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Your Body's Real Age

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Human Vs. Horse Marathon

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VIDEO: To Save A Fox, Scientists Took To Land, Air And Sea

Ryan Kellman/Adam Cole/NPR's Skunk Bear

VIDEO: To Save A Fox, Scientists Took To Land, Air And Sea

December 4, 2018 • When the population of Channel Islands foxes started to vanish in the '90s, no one knew why. Bringing them back from near-extinction has meant unraveling a mystery that started with World War II.

This Rapper Tried To Use Neuroscience To Get Over Her Ex

NPR's Skunk Bear / Brain scan images are courtesy of Center for Magnetic Resonance Research at the University of Minnesota

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This Rapper Tried To Use Neuroscience To Get Over Her Ex

September 18, 2018 • Dessa is a singer and writer from Minneapolis who spent years trying to fall out of love and get over her ex. Nothing seemed to help — until she visited a research lab for a brain scan.

How To Find The Summer Constellations (360° Video)

Adam Cole/NPR's Skunk Bear

How To Find The Summer Constellations (360° Video)

June 26, 2018 • Have you ever wanted to casually point out Cygnus, Leo and Cassiopeia? Just in time for summer, this panoramic video shows you some tricks to help you navigate the night sky.

How Birds-To-Be Get Oxygen Inside Eggs

Adam Cole/NPR's Skunk Bear

How Birds-To-Be Get Oxygen Inside Eggs

April 17, 2018 • Unlike humans, bird embryos don't have an oxygen pipeline from their mothers. They develop inside eggs in a nest. Skunk Bear's latest video explains why these pre-hatchlings don't suffocate.

Classroom Skeleton: Whose Bones Are These?

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NPR Ed

Classroom Skeleton: Whose Bones Are These?

March 20, 2018 • Remember that skeleton hanging in the front of your classroom? In some schools, those were actual human remains. We used science to figure out the story behind one of them.

Classroom Skeleton: Whose Bones Are These?

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Why Dogs Have Floppy Ears: An Animated Tale

Adam Cole/NPR's Skunk Bear

Why Dogs Have Floppy Ears: An Animated Tale

January 30, 2018 • Why do dogs look different from wolves? The question bedeviled Charles Darwin. Now scientists have a fascinating theory that links droopy ears and splotchy coats with domestication.

Saturn's Strangest Sights, As Captured By A Doomed Spacecraft

Adam Cole/NASA/JPL

Saturn's Strangest Sights, As Captured By A Doomed Spacecraft

September 13, 2017 • NASA's Cassini spacecraft will crash into Saturn in a few hours, but we'll always have the shots it took of icy volcanoes, hexagonal storms, ethane lakes and ripples in Saturn's rings.

Make Your Own Eclipse Viewer

Watching the eclipse? Save your eyeballs — rig up a sweet viewing set-up with some help from this video. Ryan Kellman/NPR's Skunk Bear hide caption

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Ryan Kellman/NPR's Skunk Bear

Make Your Own Eclipse Viewer

August 17, 2017 • No eclipse glasses? No problem. Make your own solar viewer; (almost) no tools required.

How Eclipses Changed History

Eclipses aren't just natural marvels - they're still teaching us a lot about the universe. Adam Cole/NPR's Skunk Bear hide caption

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Adam Cole/NPR's Skunk Bear

How Eclipses Changed History

August 16, 2017 • Newton and Einstein had big ideas, but needed an eclipse to prove them. And scientists are still pursuing secrets of the universe one eclipse at a time.

What Are The Planet's Real 'Talking' Chimps And Gorillas Saying?

Adam Cole/NPR

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What Are The Planet's Real 'Talking' Chimps And Gorillas Saying?

July 25, 2017 • Movies are full of loquacious chimps, but could nonhuman apes really use language? NPR's Skunk Bear sorts through the disturbing history of research on ape language to sort fact from wishful thinking.

You're A Firework (Scientifically Speaking)

Adam Cole/NPR

You're A Firework (Scientifically Speaking)

July 3, 2017 • You have more in common with pyrotechnics than you might think. The same basic process that makes fireworks explode is happening inside your cells (in a slow-motion, controlled way) right now.

How Your Sandwich Changed The World

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The Salt

How Your Sandwich Changed The World

June 20, 2017 • What road did your lunch travel before it reached your plate? NPR's latest animated video follows a BLT from the fields where it began its journey.

Why It Might Not Be A Good Idea To Wipe Out Vampire Bats

Adam Cole/NPR's Skunk Bear

Goats and Soda

Why It Might Not Be A Good Idea To Wipe Out Vampire Bats

June 6, 2017 • They drink the blood of big animals and spread rabies. Cows die. People die. Ranchers want them killed off. But scientists say they form human-like friendships. Does that mean we should protect them?

Why It Might Not Be A Good Idea To Wipe Out Vampire Bats

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Travel To The Moon With David Bowie (360° Video)

Photo Illustration by NPR's Skunk Bear/David Bowie Image by Ron Fraizer

Travel To The Moon With David Bowie (360° Video)

January 10, 2017 • See panoramic views of a trip to the moon in Skunk Bear's latest video. It's a journey that spans David Bowie's long career — and his greatest hits serve as the soundtrack.

Why Does A Frozen Lake Sound Like A Star Wars Blaster?

Cory Williams/LiveEachDay

Why Does A Frozen Lake Sound Like A Star Wars Blaster?

December 21, 2016 • Visitors to icy lakes are sometimes treated to the sounds of a space age battle. Why? NPR's Skunk Bear takes on the cold case in their latest video.

Why Does A Frozen Lake Sound Like A Star Wars Blaster?

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Watch Earth's History Play Out On A Football Field

Maia Stern, Adam Cole/NPR

Watch Earth's History Play Out On A Football Field

November 22, 2016 • If our planet's 4.5 billion-year existence were laid out on a 100-yard timeline, when and where would humans first show up? Good question. NPR's Skunk Bear hits the gridiron for a reality check.

Watch Earth's History Play Out On A Football Field

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What's In It For The Corpse Flower To Smell Like Death?

Hundreds of people flocked to the United States Botanic Garden to see (and smell) a corpse flower in full bloom. Ryan Kellman/NPR hide caption

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Ryan Kellman/NPR

What's In It For The Corpse Flower To Smell Like Death?

October 25, 2016 • The corpse flower is a botanical rock star — prized by botanic gardens around the globe. In a new video, NPR's Skunk Bear explores the biology of the stinky giant, which thrives by playing dead.

We Followed A Snowy Owl From Maryland To Ontario

Adam Cole/NPR

We Followed A Snowy Owl From Maryland To Ontario

May 24, 2016 • In the spring of 2015, a snowy owl named Baltimore was fitted with a backpack GPS transmitter. The data that transmitter collected over the past year shines a light on a mysterious species.

The Hair-Raising Science Of Goose Bumps

NPR's Skunk Bear/Julien Bouglé

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The Hair-Raising Science Of Goose Bumps

October 30, 2015 • Skunk Bear's shivery new video explores how and why our skin acts so weird when we watch a scary movie, get cold or listen to music.

Here's How You Can Outrun A Horse

NPR's Skunk Bear

Shots - Health News

Here's How You Can Outrun A Horse

October 20, 2015 • Humans are pathetic at athletic feats compared to animals. We get outrun by ostriches and outswum by penguins. But human physiology makes us aces at one sport: endurance running. Sorry, horse.

12 Ancient Giants: An Ode To The Enormous And Extinct

Josephoartigasia was a cow-size rodent that lived 3 million years ago. Mary McLain/NPR's Skunk Bear hide caption

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Mary McLain/NPR's Skunk Bear

12 Ancient Giants: An Ode To The Enormous And Extinct

August 12, 2015 • A dragonfly with a 2-foot wingspan? A sloth the size of an elephant? Skunk Bear's latest video introduces the enormous, ancient relatives of modern animals — all in rhyming verse. Of course.

Make Lava, Not War

Adam Cole/NPR

Make Lava, Not War

June 25, 2015 • A sculptor and a geologist are melting hundreds of pounds of rock in a giant cauldron to create realistic lava flows. Cool! NPR reporter Adam Cole pays a visit to learn more about lava's allure.

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