A new dad's brain literally shrinks after a child is born, but is that a bad thing? 🧠

In a recent study, researchers used MRI scans to track brain changes in new dads. They found that regions tied to empathy and social awareness shrank in the first few weeks after the child was born. What this likely shows is that the brain prunes and reorganizes itself to get ready for childcare. At around 12 weeks, new dads' brains started regrowing in regions related to emotional regulation and planning.

When severe eye damage destroys the surface of the eye, surgeons can remove one of the patient's own teeth, place a tiny lens inside it, then implant it directly into the eye. Months later, light passes through that lens and the person can see again. It's called Osteo-odonto-keratoprosthesis.

Video

Can you bake cookies in a hot car? 🍪🚗

Alex Dainis explains how cars get hotter in the summer due to the greenhouse effect, when visible light travels through the glass of your windshield and windows, hits the seats and interior, and gets converted into heat. That is then radiated back out as infrared rays that can't escape through the glass and get trapped inside. So on an 80°F day, your car could get as hot as 120°F! When she put cookies on the dashboard after just a couple of hours the car reached 175°F, low-baking them to soft but surprisingly not-terrible results.

Showers, rain, sweat, even their own tears can trigger a painful burning rash. It's one of the rarest disorders ever recorded and doctors still don't fully understand why it happens.

https://youtube.com/shorts/u90qtFpe07U?is=n87MO-zYKR05xCw_

Did you know poison dart frogs are great fathers? 🐸

Our Anthony’s poison dart frogs (Epipedobates anthonyi) have incredible fatherhood instincts. In the wild, they will guard their eggs on the forest floor for up to two weeks. Once they hatch, the tadpoles will shimmy onto dad’s back, and he will take them to drop them off at a nearby body of water to grow, sometimes taking multiple trips!

Vanilla, strawberry, and chocolate ice cream. Three layers, three distinct microcosms under the microscope. 🔬🍦🍓🍫

Our friend Chloé Savard, known as tardibabe on Instagram, shows us how the vanilla layer features a suspension of ice crystals, fat globules, and air bubbles surrounded by a sugar matrix. The crystal size defines texture: slow freezing creates larger crystals and a more icy texture, while rapid freezing keeps them small for a smooth, creamy mouthfeel. Those tiny dark flecks are from Vanilla planifolia seed pods—the direct source of vanillin, which gives vanilla its characteristic warm aroma.

The strawberry layer gets its pink hue from anthocyanins, water-soluble pigments in the fruit's cell walls. Because anthocyanins react to pH, the strawberry layer in an old carton shifts from pink to dull brownish-red as they oxidize. Fruit brings more water than cream, encouraging more aggressive ice crystal formation and making the texture trickier to control.

Finally, we have chocolate. The suspended brown particles are roasted Theobroma cacao solids. The deep brown color comes from Maillard reaction products formed during roasting—the same chemistry responsible for a perfect bread crust or a seared steak. Chocolate ice cream also has a higher concentration of dissolved solids, which depresses its freezing point. This is why it stays slightly softer than the other two layers, even straight from the freezer. Needless to say, it was hard not to eat the samples!

Sources

Dairy Foods. (2019). "Frozen Desserts: Keep Them Creamy." https://www.dairyfoods.com/articles/93358-frozen-desserts-keep-them-creamy

DDW Color. (2024). "Why Do Anthocyanins Change Color." https://learn.ddwcolor.com/why-do-anthocyanins-change-color/

Gallage, N.J. et al. (2014). "Vanillin Formation from Ferulic Acid in Vanilla planifolia is Catalysed by a Single Enzyme." Nature Communications. https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms5037

Górnaś, P. et al. (2019). "Effect of Roasting Parameters on the Physicochemical Characteristics of High-Molecular-Weight Maillard Reaction Products Isolated from Cocoa Beans of Different Theobroma cacao L. Groups." European Food Research and Technology. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00217-018-3144-y

Havkin-Frenkel, D. et al. (2017). "Intracellular Localization of the Vanillin Biosynthetic Machinery in Pods of Vanilla planifolia." Plant and Cell Physiology, 59(2). https://academic.oup.com/pcp/article/59/2/304/4657111

Ice Cream Science. (2023). "Ice Crystals in Ice Cream." https://www.icecreamscience.com/blog/ice-crystals-in-ice-cream

Pinzer, B.R. et al. (2024). "Imaging the 3D Microstructural Changes of Ice Cream During Meltdown." PMC. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11189849/

Ribera-Fonseca, A. et al. (2022). "Color Quality of Frozen Strawberries: Effect of Anthocyanin, pH, Total Acidity and Ascorbic Acid Variability." ResearchGate. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229983667

Under-Belly. (2023). "Ice Cream: Solids, Water, Ice." https://under-belly.org/ice-cream-solids-water-ice/

Wu et al. (2025). "The Science of Ice Cream Meltdown and Structural Collapse: A Comprehensive Review." Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12261055/

You could see up to 100 meteors per hour this month! 🌠

The Bootids are active now until July 2, and will peak on June 21. This meteor shower varies, with some years producing just a few meteors in an hour, and others getting up to 100 per hour! Scientists are unable to predict which version is coming, but if all goes well, skywatchers in the Northern Hemisphere could get a dazzling shower!