By Science News | Susan Milius | 3/23/2026 9:00 AM
Scientists tracked mantis strike force from youth to adulthood, showing females eventually hit far harder than males. Why is a mystery. ... Read full Story
Nearly one third of sharks studied near the Bahamas’ Eleuthera Island were found to have caffeine, painkillers and other drugs in their bloodstreams. ... Read full Story
By Science News | Elie Dolgin | 3/11/2026 12:00 PM
The Amazon molly reproduces without sex. A genomic copy-and-paste trick called gene conversion may explain how it avoids evolutionary meltdown. ... Read full Story
Submerged bees breathe and use strategies that don’t require oxygen, lab tests show. In nature, that trick could help the bees survive floods. ... Read full Story
As koalas in southern Australia have grown from a few hundred to almost half a million, the marsupials show signs of regaining lost genetic variation. ... Read full Story
The wood-feeding cockroach’s cannibalistic love bites lead to a lasting bond. Afterward, the pair prefer each other over all other roaches. ... Read full Story
Suitable milkweed habitat in Mexico may shift south, fracturing existing migration routes and possibly pushing some butterflies to stay put. ... Read full Story
By Science News | Jake Buehler | 2/25/2026 1:00 AM
Finding a caterpillar with rhythm was “mind-blowing,” suggesting it might be a more widespread part of animal communication than thought. ... Read full Story
Fecal analyses and necropsies suggest a fire-footed rope squirrel was the source of a 2023 mpox outbreak among sooty mangabeys in Côte d’Ivoire. ... Read full Story
By Science News | Emily Conover | 2/24/2026 11:00 AM
Rufus net-casting spiders can tune the stiffness and elasticity of their webs thanks to loops of silk, scanning electron microscope images reveal. ... Read full Story
By Science News | Jake Buehler | 2/18/2026 2:00 PM
Research reveals more short-snouted dogs besides pugs and bulldogs that struggle with breathing. Pekingese and Japanese Chins topped the study's list. ... Read full Story
Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for June 18, 2026 is:
acquiesce \ak-wee-ESS\ verb
To acquiesce to something is to accept it, agree with it, or allow it to happen by staying silent or by not arguing. Acquiesce is somewhat formal, and is often used with in or to.
// Eventually, the professor acquiesced to the students’ request to have the seminar’s final class be a potluck lunch.
“It may be just the right time for a chicken burger to become a significant stop on the American burger’s continual evolution—but whether beef-clinging purists will acquiesce to a poultry spin, or cry fowl, remains to be seen.” — Talib Visram, Slate, 6 Apr. 2026
Did you know?
If you’re looking to give your speech a gentle, formal flair, don’t give acquiesce the silent treatment. Essentially meaning “to comply quietly,” acquiesce has as its ultimate source the Latin verb quiēscere, “to be quiet.” (Quiet itself is also a close relation.) Quiēscere can also mean “to repose,” “to fall asleep,” or “to rest,” and when acquiesce arrived in English via French in the early 1600s, it did so with two senses: the familiar “to agree or comply” and the now-obsolete “to rest satisfied.” Herman Melville employed the former in Moby-Dick, when Ahab orders the “confounded” crew to change the Pequod’s course after a storm damages the compasses: “Meanwhile, whatever were his own secret thoughts, Starbuck said nothing, but quietly he issued all requisite orders; while Stubb and Flask—who in some small degree seemed then to be sharing his feelings—likewise unmurmuringly acquiesced.”