LabX

Nothing is sitting as still as it looks.

Tiny relatives of complex cells are crawling across surfaces. Plankton are trading chemical warnings that may help predict toxic blooms. And satellites are revealing freshwater changes hidden inside a blurrier global picture.

Swipe through for three new findings about movement in places we usually can’t see—then tell us which one surprised you most.

Happy International Coffee Day! ☕🔬

Before you pour another cup, have you ever wondered how much science goes into making it taste the way it does?

Natasha, Matt, and Robin explore the chemistry of coffee in this episode of Chemists in the Kitchen — experimenting with grind size, filtration, aroma, and flavor to find out how different choices can change the coffee-drinking experience.

Turns out your nose may be doing more work than you think.

Grab a cup and watch the full episode: https://ow.ly/N92Y50ZSo4z

Life on Earth is connected in ways that don’t always make sense at first glance.

Why are elephants closely related to manatees? Why do falcons look like hawks even though they aren’t close relatives? How can one butterfly species turn out to be many?

Explore those questions and more with NAS member Doug Soltis in LabX’s Tree of Life series.

Watch the full playlist on YouTube:
https://ow.ly/oFOo50ZSoNE

Sometimes the smallest details change the whole story: a crease in a surface, the age mix hidden inside a statistic, or the speed at which a species must adapt.

This week’s Friday Findings brings together droplets with surprising navigation skills, a smoking statistic that needed a closer look, and albatrosses facing an evolutionary speed limit. Swipe through for three new findings from PNAS and PNAS Nexus, then tell us which one made you stop scrolling.

A cocktail that changes color right in front of you? Sounds like a job for some chemists. 🧪🍹

In this episode of Chemists in the Kitchen, our chemists experiment with color-changing cocktails and explore the chemistry responsible for what you see in the glass.

Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://ow.ly/pNAv50ZR867

What does Pokérus have to do with how diseases spread?

We teamed up with adef to investigate one of Pokémon’s strangest mechanics — and follow the question from the game into the science of infectiousness.

Watch the full LabX × adef video:
https://ow.ly/ouyl50ZQL1r

Science got delightfully specific this week. 🔬

A papal announcement gave collective enthusiasm a measurable half-life. Messenger RNA may have evolved ways to avoid becoming one giant molecular clump. And a pufferfish taste receptor is surprisingly relaxed about which way its amino acids are facing.

Swipe through for three new findings from PNAS and PNAS Nexus. Which one are you bringing up at dinner?

What do WWII sugar rationing, bacterial tails, and urinal splashback have in common?

They’re all in this week’s Friday Findings.

We’re looking at research on early-life sugar exposure and long-term health, a hidden vulnerability bacteria create while building flagella, and a PNAS Nexus study that used physics to design a much less splashy urinal.

Read this week’s stories and sign up for more: https://ow.ly/AV8T50ZLJpR