Go on the scene of day-long tours from the annual Society of Environmental Journalists’ conference, April 15-18, in Chicago. Contributing journalists provide the first round of tour coverage from a conference newsroom of early-career freelance journalists who joined the SEJournal team for live #SEJ2026 coverage.
"Some researchers hold that evolution hasn’t much altered humans in the past 10,000 years. A new analysis of ancient DNA indicates that natural selection continued to shape hundreds of genes."
"Florida’s fragile Everglades are not on track to meet a new water quality standard set to take effect next month, even after nearly 40 years of costly restoration work aimed at addressing pollution in the river of grass, according to a new report."
"In a quiet stretch of western Massachusetts stands a sycamore so old it was around when the Constitution was signed. It’s awe-inspiring, with branches bigger than the entire trunks of most trees. ... In the eastern United States, that rare sense of awe was once supplied in bulk by the American chestnut."
"Risks from cancer and other diseases could be hidden with little accountability if justices favor big firms, critics warn"
"The Trump administration is holding up some National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) grant funding."
"The long-running conflict in a formerly unified community, the second ever observed, adds to Jane Goodall’s studies about a different chimp war in the 1970s."
"In places like Indonesia, plastic refuse is often burned in unregulated low-tech furnaces that pose grave health risks."
"The Trump administration is tightening its grip over EPA’s scientific enterprise as it prepares to relocate employees from its once esteemed research arm."
