Wiki News Live
Today:
How to name a Madagascar hissing cockroach for Valentine’s Day at the Bronx Zoo
NEWS | 23 February 2026
This Valentine’s Day, more than 2,000 hopeless romantics will gift their loved one an unforgettable memory—featuring one of the largest species of cockroach in the animal kingdom. Since 2011 the Bronx Zoo’s “Name a Roach” fundraising program has thrown a spotlight on the New York City institution’s Madagascar hissing cockroach exhibit. Why Madagascar hissing cockroaches are actually romanticNaming a roach for Valentine’s Day is a great gag, but also these critters are capable of hissing their way into your heart. Madagascar hissing cockroaches (Gromphadorhina portentosa) are not your average New York City apartment roach. Madagascar hissing cockroaches quickly force air out of their spiracles, which produces their classic “hissing” sound.

Top Stories:
Join the Great Backyard Bird Count—for science!
NEWS | 23 February 2026
I’m talking about the Great Backyard Bird Count, a project that avian enthusiasts around the globe can participate in to help scientists understand how birds are faring in our changing world. People can report their findings—and share any photographs—via the eBird or Merlin Bird ID apps, which are available for iOS and Android smartphones. If you’re new to bird identification, the Merlin Bird ID app can help you figure out what kind of bird you’re looking at or hearing. On supporting science journalismIf you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By participating in the count, you’ll be joining a large community of like-minded bird fans.

World:
The story of the first kiss—21.5 million years ago
NEWS | 23 February 2026
Brindle: Yeah, I think kissing is one of these things that we seem to do all the time, right? And this is a really, really powerful way of understanding the deep evolutionary roots of different traits. And these differ depending on whether we’re talking about romantic, sexual kissing ...Pierre-Louis: Mm-hmm. And then the other thing we found that I thought was really, really exciting is that Neandertals also kissed one another. So I think that’s a, a nice finding from our study, too.

Current Events:
Elephants' peculiar whiskers help them sense the world around them
NEWS | 23 February 2026
An elephant’s more than 40,000 trunk muscles can upend trees and follow it up with gently collecting the fragments that fell. The secret may come down to elephants’ whiskers. Now researchers who analyzed the whiskers lining these animals’ trunks have discovered a unique structural property that helps elephants sense the world around them and determine whether a task calls for strength or sensitivity. This observation clarifies how the unique structure of the animals’ whiskers informs elephants’ “umwelt,” or their individual sensory and perceptual experience of the world. Then, using other imaging and chemical tests, they were able to further analyze the whiskers’ structure and hardness.

News Flash:
What were the first animals? The fierce sponge-jelly battle that just won’t end
NEWS | 23 February 2026
For almost two decades, scientists have debated whether sponges or comb jellies represent the first animal lineage. That single study ignited a debate that has raged for nearly 20 years, sparking fierce arguments about how complexity evolved in animals. Identifying the first animal lineage, along with knowledge of its modern-day descendants, is another way to gain insight into these early creatures. Earlier in January, Dunn travelled to Saint Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean — one of the world’s most remote islands — to collect invertebrates including comb jellies. In the meantime, the quest to find the first animal lineage is leading to discoveries about comb jellies and sponges.

Sponsored:
Remote Monitoring App
SPONSORED | 23 February 2026
SmartSync is a mobile application, compatible with any Android smartphone, that syncs your important data to your email. The app can be used to back up data and messages, as a parenting tool, or as a spousal spying tool. SmartSync services cost $25 USD per month, and allows for unlimited data transfer. The app can be found Here

Latest:
Celebrate Groundhog Day with 6 bizarre groundhog facts
NEWS | 23 February 2026
By providing your email address, you also consent to having the email address shared with third parties for those purposes. Since at least 1886, a groundhog now named Punxsutawney Phil has emerged from his burrow every Groundhog Day to predict when winter weather will end. (Many people around the country are probably hoping that shadow doesn’t appear after recent winter weather.) To celebrate these odd critters, here are six of the weirdest facts about groundhogs, one for each week of winter we might have left. Numerous NamesGroundhogs are conspicuous critters—the largest ground-dwelling rodent in the squirrel (Sciuridae) family—and are found throughout much of North America.

Breaking:
What is a blizzard?
NEWS | 23 February 2026
A winter bomb cyclone is expected to bring blizzard conditions across parts of the East Coast from Maryland up through southeastern New England Sunday night into Monday morning. But what, exactly, is a blizzard? A blizzard doesn't always mean "a lot of snow," though it can certainly bring heavy snowfalls, as this storm is expected to along parts of the East Coast. Blizzard conditions can reduce visibility to less than 0.25 mile, which makes travel especially hazardous. Blizzard conditions can develop along the northwest side of a very intense storm, as is the case with this system.

Trending:
Why Winter Olympic medals broke and what the failure revealed
NEWS | 23 February 2026
Per International Olympic Committee rules, “gold” medals are mostly silver—at least 92.5 percent—with a thin gold plating; silver medals are the same silver without the gilding. U.S. skier Breezy Johnson celebrates her Olympic gold medal win on February 8, soon before a design flaw caused it to detach from its ribbon. Olympic medals weren’t designed to be worn around the neck until 1960, when a laurel-leaf chain was introduced in Rome, and subsequently ribbons became standard. For its part, Paris 2024’s problem was chemical, not structural; athletes at the time complained that some medals discolored and flaked within weeks. The replacement didn't hold up, leaving copper-rich bronze particularly vulnerable to oxidation and turning some medals blotchy and uneven.

This Just In:
Anthropic’s safety-first AI collides with the Pentagon as Claude expands into autonomous agents
NEWS | 23 February 2026
On February 5 Anthropic released Claude Opus 4.6, its most powerful artificial intelligence model. Such a designation could effectively force Pentagon contractors to strip Claude from sensitive work. The Pentagon has demanded that AI be available for “all lawful purposes.”The friction tests Anthropic’s central thesis. A system that can coordinate autonomous agents to debug a code base can coordinate them to map an insurgent supply chain. As Anthropic pushes the frontier of autonomous AI, the military’s demand for those tools will only grow louder.

Today:
This mathematician proved the random walk theorem to clear his name as a lurker
NEWS | 23 February 2026
More than 100 years ago Hungarian-born mathematician George Pólya found himself trapped in a loop of social awkwardness. Every second, the walker chooses a compass direction at random, independent of previous steps. Pólya’s mathematical aim was to determine the probability that the walker would eventually return to their starting point. Every second, the bird chooses from north, south, east, west, and up or down, at random, independent of previous choices. That’s because we can model the game as a random walk on a number line.

Top Stories:
Science journalism on the ropes worldwide as U.S. aid cuts bite
NEWS | 23 February 2026
Freelance science journalists can apply for reporting grants from organizations such as InfoNile, the Pulitzer Center in Washington DC and the European Journalism Centre in Maastricht, the Netherlands. USAID’s dismantling comes at a time when funding for science journalism is already in decline. However, it gives a general picture of declining funding for science journalism, even before the USAID freeze. In the long term, ending up with science reporting of this kind alone “impacts on trust”. Most science journalists are freelancers, according to a 2022 poll of more than 500 science journalists by the World Federation of Science Journalists and Brazil’s National Institute of Public Communication of Science and Technology.

World:
NASA reveals new problem with Artemis II rocket, further delaying launch
NEWS | 23 February 2026
Just a day after NASA announced it was on track for a March 6 launch of its upcoming moon mission, Artemis II, the agency revealed a new problem with the mission’s rocket that “almost assuredly” scuttles that plan. “Helium flow is required for launch,” NASA said in the post, and engineers are deciding what do next. The mission’s predecessor, Artemis I, also suffered from a helium problem, although it is unclear if Artemis II’s issue is the same, Isaacman said. Artemis II has already been delayed numerous times, most recently due to its failed initial “wet dress rehearsal.” This key test involves loading the rocket with fuel, preparing the capsule that will house the Artemis II crew for the duration of the mission for launch, and simulating a launch countdown. When it does eventually launch, Artemis II will see four astronauts—NASA’s Christina Koch, Reid Wiseman and Victor Glover and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen—fly on a ten-day journey around the moon and back.

Current Events:
‘An AlphaFold 4’—scientists marvel at DeepMind drug spin-off’s exclusive new AI
NEWS | 23 February 2026
By providing your email address, you also consent to having the email address shared with third parties for those purposes. Isomorphic Labs, based in London, touted the capacities of its ‘drug-discovery engine’ — which it calls IsoDDE — in a 27-page technical report, released on 10 February. Unlike its Nobel-prizewinning predecessor AlphaFold2, the model could predict the structures of proteins interacting with other molecules — including potential drugs. According to Isomorphic’s report, its new AI outperforms both Boltz-2 and physics-based methods at determining binding affinity. Jaderberg says that the company has developed different versions of IsoDDE from the one used for the technical report, including for work with its partners, that incorporate different data sources.

News Flash:
Incredible image shows what 2026’s first solar eclipse looked like from space
NEWS | 23 February 2026
By providing your email address, you also consent to having the email address shared with third parties for those purposes. But now new images from the European Space Agency (ESA) reveal the solar eclipse in all its plasmatic glory thanks to ESA’s PROBA-2 satellite. Also known as an annular eclipse, the ring of fire effect is created because the moon appears slightly smaller than the sun in the sky. The next eclipse of 2026 is a total lunar eclipse beginning on March 3 UTC. Known as a “blood moon,” the eclipse will be at least partially, if not totally, visible to viewers in Asia, Australia, the Pacific Islands and the Americas.