Butterfly brooch
The National Museum of Natural History’s gem collection has a new addition: the Cindy Chao Black Label Masterpiece Royal Butterfly Brooch. Created by Chao in 2009 and donated to the museum by the artist, the...
Science Spotlight
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Clean bill of health for cubs
Animal keeper Karen Abbott holds one of the National Zoological Park’s twin 8-week-old Andean bear cubs during its first veterinary exam. The cubs received a clean bill of health Feb. 20 from Zoo veterinarians during...
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Highly distorted supernova remnant seen by Chandra X-ray Observatory
New data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory suggest a highly distorted supernova remnant (shown here) may contain the most recent black hole formed in the Milky Way galaxy.
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Cats kill 2.4 billion birds annually
Domestic cats in the United States kill some 2.4 billion birds and 12.3 billion mammals each year, most of them native mammals like shrews, chipmunks and voles according to the New York Times in a...
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A wild giant panda from the Web site Smithsonian Wild
This image of a wild giant panda was taken by a trail camera in a remote forest in central China. As few as 1,600 giant pandas remain in China’s mountains. They live in broadleaf and...
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One in six stars has an Earth-sized planet
This artist’s illustration represents the variety of planets being detected by NASA’s Kepler spacecraft. A new analysis has determined the frequencies of planets of all sizes, from Earths up to gas giants. One in six...
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Western Mottled Owl
Scops mc callii, or the Western Mottled Owl, a color plate from The Birds of North America, the descriptions of species based chiefly on the collections of the Museum of the Smithsonian Institution, 1860 by...
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Tentacled snakes born at the National Zoo
The newest additions at the Reptile Discovery Center at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo are eight tentacled snakes, born Oct. 21 to parents that have not produced viable young in the past four years. Tentacled snakes are aquatic,...
