A widespread loss of birds across North America has been detailed in a study published in Science. Researchers say nearly 3 billion individual birds, representing 29% of those in North America, have vanished since 1970.

A North Carolina high school opened a new 6,000-square-foot auto shop this year as part of a push to expand career and technical education in the district. Officials say it is part of a national trend of prioritizing career education to prepare students for in-demand careers.

Researchers extracted DNA from the finger bone of a Denisovan fossil and used the results to recreate the skeleton and create a portrait of what one of the early hominins might have looked like. "We just reconstruct the face of the human group, not of a specific individual," said Liran Carmel, author of a study on the process published in Cell.

Scientists on a backpacking trip along the Oregon-Idaho border stumbled upon some wolf droppings that contained recognizable parts of grasshoppers. "Why waste your time running down an elk calf or a cow elk that a lone wolf probably can't take down anyways, when you can just eat all these grasshoppers?" says study author Brandon Barton.

Enceladus may be spewing water into Saturn's orbit so that it showers neighboring moons with snow, causing them to shine, according to findings scheduled to be presented at the 2019 EPSC-DPS Joint Meeting this week. Researchers observed the brightness of Saturn's inner moons when they examined radar observations of Mimas, Enceladus and Tethys made by the Cassini spacecraft.

The otopetrin-1 proton channel is responsible for making mice sense sour tastes, according to a pair of studies, one published in Cell and the other published in Current Biology. "When something is acidic, it has a high concentration of protons, so it makes sense that a molecule like that could serve as a sensor for pH," said Emily Liman, an author of the findings published in Current Biology.

Researchers with Virginia Tech have received a $7.5 million grant from the Defense Department to study ways to reduce latency in the military's internet of things systems. Twenty-three other research teams will receive grants as part of a $162 million funding pool.

Middle- and high-school students in a Nebraska district recently learned about careers in construction at an event at Mid-Plains Community College. At the event, students learned about drywalling, roofing, welding, masonry and other skills.

High-schoolers in an Ohio district recently learned about careers in manufacturing during an expo hosted by Lorain County Community College and the Lorain County Manufacturing Sector Partnership. The event is aimed at introducing students to the field at a time when forecasts predict there will be a growing need for trained workers in manufacturing.

La Salle-Peru Township High School in Illinois is offering its first flight course, with 15 students currently enrolled. Students each will receive two hours of flight time.