Plus, why we blink; how some animals stress-eat; a supernova sky
|  | Wednesday, April 26, 2023 | | | | |
 | | PHOTOGRAPHS BY MIKE HETTWER | | With an explosion that dispersed 400 times more radioactive material into the atmosphere than in Hiroshima, the people fled.
But hundreds of dogs remained behind around the nuclear-contaminated Chernobyl plant.
What happened to them—and to following generations over the past 37 years? What can we learn about radiation from them (one pictured above)?
Read the surprising story here.
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 | | PHOTOGRAPH BY BRIAN FINKE, NAT GEO IMAGE COLLECTION | | | |
 | | PHOTOGRAPH BY ROBBIE GEORGE, NAT GEO IMAGE COLLECTION | |
It’s not good for animals, either: Loud, roaring military planes cause lizards to stress-eat. When sparrows feel threatened, they get anxious. The stress from being hunted takes a toll on female snowshoe hares’ (pictured above) physical condition, leading to weaker offspring. And some small freshwater fish experience generational trauma.
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 | | PHOTOGRAPH BY MARK THIESSEN | |
Precision training: Athletes are stronger, better, faster—and there’s reason for it: technology and smarts. The innovations are critical for people like professional ballet dancer Esmiana Jani (above), who must point her foot to its “absolute extreme while bearing weight,” Nat Geo reports. Science is helping create new training methods to achieve even greater performances.
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| Why we evolved to blink: About 375 million years ago, the first fish made their way out of the water and onto land—and suffered from chronic dry eye. Today, a new study reveals that fish have the muscles needed to blink: “That actually suggests that there’s really not that big of a hurdle in order for fishes to be able to see effectively on land,” Nat Geo reports. (Pictured above, an Atlantic mudskipper.)
Related: Do we hiccup because we were once fish?
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 | ILLUSTRATION BY ANDREW FAZEKAS
| | Supernova: Bright lights filled the sky for weeks in 1054. Nearly a millennium later we can see the remnants of that mighty supernova in the sky. On Sunday and Monday nights, look for Venus, wedged in between the horns of Taurus. Near one horn, the star Zeta Tau, you can see under high magnification the Crab Nebula. That tiny but distinct cloud represents the supernova’s remnants. — Andrew Fazekas
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