Several weeks after a series of wildfires blackened nearly 500 square miles in Southern California, a large winter storm rolled in from the Pacific. In most places the rainfall was welcomed and did not cause any major flooding...

The World Bank, which provides developing countries about US$60 billion a year in financial assistance, is officially phasing out its support for the oil and gas industries.

This move brings its actions more in sync with its overarching commitment...

“Rampant” and “elderly” are words rarely used in the same sentence, unless we are talking of the percentage of people over 65 years old worldwide. Life expectancy has considerably increased, but it is still unknown how many of those years are going to be lived in good health.

As a researcher of...

“The Disaster Artist” – which just earned James Franco a Golden Globe for his portrayal of director Tommy Wiseau – tells the story of the making of “The Room,” a film that’s been dubbed “the...

All across the U.S., rural communities’ residents are being left out of modern society and the 21st century economy. I’ve traveled to Kansas, Maine, Texas and other states studying internet access and...

According to a 2017 Pew Research Center poll, many people believe language is “the core of national identity.”

More than 70 percent of the population of the United States, Europe, Australia and Japan agree on this. And yet, as...

U.S. gross domestic product is at an all-time high. U.S. life expectancy is not.

Life expectancy has fallen for the second time in two years – from a high of 78.9 years in 2014 to 78.6 years in 2016. It fell for men and...

When “Fifty Shades Freed” opens in theaters on Feb. 9, fans will no doubt flock to see bad boy Christian Grey (played by Jamie Dornan) bested by naughty-but-nice heroine Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson).

A less racy but equally thrilling story, my research shows, is how romance writers are getting ahead in the digital era.

While...

Robotic movement can be awkward.

For us humans, a healthy brain handles all the minute details of bodily motion without demanding conscious attention. Not so for brainless robots – in fact, calculating robotic movement is its own scientific subfield.

My colleagues...

Scenic hill slopes can be inspiring – or deadly, as we are seeing after the disastrous debris flows that have ravaged the community of Montecito, California in the wake of heavy rains on Tuesday, Jan. 9,...