Scientists in San Francisco have coaxed mouse hearts to repair themselves from within. The breakthrough could lead to treatments for the 5 million people in the United States living with a damaged heart.
Monarch Butterflies migrate from all over the western United States to overwinter along the California coast. Conservation Biologist Stu Weiss uses specialized photographic equipment to study what makes good Monarch overwintering habitat.
Kandis Elliot is on the Botany Department staff at the University of Wisconsin, but she's not a scientist or professor. Elliot is an artist and transforms mere photographs of plants into lush, painterly artworks that educate as well as captivate.
The USGS National Wildlife Health Center investigates animal die-offs and threats to endangered species through on-site investigation and necropsies--animal autopsy--at its headquarters in Madison, Wisconsin.
In 2006, the world learned that honeybees in America and Canada were dying in large numbers, and hives were becoming defunct. Five years later, what have scientists learned about the causes of Colony Collapse Disorder?
If you can't abide Brussels sprouts and broccoli, your genes may be to blame. Geneticist Danielle Reed of the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia studies differences in our perception of taste and smell. A small blip in DNA might determine if you're bitter blind or have a sweet tooth.
Biomedical researchers are investigating ways to 'grow' new skin in hopes that healing burns can be quicker, safer and more complete.
An exoskeleton suit may seem like science fiction, turning ordinary humans into super heroes, but wearable robots are moving forward into reality.
Mike Forsberg, a nationally renowned photographer, conservationist, and author from Nebraska, spent four years traveling 100,000 miles across the Great Plains—from North Dakota to Texas—to create a portrait of under-appreciated species and habitats of what many consider "flyover country."
For over one hundred and fifty years, scientists have captured images of celestial objects scattered across the night sky. The Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute in North Carolina is attempting to save those historical records before they vanish into a black hole.
QUEST travels to the Cleveland Museum of Natural History to meet Dr. Spurlock, an anatomist and forensic reconstruction artist who uses clay to re-construct the faces of ancient humans in order to show what they looked like when alive. She also sketches more recently deceased individuals using only their remains in order to help law enforcement solve crimes.
The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is hard at work on a $4.6 billion, decade-long construction project to overhaul the Hetch Hetchy water system, which delivers water from the Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite National Park and five local reservoirs to 2.5 million residents in the Bay Area.
Within and along the waters of Lake Erie (one of the five Great Lakes), there is a daily struggle for survival between natives and unwelcomed invasive species.
The invasive Asian carp has wreaked havoc in the Mississippi River system. The voracious plankton eaters have out-competed native fish and have become the dominant species in many locations. If the carp reach the Great Lakes, they pose a threat to its $7 billion fishery, so a battle against them is taking place on many fronts.
The art and science of salt glaze pottery requires skills and techniques acquired over generations of trial and error. Ben Owen III combines his family’s experiential knowledge of ceramics and additional scientific knowledge to create and improve his unique works of art.
In a dark lab at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, engineers and mathematicians are developing new burners and studying different flames in hopes of better understanding the power of fire and how to make the most efficient flame possible.
QUEST takes to the high seas with researcher Dirk Rosen to study the underwater world off the California coast. In recent years, the state has established a network of marine protected areas to help fragile habitats and struggling fish populations bounce back. But are they working?
Khalid Mosalam and his colleagues at the Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center's Shaking Table Laboratory are helping to make communities safer in an earthquake.
Experts warn that an offshore quake powerful enough to kill thousands and discharge a tsunami could hit the West Coast anytime. QUEST Northwest talks with geologists and seismologists about cutting edge research in earthquake prediction, and what it would look like if the next "Big One" hits close to home.
In California, more renewable energy comes from geothermal energy than solar and wind, combined. Today, a new technology known as Enhanced Geothermal Systems has the potential to extract even more heat and consequently energy to power steam turbines, but it's not without challenges.
"Ocean Babies on Acid" focuses on an experiment that Stephen Palumbi and UC Davis marine biologist Eric Sanford are doing to study the effects of ocean acidification on sea urchin larvae off the California and Oregon coasts.
Looking up at the jet stream, Ken Caldera, a climate scientist from the Carnegie Institution of Global Ecology at Stanford University says, "We find that there’s more than 100 times the power necessary to power civilization in these high altitude winds."
Scotts Valley photographer Bryant Austin swims eye-to-eye with the world's largest animals in order to bring attention to the plight of these intelligent ocean denizens.
Studying the effects of a concussion at its source, inside the brain, is no easy feat. Says Dr. Geoffrey Manley, Chief of Neurosurgery at San Francisco General Hospital, "What we’re dealing with is one of the most complicated injuries in the most complicated organ in the body."
How does San Francisco’s 600 tons of compostable waste become a nutrient-rich material that improves the quality of our local wines? Agronomist Bob Shaffer, Northern California's "compost guy," takes QUEST into the composting process.
The Salt Creek tiger beetle is one of the most endangered species in the United States, with only 200 to 500 beetles left. They're found only in a small saline wetland area just north of Lincoln, Nebraska. QUEST Nebraska reports.
Katie Colbert, a naturalist at the Sunol-Ohlone Regional Wilderness, shares with us how she tracked dozens of Nothern Pacific Rattlesnakes and what surprised her about their movements and behaviors.
Watch as thousands of prehistoric horseshoe crabs take over a beach in Delaware.
Every summer, 250,000 bats take up residence under a freeway bridge in California's Central Valley. And each night, they exit the bridge in a stunning ribbon-like formation.
One of the great things about my job is to be able to talk to some of the world's greatest and most charismatic scientists, like Professor Dan Costa of UC Santa Cruz.
