Science

The solitary bee’s knees

By Carmen Smoak | March 4

When you think of bees, what comes to mind? It might be the sweet taste of honey or an ever present buzzing next to your ear. It may even be the 2007 cinematic masterpiece, “Bee Movie.”

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Science

A new shield against bird flu

By Pia Sodhi | February 26

With the COVID-19 pandemic still fresh in the minds of many U.S. citizens, concerns over the government’s ability to contain emerging health threats persist. The ongoing struggle to control the H5N1 bird flu outbreak has raised alarms, particularly as the virus has begun spreading beyond poultry to cows and even humans. While the likelihood of a pandemic remains low, if one does occur, it could be as disruptive as 2020, if not worse.

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Science

Spotlight on the Scheck Lab

By Shoshana Daly | February 20

One of the first things that students learn when they enter a biology class is the central dogma: DNA → RNA → Proteins. Proteins are the workers of our cells. From signaling cascades to intracellular transport, from energy metabolism to DNA repair, proteins are behind it all. In most intro level biology courses, we learn simply: amino acids dictate a protein's structure and thus determine its function as a result. However, there is another piece to this story: namely, what happens to proteins after they are formed. Post-Translational modifications are chemical changes that can change a protein's function, inactivate it or activate it. 

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Science

The ‘quad-demic’ is in town: RSV, COVID-19, influenza and norovirus

By Shanzeh Haider | February 13

There’s a new term to describe the rise of respiratory illnesses this season: “quad-demic.” The “quad” in quad-demic refers to four diseases that are part of the outbreak: respiratory syncytial virus, COVID-19, influenza and norovirus. The suffix “-demic,” stemming from the word “epidemic,” signifies a large occurrence of a disease or illness in a community or specified area. Knowing pertinent information, keeping up with available data and learning how to prevent these illnesses are three key steps in managing and ending this quad-demic.

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Science

How to find a planet

By Carmen Smoak | February 3

Staring up at the night sky, you might see thousands of stars sprinkled above the horizon. It feels as though you can see so much of the universe beyond Earth; however, some of the most interesting aspects of space are hiding in the darkness between. Exoplanets, planets that exist outside of our solar system, can be discovered in the darkness if you know how to look.

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Science

As sea levels rise, our land sinks

By Grace Lee | January 15

From deadly, destructive fires in the West to major snowstorms across the Mid-Atlantic and South, extreme weather events have dominated these first few weeks of 2025. Among other causes, the influence of climate change in the uptick of such destructive events is a topic that has been spotlighted by many. Yet, climate change’s effects extend beyond immediate weather events into other harmful but perhaps less obvious phenomena. One such phenomenon is landsubsidence: the sinking of the ground as the materials below are disturbed. While a natural occurrence, subsidence has been exacerbated by heavy extraction of ground materials and other manmade causes.

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Science

Life in STEM: Tufts hires systems engineer Lauryn Spearing

By Makens Joseph | December 10

Assistant Professor Lauryn Spearing joined Tufts University’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering this semester. Spearing obtained her bachelor’s degree, master’s degree and doctorate degree in civil engineering from the University of Texas at Austin, and, she was an assistant professor at the University of Illinois Chicago before joining Tufts. The Daily sat down with Spearing to discuss her transition, research and goals.

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Science

Freshman flu and fall respiratory illnesses: What is in the air?

By Shanzeh Haider | November 6

With the beautiful colors on Prez Lawn and parties galore on weekends, we are in the peak of fall frenzy. However, with fall comes many respiratory illnesses and the continuation of the “freshman flu.” So, what actually is the freshman flu that is so often spoken about? The “freshman flu” is a common umbrella term used among university students to describe the variety of respiratory illnesses that first-year students contract during their first few months at college.

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Science

The 2024 Triple E Outbreak: All you need to know

By Shanzeh Haider | October 18

In August 2024, a man from Worcester County was infected with the Eastern equine encephalitis virus, the first human case in Massachusetts since 2020. The virus, also known as Triple E, can severely impair the human nervous system and cause illness, potentially proving fatal.

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Science

Mpox outbreak highlights the importance of information in medicine

By Jaiden Rodgers | September 3

Ten thousand doses of mpox vaccines arrived in Nigeria on Aug. 27, courtesy of the U.S. government, in response to the World Health Organization's Aug. 14 declaration of a public health emergency of international concern regarding an outbreak of a new strain of mpox in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

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Science

Meet Professor Shelly Peyton, incoming biomedical engineering chair

By Meg Radke | May 18

Professor Shelly Peyton will be joining the Tufts Department of Biomedical Engineering in July. The department was founded in 2002 and chaired by Professor David Kaplan. Kaplan stepped down in 2022, and Professor Sergio Fantini has served as the interim chair over the past two years until Peyton takes over. Last week, I was able to sit down and interview her about her background and her plans as the new chair.

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Science

Life in STEM: Mike Kourkoulakos on the Daily, future plans in biology

By Adi Raman | May 17

Mike Kourkoulakos has loved everything science and engineering-related from a young age, but it was during his sophomore year of high school when he really started to feel “connected to biology.”After taking two biology classes in high school, Kourkoulakos decided that biology was his calling and what he wanted to pursue in college.

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Science

Q&A: Diana Reiss decodes the dolphin Rosetta Stone

By Amelia Macapia | May 16

Although dolphins are recognized for their large brains and intricate social structures, the extent of their self-awareness was not widely acknowledged until Diana Reiss, a professor at the cognitive and comparative psychology program of The City University of New York, published her groundbreaking work. As a leading expert in dolphin communication and cognition, Reiss introduced innovative mirror self-recognition tests. By strategically marking dolphins in an area not visible to them, such as above their eyes, Reiss observed their reactions to seeing their reflections and playful investigations of marked body parts. These behaviors were traditionally associated only with humans and great apes, yet Reiss’ groundbreaking work revealed that dolphins also exhibit self-awareness.

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Science

Sounds of seagrass

By Amelia Macapia | April 29

Dr. Megan Ballard discusses listening to seagrass for studies on carbon sequestration and what we can learn about environmental change through underwater acoustics. 

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Science

Three dimensions of humpback whale communication

By Amelia Macapia | April 5

Amelia Macapia (AM): Whale songs can travel vast distances, and if they are using their songs to communicate with one another, they are not just doing so across space, but also across time. That concept flashed briefly in your documentary “Fathom.” I came across a recent quote in an article by Elizabeth Kolbert in The New Yorker, suggesting that a call “made by a humpback whale near Bermuda would take 20 min to reach a humpback whale swimming off the coast of Nova Scotia, and if the Canadian whale answered immediately, it would be 40 min before the Bermuda whale heard back.” So, are the whales receiving information from the past and present simultaneously? And how are they registering that?

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Science

Do whales think about tomorrow?

By Amelia Macapia | March 29

Editor’s Note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Amelia Macapia: Let’s start with whale culture. This isn’t a figure of speech but rather an observation that whales communicate. Now, maybe everyone thinks all animals communicate, but you mean something very specific. What is that?

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Science

Dr. Jan Pechenik discusses intertidal animals and changing tides

By Amelia Macapia | March 13

Humans are tampering with the selective forces acting on organisms all over the planet and accelerating the rates at which selection is occurring. Dr. Jan Pechenik, professor emeritus of marine biology at Tufts University, suspects that one group of organisms is going to outlast many others: intertidal marine animals. They endure extreme fluctuations in their environment, particularly temperature changes, better than many others.

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