April 17, 2025—We’re covering the rise in autism diagnoses, a growing threat to crops and efforts to re-introduce red wolves into the wild.
—Robin Lloyd, Contributing Editor |
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Autism rates are rising primarily due to broader diagnostic categories, better diagnosis and more widespread screening, reports freelance science journalist Stephanie Pappas. The risk of autism is largely inherited, and a set of genetic mutations can explain the condition in up to 40 percent of cases. Contrary to claims by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., environmental exposures are not the main factor driving the steady rise in diagnosis.
What the experts say: “This idea that there needs to be one single cause [of autism], and it needs to be really scary—it’s just really taking us backward,” says Annette Estes, director of the University of Washington Autism Center.
How it works: Criteria for U.S. psychiatric diagnoses changed in the 1980s. A person whose condition previously might have been labeled as “schizophrenic reaction” or “schizophrenia” was shifted to a diagnosis of “infantile autism.” And autism diagnostic symptoms also broadened to include communication and restrictions in activities. In 2013, Asperger’s disorder was subsumed into “autism spectrum disorder.” Standards also started to allow for a diagnosis of autism and ADHD in the same individual, so an ADHD diagnosis no longer precludes one of autism. The conditions often overlap.
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Parasitic mites from Asia that feast on developing bees spread last year to Europe and are threatening a collapse of honeybee populations and the crops that they pollinate worldwide, writes nonfiction author and journalist Hannah Nordhaus. The so-called tropilaelaps mites are certain to appear soon in the Americas, scientists say, putting at risk the abundant yields of more than 130 crops, including nuts, fruits, vegetables and alfalfa hay for cattle.
Why this matters: “Honeybees are essential agricultural workers,” Nordhaus writes. In the U.S., the apiculture industry raises honeybees and rents boxes of them to farms, trucking them from field to field to pollinate crops worth more than $15 billion annually. A pandemic in honeybee populations, already diminished by varroa mites, could cause staggering food shortages and devastate farms.
What the experts say: “The acceleration of the tropi mite’s spread has become so clear that no one can deny it’s gunning for us,” says ecologist and bee researcher Sammy Ramsey, currently at the University of Colorado Boulder. Fortunately, Ramsey and others are studying multiple tropi-mite detection and control techniques, including heat treatments and a caustic chemical, to fight the menace.
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Credits: Daniel P. Huffman; Source: Mallory Jordan and Stephanie Rogers, Auburn University. November 5, 2024, map hosted by Apiary Inspectors of America (reference); Data curated by: Rogan Tokach, Dan Aurell, Geoff Williams/Auburn University; Samantha Brunner/North Dakota Department of Agriculture; Natasha Garcia-Andersen/District of Columbia Department of Energy and the Environment
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