The largest environmental and public health disaster in American history isn't Three Mile Island or Love Canal. It's in Libby, Montana, where the effects of asbestos fibers are still being felt years after a mining operation was shut down.

Two UNLV professors say they were intimidated by state health officials who ordered them to keep quiet about evidence of a possible threat to public health.

Here’s a fish story for you: Five years ago, researchers at UNLV launched what they expected to be a simple, one-week study of the endangered Devil’s Hole pupfish. What they netted instead was a metabolic mystery that seems to defy the rules of biology.

In a large swath of desert near Boulder City, naturally occurring asbestos rests in the rocks and soil.

A new scientific paper published this week alleges that southern Nevadans are being exposed to unhealthy levels of asbestos and that people might be dying as a result.

Social media sites of late have been reading like an end-times sci-fi book with online users collectively wondering, “What’s with all the moths?” In fact, mention moths in a group and stories are likely to pour in. The only thing we’re missing here is the alarmist news broadcasts a la vintage pulp novels.

Dr. Frank van Breukelen is an Associate Professor in the School of Life Sciences at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He was invited to tell us about a new research project in this laboratory about some really cool mammals called tenrecs.

Once bathing in the waters of the southwestern United States, a fish, Cyprinodon macularius , found in the Death Valley basement, has surprisingly adapted after the drastic change in its aquatic environment. The adaptation of its metabolism to new conditions is an astonishing example of physiological plasticity.

Of course New York City needs the microbes in the soil and the roots from the trees and plants of the Catskill Mountains to clean up its drinking water.

Tiny pupfish have adapted their respiration to go without oxygen for long stretches.

The desert pupfish has evolved to go without oxygen for considerable periods of time to survive its harsh environment

And you thought you could hold your breath for a long time. Enter the desert pupfish, a tiny fish that has been playing evolutionary catch-up due to the extreme changes in its environment over the last 10,000 years.