In Tulsa, Oklahoma, over the last 30 years, the number of cliff swallows killed by moving vehicles has drastically decreased. That change can't be accounted for by alterations in traffic patterns or swallow populations, say scientists. Instead, they think it's tied to the fact that the birds' wingspan is also decreasing. This adaptation — whether selected for by vehicular birdicide and/or other factors — helps swallows be more nimble in the air at high speeds, making it easier for them to avoid oncoming traffic. (EDIT: Sorry guys, I made an error here. Some of the researchers were from Tulsa, but study actually happened in Nebraska. Evolution takes place throughout the plains states.)
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5:11 am Wed
Mar 20, 2013
Evolution happens. Even in Oklahoma.
Alarming chart shows 140 years of country-level temperature anomalies
Antti Lipponen of the Finnish Meteorological Institute created this troubling but unsurprising chart of almost 140 years of temperature anomalies by country. The data used was from the NASA GISS, Land Ocean Temperature Index. You can probably guess what will happen.
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Tropical Storm Fay imaged by NASA's Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS)
NASA’s AIRS instrument captured this image of Tropical Storm Fay around 2 p.m. local time on July 10, 2020, as the storm swept through New England. Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech From NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory: Tropical Storm Fay is sweeping across New England, with the center of the storm making landfall about 10 miles (15 kilometers) north-northeast […]
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Watch how crowdsourced citizen data demonstrated how tornadoes form
The deadly 2013 El Reno tornado was 2.5 miles (4 km) wide and killed a team of tornado experts. But as Anton Seimon explains, his colleagues turned that tragedy into an opportunity to confirm a key element of tornado formation.
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This leather and stainless steel Active Strap is the band your Apple Watch never knew it needed
If there’s any knock on most smartwatches, up to and including the industry-leading Apple Watch, it’s probably that the bands aren’t…well, they aren’t usually the greatest. While Apple is certainly making strides in the watchband game, most models are just as black, boring and nondescript as you’d expect from a tech company. And where many […]
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Busuu can teach you your favorite foreign language and you’ll have worldwide help
For all their obvious similarities, language learning apps will often each take unique approaches to teaching a foreign tongue. Or, in the case of many services, a whole bunch of foreign tongues. While some providers give you access to training across overwhelming menus of more than 150 different languages, the people behind the Busuu Language […]
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Your home office could use some work of its own and these 20 items might just do the trick
Example no. 3,225 why the real world isn’t like The Brady Bunch: your home office. Mike Brady was able to turn his den into a truly groovy cool home office for his architectural work. Mike had a wife, six kids and a live-in maid, yet still had a spare room he could devote to his […]
