Alaska, nicknamed “The Last Frontier,” is one of the most interesting, and paradoxical, US states. It’s the largest state by area, over twice the square mileage of Texas and four times that of California. And yet, it is less populous than Rhode Island. It has more coastline than all other states combined, with coasts facing the Arctic Ocean, Pacific Ocean, and Bering Sea, but the Nurdle Patrol map has never before displayed surveys from one of its beaches. However, there is someone in this sparse state who happens to know a lot about nurdles, and this year, he reached out to help the

Cotton producers in Texas, elsewhere in the US and around the world are looking for new varieties that can better withstand droughts, pests and pathogens, yet yield higher-quality fibers for the textile industry. To help accelerate the breeding and improvement of cotton varieties, researchers from The University of Texas at Austin and elsewhere teamed up to produce the reference-grade genomes of all five species, including two cultivated cottons. Their results were published in the journal Nature

As people across the world adapt to social distancing due to COVID-19, we are beginning to feel its full weight on our own lives and global health, made especially stressful by the fact that there is no definitive timeline or endpoint. It’s true that being restricted from spending