Science Times: Wastewater Disease Tracking, from Sewer to Lab

Plus: Forever Chemicals No More? —

View in browser|nytimes.com Continue reading the main story August 23, 2022 Jonah Markowitz for The New York Times Wastewater Disease Tracking: A Photographic Journey From the Sewer to the Lab Here's how a scrappy team of scientists, public health experts and plumbers is embracing wastewater surveillance as the future of disease tracking. By Aliza Aufrichtig, Emily Anthes and Jonah Markowitz Robert F. Bukaty/Associated Press The Juicy Secrets of Stars That Eat Their Planets As scientists study thousands of planets around the galaxy, they are learning more about worlds that get swallowed up by their stars. By Becky Ferreira Jana Shea/Alamy Matter Forever Chemicals No More? PFAS Are Destroyed With New Technique The harmful molecules are everywhere, but chemists have made progress in developing a method to break them down. By Carl Zimmer Mark Garlick/Science Source African Crater Adds an Asteroid Strike to the Late Dinosaur Era The impact that made the submarine depression probably occurred close to the dinosaur-ending Chicxulub event, but researchers say much remains to be learned. By Robin George Andrews Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT Email us Let us know how we're doing at sciencenewsletter@nytimes.com. Madoka Nakamura Do You Believe Scientists, or Your Dog's Crying Eyes? Researchers disagree about whether your best friend tears up more when it is reunited with you, but agree that the wet eyes of a pup make you want to care for it. By Elizabeth Landau J. J. Giraldo Trilobites The Megalodon Was Bigger, Faster and Even Hungrier A 3-D model developed by researchers suggests that the extinct megashark was fiercer than paleontologists previously imagined. By Asher Elbein Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters Scientists Boost Crop Performance by Engineering a Better Leaf Researchers increased yield in soy plants by making them better at photosynthesis, the process that powers life. The findings hold promise for feeding a warming world. By Raymond Zhong and Clare Toeniskoetter Amanda Henry How Chewing Shaped Human Evolution An experiment revealed that chomping on slightly tougher material requires markedly more energy. Spending less time on mastication may go hand in hand with human evolution. By Kate Golembiewski Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times In the Lanternfly War, Some Take the Bug's Side Even as the invasive pest spreads across 11 states and threatens agriculture, lanternflies are winning sympathizers who resist kill-on-sight orders. By Sarah Maslin Nir Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT CLIMATE CHANGE Anna Rose Layden for The New York Times Democrats Designed the Climate Law to Be a Game Changer. Here's How. In a first, the measure legally defines greenhouse gases as pollution. That'll make new regulations much tougher to challenge in court. By Lisa Friedman The New York Times Track Wildfires in the West Maps of wildfires and air quality in California, Oregon and the Western United States. By Matthew Bloch, Josh Williams, Rumsey Taylor, Tim Wallace, John-Michael Murphy and Tiff Fehr Subscribe Today We hope you've enjoyed this newsletter, which is made possible through subscriber support. Subscribe to The New York Times with this special offer. HEALTH A Teen's Journey Into the Internet's Darkness and Back Again As anxiety and depression soar among adolescents, researchers struggle to understand how exactly social media affects mental health. By Matt Richtel and Annie Flanagan Thoko Chikondi for The New York Times Global Health Polio Was Almost Eradicated. This Year It Staged a Comeback. Before its discovery in New York's wastewater, the virus made a series of ominous appearances around the world. By Apoorva Mandavilli Biophoto Associates/Science Source New Method Improves Speed and Cost of Birth Defect Testing If the technique is confirmed, women who have had miscarriages or those undergoing prenatal screening may no longer need to rely on centralized testing labs for results. By Gina Kolata Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times Walensky, Citing Botched Pandemic Response, Calls for C.D.C. Reorganization Among other flaws, public guidance during the coronavirus pandemic was "confusing and overwhelming," the agency said. By Sharon LaFraniere and Noah Weiland Jason Andrew for The New York Times Fauci Says He Will Step Down in December to Pursue His 'Next Chapter' Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, who has advised seven presidents and spent more than half a century at the National Institutes of Health, will leave government service by the end of the year. By Sheryl Gay Stolberg Continue reading the main story ADVERTISEMENT An Old Medicine Grows New Hair for Pennies a Day, Doctors Say Dermatologists who specialize in hair loss say that the key ingredient in a topical treatment worked even better when taken orally at a low dose. By Gina Kolata Pickleball, Sport of the Future Injury? It's all fun and games till you strain your Achilles' tendon, herniate a disc or do a face-plant in the Kitchen. By Matt Richtel A Repeat of Covid: Data Show Racial Disparities in Monkeypox Response New York City has released new data showing that Black men have received far fewer monkeypox vaccines than their share of the at-risk population. By Sharon Otterman, Joseph Goldstein and Liam Stack Raymond Damadian, Creator of the First M.R.I. Scanner, Dies at 86 Incensed when two others won the Nobel Prize for the science behind the invention, he took out a newspaper ad that called his exclusion a "shameful wrong that must be righted." 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