antibodies – components of the immune…

Nature Index

These materials scientists are a ‘power couple’ in the physical sciences

Two decades ago, Takashi Taniguchi had one goal: to produce a flawless piece of cubic boron nitride (c-BN), an ultra-hard material with a similar crystal structure to diamond, so he…

Nature Index

Front line scientists call for mental health support in the wake of catastrophic ecosystem loss

When ecologist Daniella Teixeira visited her bushfire-ravaged study site on Kangaroo Island, South Australia in February this year, the scale of the damage hit her hard. Teixeira, an ecologist at…

Nature Index

Scientists reveal what they learnt from their biggest mistakes

Be it a botched experiment or a coding error, mistakes are easily made but harder to handle, particularly if they find their way into a published paper. Although retracting a…

Nature

‘Ecological grief’ grips scientists witnessing Great Barrier Reef’s decline

When Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, the world’s largest coral-reef system, was hit by record-breaking marine heat waves that bleached two-thirds of it in 2016 and 2017, many researchers were left…

Hakai Magazine

Overheated reefs are caught in a vicious carbon cycle

Ohad Peleg spent his childhood snorkeling among lush seaweed forests in the cool Mediterranean Sea off the Israeli coast. When he dives there today, though, he sees a barren seascape…

Audubon

Exotic parrot colonies are flourishing across the country

On a cold, windy day in Chicago eight years ago, Jennifer Uehling strolled through Hyde Park, a picturesque neighborhood known for its bookstores, museums, and grand historical homes. The scenery…

Smithsonian Magazine

Dinosaur bones shimmering with opal reveal a new species in Australia

Three decades ago, opal miner Bob Foster was getting frustrated while digging around in his mining field just outside of Lightning Ridge, a dust-swept town in outback New South Wales.…

Scientific American

Seabird poop speeds up coral growth

When marine biologist Candida Savage was collecting samples of nitrogen and other nutrients in the coastal waters of Fiji, she was jarred by what she found at one horseshoe-shaped coral…

Hakai Magazine

Stopping marine roadkill

When Vanessa Pirotta is surveying whales in the frigid water off Antarctica, the traffic-packed roads back home are far from her mind. “You see absolutely nothing out there at times,”…

Hakai Magazine

Seagrass safeguards human history

From storing carbon to guarding against ocean acidification, seagrass is fundamental to keeping ocean ecosystems in balance. But new research shows that seagrass meadows play another crucial, if overlooked, role:…

Scientific American

Warming waters could make sharks “right-handed”—and deadlier

Rising ocean temperatures and acidification are known to be altering the way fish grow and reproduce—and now research shows these climate change side-effects may also change how fish think and…

Hakai Magazine

150 years of shifting global fishing

For thousands of years, seafood has sustained communities, livelihoods, and economies across the world. In ancient Rome, wealthy entrepreneurs snapped up beachfront property and built elaborate fish farms. In 15th-century…

Hakai Magazine

We have unrealistic beauty standards for coral, too

Vibrant images of coral reefs are popular features in glossy travel magazines. This spiraling kaleidoscope of neon corals leads many to believe that “pretty” must also mean “healthy.” But according…