Science Friday Science Friday and WNYC Studios

Squid, octopuses, and cuttlefish use ink to confuse predators and to communicate. But there’s still a lot we don’t understand about inking.

Psychologist Dr. Lisa Damour helped make the film more scientifically accurate to how a teenager’s mind works.

A new study used machine learning to analyze elephant vocalizations and identified “contact rumbles” that appear to function as names. Also, on a hike in the Badlands, a family found a dinosaur bone sticking out of a rock. It joined the few teenage T. rex fossils ever discovered.

In her new book, science journalist Amorina Kingdon explores the astonishing variety of sound in the ocean, and how it affects ecosystems.

Plants called “hyperaccumulators” have evolved to absorb high levels of metals. Scientists want to harness them for greener metal mining. And, a little fern from New Caledonia is just a few inches tall, but its genome has 160.45 billion base pairs—50 times more DNA than a human.

A new book looks at the history of psychological warfare, its connections to science fiction, and how it’s been adapted to modern politics.